Went to see the new INDIANA JONES with oldest son Julius (12) yesterday in new favourite cinema Falkoner Bio at Frederiksberg.

You can say many things about the movie, but Spielberg definetly havnt lost touch, and the beginning of the movie where you are more less dumped into a hotrod on a carchase in Nevada, near Area 51 (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Area_51), 1957, is a fat reminder of what context to see the flick: Pure entertainment.

The storyline is as in the other three IJ movies ofcourse of importancte but generally you could say that they are also the hardest to remember as they overlab a lot. But still, what distracts from this fact - to me - is how Spielberg squeeze in numerous historic details and references; in this here movie: a neonsign For Atomic Cafe in Nevada, references to Area 51 and Roswell conspiracies, The myth of Eldorado etc.
And even though the nazis are out of this movie, in comes a new enemy, a cartoonish funny portrait of the KGB and partly the FBI, so we have ourselves some narrative coldwar framework, that however do not as such have an influential role: It is as always with IJ: A very clean fight between good guys and bad guys.
In spite of the almost infantile and superficial layout of the movie, it runs smootly for 88 minutes: Good and constant laughs, spookyness, fights, very controlled sexual references. In the words of danish senior-rockers DAD: Good clean family entertainment you can trust.

It doesnt loose speed, it just layers up to the grande finale, which I think in a way is a hommage to the man. Stephen Spielberg, himself. I wont go into details by giving away the end, but it does draws a circle for his collective work in movie production.
From here hollers a enthusiastic recommandation. 5 of 6 stars *****


The whole design and to some degree the mindframe of the film also reminds me of magazines that started being published during, and especially after the second world war, particuarly in th US: Magazines like Man`s Story, Champion of Men, Mystrery Tales, True, Stag, Male: Magazines that all were frontrunners for Playboy magazine and others. Before Hugh Hefner, theres was one Berhard Macfadden to kick of the industry: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bernarr_McFadden
The magazines were mostly men accounts of figthing in strange battles in strange places with strange peolple and animals, and was to some extend a result of the fact that the US governmant censored any critic journalism regarding the atrocities of WWll. Therefore a brand new market opened to magazines who spun out horrid and famtastic tales of naziterror and US heroism.

That is a long story, and I recommend reading for example: "Mens Adventure" by Max Allan Collins (out on http://www.taschen.com/). Not only is it a informative corner of history, its also a marvellous account of fantastic potent illustrations, by for example an artist like Norman Saunders: http://victorian.fortunecity.com/summit/501/pulpgall.htm