Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull

I was pleasantly suprised when I went to see Indiana Jones and the Kindom of the Crystal Skull. The trailers didn't impress me much, the name sounded retarded and my dad found a reveiw mere hours before it came out saying "It's the Indiana Jones you were afraid of." Overall however, I liked it. I left the theater feeling joyful and hopeful, which is a feeling I haven't had coming out of a theater in a long time. The story was over the top, there were tons of special effects and it was two hours long but George Lucas and Stephen Spielberg managed to weave all the parts of the story together and make it all work.

The following may contain spoilers

The plot weaves together ancient Mayan culture and aliens with astonishing flair. It's believable enough to have a good time and I think that's what the movie was going for. Indiana Jones has a tendency to follow old Hollywood rules and guidelines. There's a good guy, a bad guy and the plucky determined hero will always save the day and his own hide (even if it's at the expense of reality).
This film follows that formula, as do all the others except in this film the bad guys aren't a hoard of savages or nazis, they're ...COMMIES! (though it should be noted that there is a sub plot wherein federal agents are giving Indiana Jones a hard time). The head of the communist agents is agent Irina Spalko, played masterfully by Cate Blanchett (including a superb accent that's different from stereotypical Russian accents in Hollywood). The Good guys are comprised of Indy, his old flame from the first film, Marion Ravenwood (though her last name is now Williams as she has married and been widowed since the first film), and "Mutt" Williams (Marion's son, played by Shia LaBeouf). They fight together as a family using their unique talents to take on the dastardly commies.
The first and third movies were based on Judeo-Christian beliefs, and the second was based around a purely fantastical "tribal" theme (the political correctness of this film has been disputed, not to mention the accuracy). The fourth film seems to take after the second film, but bases it on a real tribal culture and in a respectful fashion, such as gleaning information about the aliens from tribal paintings and the ingenious and technical traps that thwart our heros. It's still a moralizing tale though, as the alien's veiw of treasure is sharply different from that of some of the humans, and there are some severe lessons on greed.
The movie has all the action and wit of the first three films (including gruesome deaths yet bloodless bullet wounds), making the two hours fly by. Not to mention, there are several inside jokes and allusions to the previous films, so there's plenty there for old Indiana Jones fans. There's also plenty of new things for Indiana Jones fans, such as the improved special effects, a solid and original plot, and just the right amount of exposition to introduce newbies to the franchise. All in all I thought it was an enjoyable movie, and left the theater in higher spirits than when I entered. Sometimes there's nothing better than an old-school style movie where good always overcomes evil and imagination and adventure are unlimited.