Out in Right Field

Earlier this summer, I saw the newest installment in the Indiana Jones franchise, “Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull,” and was thoroughly disappointed.

Take a moment and consider the character played by John Hurt. You may remember him as Caligula from the “I, Claudius” series. He plays Professor Harold Oxley, and his acting talent is wasted in most of the picture in incoherent babbling. Even worse, the other characters equate his insane ramblings as wisdom. This is worse than the dystopia envisioned by Kurt Vonnegut in his short story, “Harrison Bergeron.” At least in that story, the leftists needed hundreds of constitutional amendments and numerous technological handicaps to enforce their rabid egalitarianism. In the Indiana Jones movie, the other characters simply consent to that equalization.

At the end of the movie, there is a scene with Indiana Jones and Marion Ravenwood tie the knot at the altar. This is totally out of character with the Indy we’ve grown to know and love in the previous three movies. There is no explanation given for this alteration. Just as Democrats from Jimmy Carter to Barack Obama are deluded into thinking terrorist sponsors like Syria and Iran will suddenly become cooperative and civilized with the appropriate amount of hand holding. We’re just as likely to see Kim Jong-Il cease claims that he aced five holes and finished thirty eight under par on the links.

This movie was a disappointment on multiple levels. It lacked the great stunt work of the previous chapters, and relied too heavily on computer generated imagery. The entire UFO plot line was threadbare and unconvincing. Worst of all, there were these none too subtle leftist underpinnings. My evening of escapism was stolen, instead, by an extended Mark Shields column.