Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull: The Abridged Script
By: Rod Hilton on Jun 17th, 2008 | Movie Rating: 
Shia comes face-to-face with his career in 10 years.
FADE IN:
EXT. NEVADA DESERT
PRODUCER FRANK MARSHALL immediately proves his commitment to using CGI “only when necessary” by featuring completely necessary CGI prairie dogs in the first shot of the movie.
A bunch of cars drive through the DESERT to AREA 51. HARRISON FORD’S SHADOW, then HARRISON FORD’S SHOE, then HARRISON FORD’S ARM, then HARRISON FORD’S HAT and finally HARRISON FUCKING FORD are eventually revealed.
HARRISON FORD
Alright folks, let’s get this show on the road. I want to make it to Country Buffet by four.
CATE BLANCHETT
Pryvet, Harrison. I am evil Soviet. You vill help me find Moose and Squirrel, yes?
HARRISON FORD
Holy Christ, you’re not going to talk like that the whole movie are you?
CATE BLANCHETT
Da. You vill help locate MacKuffin now.
HARRISON FORD
Fine. The thing you’re looking for is super magnetic, so if we just throw this gunpowder into the air it will lead us to the MacGuffin.
RAY WINSTONE
Nineteen years to write this movie and that’s how it’s going to start? Really? I think I’m going to write myself out of this movie as much as possible by revealing myself to be a double agent.
RAY turns on HARRISON. CATE escapes with the MACGUFFIN and HARRISON gets away, only to find himself in the middle of a NUCLEAR TEST SITE that is apparently located within walking distance of AREA 51.
HARRISON FORD
Holy shit, a nuclear bomb! I’ll hide in this lead-lined fridge to protect myself from the radiation that will permeate the area shortly after the ten-million degree heat generated by the blast is done obliterating every single object in a 5 mile radius!
Somehow, this WORKS. HARRISON FORD emerges from the fridge with his face covered in black soot, holding a sign that reads “ouch.”
INT. MARSHALL COLLEGE
HARRISON teaches his film class entitled “How To Ruin Millions Of Childhoods In 2 Hours” when he is interrupted by the DEAN, JIM BROADBENT.
JIM BROADBENT
Sorry Harrison, I have to let you go. The government thinks you might be a Soviet. Apparently someone rented “K-19: The Widowmaker” and panicked.
HARRISON FORD
Bullshit, nobody saw that movie.
HARRISON packs up props from the prior films, but is interrupted by SHIA LABEOUF.
SHIA LABEOUF
Hey, my mother and John Hurt have been kidnapped. My mom said you’d help me because every great adventure film needs an insufferable douchebag sidekick.
HARRISON FORD
Your mom knew me? Well it seems painfully obvious that you’re going to turn out to be my son, then.
SHIA LABEOUF
And yet, that’s going to be mentioned later in the movie as though it’s some kind of shocking revelation.
Suddenly, more CARTOONY SOVIETS show up and try to kidnap SHIA and HARRISON.
SHIA LABEOUF
Shit, they have guns. What do we do?
HARRISON FORD
Just wait until the movie gets re-released in a few years and they’ll be replaced with walkie-talkies.
SHIA and HARRISON escape on a motorcycle. Crazy stunts are performed in order to evade the SOVIETS.
SHIA LABEOUF
Are we really expecting audiences to put up with this? We’re violating like ten thousand laws of physics here.
HARRISON FORD
Are you joking, kid? That makes this the most realistic action scene in the movie.
EXT. SOUTH AMERICA
SHIA and HARRISON go to SOUTH AMERICA to look for the next CLUE. SHIA flips his knife around in his hand trying to look badass, but actually grabs it by the blade. Twice. Seriously.
HARRISON FORD
Alright, the walkthrough for the movie says that our next clue is in a spooky graveyard. We should probably save our game here.
SHIA LABEOUF
Pick up MAP. Use MAP on HARRISON FORD. Walk To TOMB.
They travel to an underground tomb and find a CRYSTAL MACGUFFIN using its super-powerful magnetic properties.
SHIA LABEOUF
That crystal skull looks like an alien head. And the Soviets were looking for an alien corpse stored in Area 51. Golly, there sure is a lot of alien stuff.
HARRISON FORD
If you’re trying to mentally ready the audience for the ending, don’t bother. I’ve read through the script, nothing can prepare moviegoers for what happens at the end.
Suddenly, SOVIETS show up and kidnap SHIA and HARRISON. They bring them back to their camp, where HARRISON finds JOHN HURT and KAREN ALLEN. CATE BLANCHETT embarrasses herself some more and eventually they all travel into the AMAZON FOREST.
HARRISON FORD
What are we doing in the Amazon?
KAREN ALLEN
Cate wants to return the Crystal MacGuffin to the ancient City of Gold.
HARRISON FORD
City of Gold? Isn’t that what Nicolas Cage was looking for in National Treasure 2? Are we seriously getting the plot for our shitty sequel to Indiana Jones by ripping off the plot of a shitty sequel to a shitty knock-off of Indiana Jones? I feel like that should unravel the space-time continuum or something.
A caravan of vehicles, led by a giant tree-cutting machine, travels deep into the AMAZON FOREST. HARRISON uses a CHEAT CODE to spawn a ROCKET LAUNCHER, then uses it to blow up the tree-cutting machine.
