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Gaf, In your opinion is The Last Crusade better than Raiders of the Lost Ark?

A

A Serious Man

Member
robotrock said:
There's a fourth movie with a lot of garbage if you haven't seen it. It's called "Kingdom of the Crystal Skull". IMO it's really not good.
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I've seen the Young Indiana Jones TV show too. I used the word franchise for a reason. I like The Last Crusade as a whole but that scene is offensively dumb and I consider it the original sin of a world that now produces entire films to explain how the Death Star plans got to Princess Leia or how the alien spaceship got to LV-426 or whatever other creatively bankrupt nostalgia-milking bullshit they churn out.
 
F

Fancy Clown

Member
A Serious Man said:
I've seen the Young Indiana Jones TV show too. I used the word franchise for a reason. I like The Last Crusade as a whole but that scene is offensively dumb and I consider it the original sin of a world that now produces entire films to explain how the Death Star plans got to Princess Leia or how the alien spaceship got to LV-426 or whatever other creatively bankrupt nostalgia-milking bullshit they churn out.
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I think if you take the opening scene of The Last Crusade completely literally then yeah, it's kind of dumb and way too cheeky. But for me it works in the context of the film as a whole since Last Crusade is all about myth, and that opening scene is sort of the mythologizing of Indiana Jones, presenting a truncated and stylized origin of the hero and his iconography. The same scene would play horribly in either of the other Indy movies, but within the narrative context of Crusade it pulls it off imo. Plus, action scenes on trains are great.
 
D

DiipuSurotu

Banned
Kinda off-topic but the fact that they never explored the character of Abner Ravenwood in the franchise was such a missed opportunity.

Apparently Abner was supposed to be the guy that gives Indy his hat in the opening scene of The Last Crusade, but they changed that in the final script. Maybe they thought it was one too many ticked box in the list of explained quirks for that scene...
 
E

Epcott

Member
Crystal Skull is better than anything? Yep, Gaf is certified crazy. The story is an absolute mess.

Raiders at the top, always. It's just so iconic and so damned good. Allen Quarterman, Ernest Evans, and Jack T. Colton agree.
 
S

StrangeRoboMemory

Member
Not even remotely. Last Crusade is a fun 80s adventure movie, but Raiders of the Lost Ark is a timeless, just about perfect film. Every note, every shot, every performance is totally on point.
 
T

Timeaisis

Member
No, but it's still very good. It's the Return of the Jedi of Indy movies.

And I love the opening sequence. I mean it's no Temple of Doom, but Young Indy fighting bad guys on a train is fun. Fwiw, I think Crusade is a funnier movie. I do enjoy the banter.
 
C

CyclopsRock

Member
Raiders is better. The Last Crusade is what makes everyone's eye-rolls about the aliens in Crystal Skull so absurd. That film - Crystal Skull - was terrible and the worst of the series for a hundred reasons, but the existence of aliens really can't be one when Crusades ends with a 700 year old ghost that talks to everyone whilst people wither to death from a magic cup.
 
Y

YuShtink

Member
Pezking said:
Raiders is the better movie, but I enjoy watching Crusade more.
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This basically sums up my feelings. Crusade is probably my "favorite" because of the chemistry between Ford and Connery and some of the fun moments, but Raiders is without a doubt the better crafted film.
 
W

Whoyouare

Member
No. Having watched all 3 movies recently crusade ranks last. It was a "buddy cop" movie. Something I never picked up on as a kid.
Also for what it's worth my kids found crusade boring compared to the other two.


Temple of doom is the best one followed by raiders.
 
B

Bits N Pieces

Member
Indiana Jones: It's disgraceful, you're old enough to be her... her grandfather.
Professor Henry Jones: Well, I'm as human as the next man.
Indiana Jones: Dad, I *was* the next man.
Professor Henry Jones: Oh... ships that pass in the night."
Click to expand...

Some amazing one liners in Crusade.
 
