Indiana Jones and Prince Caspian

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I’ve seen several reviews of Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull and The Chronicles of Narnia: Prince Caspian. I saw the movies this week and last, and I wanted to put in my two cents.

Kingdom of the Crystal Skull was a good movie. It was actually my favorite of the Indiana Jones series. The main reason was the image of the hero and heroine. Indiana Jones is a grey-haired, glasses wearing main character who is past his physical prime. The heroine from the first movie in the series returns. She is a wrinkled, slightly overweight, but singularly passionate character. These two are refreshing in the days of Hollywood’s plastic-surgery-enhanced Barbie-doll-look-alikes. The action stretched believability at several points (see review here), but it didn’t take away from the characterization that made the movie stand out.

Prince Caspian let me down. There was nothing wrong with the movie, but many of the best scenes from the book were stripped of their distinctly Christian elements (see reviews here and here). The book, as the weakest in the Chronicles, needed a little fleshing out. That was done well, but it still suffered from the missing Christian overtones. (See a more favorable review here.)

Lastly, I liked Ironman better than I liked both of these shows. Marvel comics often, if not always, blends in a moral component similar to the Westerns of old. It seems better form to make the messages more subtle.

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