SHIA LABEOUF
I’m pretty sure the audience came here to see more Shia LaBeouf, so I’m going to fence Cate Blanchett in front of an obvious green screen.
HARRISON FORD
Wait, what are they chasing us through? Are there roads in the middle of the jungle? Why the hell did we bother showing that tree-cutting thing if we were just going to contradict the very thing it was trying to establish?
KAREN ALLEN
That’s what’s so great about this movie - we can just do whatever the hell we want, because even glaringly obvious flaws like that are dwarfed by the sheer magnitude of failure that is the rest of the movie.
To illustrate this, SHIA LEBEOUF flies up into the FUCKING JUNGLE and swings like FUCKING TARZAN along the FUCKING VINES with a FUCKING ARMY of CGI FUCKING MONKEYS. That actually FUCKING HAPPENS.
Everyone eventually winds up in the CITY OF GOLD.
INT. CITY OF GOLD
HARRISON solves a few simple puzzles and gains access to the CITY. Some natives show up and attack, but are quickly dispatched, making the AUDIENCE wonder why they were introduced at all.
HARRISON FORD
Alright, the aliens or whatever want me to return the crystal to some ridiculous alien throne room.
CATE BLANCHETT
Not zo fast. I vill return skull instead.
HARRISON FORD
Shouldn’t it have been taken as an indicator of a writing problem when the good guy and the bad guy in a movie have the exact same goal?
CATE takes the skull and places it on a THRONE. It then turns into an ACTUAL ALIEN and makes her head explode. The ALIENS pile into a GIANT UFO and fly off into SPACE.
HARRISON FORD
Wow. Considering that the first movie revolved around a magical box made by God that melts faces when opened, it’s really astonishing that this movie managed to be so incredibly stupid by comparison.
JOHN HURT
I can’t believe that the crystal skull wanted you to return it to the city just so that aliens could have blown your head up. Those aliens are total assholes.
SHIA LABEOUF
Seriously, what kind of jerks would intentionally trick people into thinking they were going to get something awesome, but then give them something so awful it makes their brains melt instead?
GEORGE LUCAS AND STEVEN SPIELBERG
Rich jerks! Bwa-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha!
END
Loved the “walkie-talkies” reference.
June 18th, 2008 at 8:18 pmRod must’ve run out of space so he couldn’t mention the killer ants that can outrun an adult human.
Or Ray Winstone’s pointless character switching sides three times.
Or the fact that Karen Allen’s character was:
1. Abandoned by Indiana
2. Just before their wedding date
3. And she was pregnant
4. And he never contacted her
5. For 20 years
….and she IMMEDIATELY FORGIVES HIM. And then they get MARRIED.
That shit was pathetic. I walked out of the theater with a strong desire to buy Raiders and Crusade - which, I suspect, was the reasoning behind making Crystal Skull all along.
June 18th, 2008 at 8:22 pmWoah woah woah people. Hate all you want on this movie, but do not touch Temple of Doom. That is not even close to being as bad as everyone says it is. It is funny, action packed, and most of all, exciting. Which is more that you can say for this one and Last Crusade a.k.a. same exact movie as Raiders but with a different item and a pathetic villain with the stereotypically Spielbergian estranged father subplot shoe-horned in.
Willy is the perfect foil to Indy; whiney, annoying, and bitchy to compliment his exactly opposite attitude. It’s funny to watch them be in the same situation and have drastically different responses. While I love Marion and think she’s perfect for Indy, I thought it was nice to have a character who was stubbornly opposed to having the same sense of adventure as Indy.
June 18th, 2008 at 9:12 pm[...] battle of the hilarious summer movie synopsis has begun! i can’t decide which is funnier: the abridged script of indy4 or this review of the hulk… by the hulk. (warning, [...]
June 18th, 2008 at 9:23 pmThat was rather funny, good job!
June 18th, 2008 at 10:13 pm[...] folks, let’s get this show on the road. I want to make it to Country Buffet by four. Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull: The Abridged Script [probably contains spoilers] Read More…. @ [...]
June 18th, 2008 at 10:20 pmI will defend Temple of Doom with my dying breath.
Temple of Doom>>>Crusade
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June 18th, 2008 at 10:51 pmMy kids just watched the 1st and 3rd of the franchise. They’re 13 and they loved them. I was holding back 2 and Skull, but I’m thinking now that they’ll enjoy both. They’re 13, in the important target group.
I also believe there must be better story ideas out there. What say with home pc power somebody builds a better Indy? There must be worse hobbies.
This kid’s U-tube Ford gets my appreciation.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bba_wPdLxp4
June 18th, 2008 at 11:29 pm======================================
Movies are supposed to be entertainment and we are so saturated by rapid images and instant gratification that you can’t even enjoy a good romp through a character that many of us grew up with.
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But this movie is exactly the kind of “rapid images and instant gratification” you speak of. It’s very much the problem. Nostalgia is not a strong enough premise for blind enjoyment, sorry.
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Why don’t you invest some of that high powered observation and write something completely original instead of bitching about other peoples work.
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Practice what you preach.
June 18th, 2008 at 11:49 pmvery funny and true. The Phantom Menace made me feel like I had been raped but Indiana Jones 4 made me feel as if I had been raped with a CGI groundhog.
June 19th, 2008 at 1:30 am