B

Beartruck

Member
CyclopsRock said:
Raiders is better. The Last Crusade is what makes everyone's eye-rolls about the aliens in Crystal Skull so absurd. That film - Crystal Skull - was terrible and the worst of the series for a hundred reasons, but the existence of aliens really can't be one when Crusades ends with a 700 year old ghost that talks to everyone whilst people wither to death from a magic cup.
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The reason aliens are terrible but magic cup ghosts aren't is because the Indy series was always about religion and mysticism. Sci fi and aliens in this setting are a little jarring.
 
M

MeatGrinder

Member
The last crusade has so many memorable moments !! Definitely the best film !

Crusade > Lost Ark > Doom > w/e4this

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46ea3f357acb798b6f1111038d3d081c.gif
 
V

VistraNorrez

Member
Raiders is far and away the best of the bunch. The others don't touch it. All the sequels, yes all 3 of them, aren't that different in quality. They get progressively worse I guess. Depending in your tolerance for racial stereotypes, enjoyment of Connery, and opinion on sci-fi in Indy.
 
V

VeryGooster

Banned
Like, I acknowledge Raiders' place in American filmmaking and it's probably the better paced film but I have a lot more fun watching Last Crusade. I think part of my preference is rooted in it being the first Indy movie I saw because I actually saw it in theaters.
 
P

PhoncipleBone

Banned
crimsondynamics said:
No, that's not the point.

The point is, I recall the movie as being all sorts of amazing; as I said, it's a landmark movie. However, like many things we have appreciated in the past, nostalgia plays a part in our perception.

Honestly, when I saw it last week, while I recognize the movie for what it is, it doesn't hold up as well nowadays as it did when I first saw it. It's like GoldenEye for the N64: When it came out it blew my mind, but not so much anymore.

As an aside, when was the last time you saw the movie, and has your perception of it changed from the first time you saw it?
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Growing up and seeing all of them in theaters, Crusade was my favorite, or the one I enjoyed watching the most.

However, as time has gone on and I have watched them all over and over again, my appreciation of Raiders has gone up while Crusade has diminished. Crusade is more fun, but Raiders is just a perfectly constructed film. It has this rawness and vitality that the sequels didn't have, and it all seems so effortless with how it is pulled off.

The only thing that Crusade has going for it over Raiders is Sean Connery, but outside of that, everything is stronger in Raiders. Better love interest. Better Macguffin. Better action sequences. Better score. Better cinematography.
All of those things just stand out more and more as I get older. That isn't nostalgia talking, it is looking at them both more critically.
 
T

TheXbox

Member
CyclopsRock said:
Raiders is better. The Last Crusade is what makes everyone's eye-rolls about the aliens in Crystal Skull so absurd. That film - Crystal Skull - was terrible and the worst of the series for a hundred reasons, but the existence of aliens really can't be one when Crusades ends with a 700 year old ghost that talks to everyone whilst people wither to death from a magic cup.
Click to expand...
One is fantasy. One is science fiction. One is established as early as the first film. The other is unprecedented. Absurdity isn't the issue with the football-head aliens (although Crystal Skull has its predecessors topped in that department by several orders of magnitude) - it's a genre switch, and people were uncomfortable with it.
 
L

Luigi87

Member
Crusade is probably my favourite, but I think Raiders is probably the better film.

I do believe Temple of Doom to be the worst of the four though.
 
F

Fancy Clown

Member
Moppeh said:
And we can all agree that Doom is a piece of shit, right?
Click to expand...

Wtf no. It's not better than Raiders but it does have:
-the best cinematography and set design
-the best music
-best Ford performance
-best setpieces overall
-that awesome lurid pulp horror tone
-great relationship between Shorty and Indy
-Mola Ram is a dope villain
-the opening is delightfully insane

It's just a hell of a good time. The script is not nearly as taut as Kasdan's Raiders screenplay though, which holds it back from being as good.
 
C

Chao

Member
Watched raiders the other day and let me tell you: it hasn’t aged all that well.

Found some parts of it pretty boring, the pacing is all over the place. I’ll need to rewatch the other two to see if they hold up
 
S

scamander

Banned
RotLA >> ToD >>>>>>>>> TLC > KotCS

Like many franchises, it got progressively worse with each film. Raiders is the only really good one of the bunch. The Last Crusade isn't that much better than Kingdom of the Crystal Skull. People have just more nostalgia for it.
 
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