Home Entertainment Harrison Ford is ready to crack the whip again (just a little more gently now) in INDIANA JONES 5

Harrison Ford is ready to crack the whip again (just a little more gently now) in INDIANA JONES 5

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As soon as the credits rolled on the fourth Indiana Jones film, The Kingdom of the Crystal Skull, two things happened: the internet erupted into people shouting about nuked fridges, CGI gophers and Shia Lebeouf thinking he’s a monkey; and other people – including the film’s creators – began counting down to when the next movie will happen.

We’ve heard from Karen “Marion Ravenwood” Allen that the gang’s all ready and waiting to do another, as soon as they can work out a story, but how about the man himself? How does Harrison Ford feel about donning the hat and whip again? Well he feels old, that’s how. But that ain’t stopping him.

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Speaking to The Telegraph, the 71-year old Ford revealed that while his character may have some mileage on the clock, he’s still up for the challenge.

“We’ve seen the character develop and grow over a period of time and it’s perfectly appropriate and okay for him to come back again with a great movie around him where he doesn’t necessarily have to kick as much ass. To me, what was interesting about the character was that he prevailed, that he had courage, that he had wit, that he had intelligence, that he was frightened and that he still managed to survive. That I can do.”

And that I can get behind. In fact, that sums up just about everything I love about the character: his undeniable humanity.

Now, there’s no such thing as the perfect film, right? Wrong. It does exist and it’s called Raiders of the Lost Ark. Ever since my child-mind was blown away by that first whip-cracking adventure of the tomb raiding archaeologist who was afraid of snakes and got punched in the face better than anybody else, I’ve been rooting for him in every subsequent movie with a goofy grin on my face.

One superhuman, nuclear-explosion surviving, fridge escape later though, and that grin had faded a bit. Now while I don’t outright hate all of Kingdom of the Crystal Skull like some folks (there are in fact some parts that I really love), for the first time I was okay with there not being another film ever again. Especially since Allen and Steven Spielberg previously indicated that it was all up to George Lucas writing the script. The words “George Lucas writing the script” gets about the same response from me lately as having discovered that eating all that bran and dried fruit last night was not a good idea.

But now that Lucas has thrown in the flannel towel on filmmaking and Disney are the new paymasters of the Indiana Jones franchise, who is to say what could happen? Spielberg did a decent enough job directing KOTCS, and there were no serious faults with the actors’ performances (ok, maybe Cate Blanchett strayed a little too much into the cheese), but it was really Lucas’ script with its moments of severe retardation that sunk the film with hardcore fans.

Please note: I said hardcore fans. The general public flocked to the film, earning it nearly $800 million on a $185 million budget, and even critics viewed it more positively than some detractors would have you believe with 78% of reviewers on Rotten Tomatoes giving it a positive review, with a Metacritic score of 65/100.

Those are not the kind of numbers that Disney/Lucasfilm is likely to ignore, so I’d say that it’s more than likely that we’re going to see an Indiana Jones 5. The fact that Ford still has such a good grasp of the character and how he has organically changed over time is certainly a rather buoying sign for future endeavours. Now they just need to keep George Lucas as far away from it as possible.

Last Updated: August 8, 2013

4 Comments

  1. I like the idea. I liked Indy 4, though George Lucas should definitely never go near a script again. Indy 5 can only be an improvement. It doesn’t all have to be OTT.

    Reply

  2. Mook

    August 8, 2013 at 10:11

    Harrison needs to move on, maybe play Indie’s dad (like Sean did), he has the same problem Tom Cruise has (apart from the massive egos) they are too old to p[lay action hero’s – for frack sake – 71 years old! Harrison has only really had two good movie parts the early “Jones” movies and Mr. Solo.

    But unfortunately the box office (and other channel) sales mean that he wont go away soon, shame for the “Jones” franchise.

    Reply

    • TiMsTeR1033

      August 8, 2013 at 10:26

      I agree they should sack the old geezer already. Otherwise he will break a hip or something

      Reply

    • Tbone187

      August 8, 2013 at 16:56

      Air Force one was pretty good but yeah, I agree.

      Reply

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