Starring: Harrison Ford, Karen Allen, Denholm Elliott, Jonathan Rhys-Meyers, Paul Freeman, Ronald Lacey, Jonathan Ke Quan, Kate Capshaw, Amrish Puri, Sean Connery, Julian Glover, Alison Doody, River Phoenix, Michael Byrne, John Hurt, Ray Winstone, Shia LaBeouf
Written By: George Lucas, Lawrence Kasdan, Philip Kaufman, Willard Huyck, Gloria Katz, Jeffrey Boam, Tom Stoppard, Menno Meyjes, David Koepp, Jeff Nathanson
Directed By: Steven Spielberg
Studio: Paramount
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Indiana Jones gets the same Blu-Ray treatment as Star Wars did last fall and I’m a happy fan! Well, they could have left off the 4th movie and I’d still be happy. If you own the DVDs, be sure to sell those because this is worth the upgrade!

I won’t go into detail about the plots of these 4 movies because most of the people reading this already know. Raiders of the Lost Ark is still considered the favorite out of the 4 movies. While it’s an excellent classic, I always liked The Last Crusade the best. Temple of Doom I like as well, but it’s a bit dark at times. Raiders of the Lost Ark started things off, establishing the character and Indy’s always been the best at battling Nazis. Temple of Doom takes places before Raiders I believe, which is kind of odd for sequel that’s really a prequel. Raiders doesn’t really have the fun moments as the other movies have. Temple of Doom started off the comedic elements of the series. Having a funny Asian kid sidekick for Indiana worked out really well I thought. The dinner scene inside the palace serving fried monkey brains, and snakes is disgusting was really funny. The airplane raft scene was funny too. I always crack up at the scene where Short Round and Indy are close to death in that small room with the spears. That scene is classic Indiana Jones to me. Intense, action-packed, somewhat light-hearted, and very funny. But the dark moments is what people tend not to like about Temple. The Kali Ma stuff is so iconic and memorable to me. I absolutely LOVE the ending Temple where he’s on the bridge and cuts it down. Truly Indiana Jones most badass moment of all-time!

I think the Last Crusades combines the action-packed-ness of Raiders, the dark of Temple of Doom and brings it all together for The Last Crusade. It’s just something about that movie that I love the most. The brilliant opening with River Phoenix, where we find out why Indy hates snakes and how he got his famous hat. Indy is just more interesting when he’s battling the Nazis, which comes in full force for the third movie. The acting is superb as well and it was perfect having Sean Connery play his dad. I also was happy they included more of Denholm Elliot and Jonathan Rhys-Meyers. Plus the movie goes all over the place: America, Italy, Austria, Germany, and Jordan. I also happen to think that Alison Doody is the prettiest Indy girl out of the series. Though I’m sure Spielberg has something to say about that. Kate Capshaw is annoying in Temple but that’s what makes her funny. She also happens to look great at the end when she’s all wet. I can see why he married her haha. Karen Allen is more adventurous for Indy and was fitting for him to marry her at the end of the fourth movie.

Speaking of the 4th movie, I’ve only seen that movie once (maybe twice). Talk about being severely disappointed with it. There were so many different things that just didn’t feel right about Kingdom of the Crystal Skull. It didn’t feel like an Indiana Jones movie. It almost felt like a parody. The infamous nuclear fridge, monkey swinging, using a snake for a rope, and of course the silly aliens. Something happened along the writing process that just made this movie into a pile of shit and not that great. It’s unfortunate for the 4th movie to be this crappy, because I was really looking forward to having more and more Indy movies after that one. Now I kinda hope they just stop before they bring the series down further. But 4th movie aside, this is still one of my favorite film franchises ever!

The quality of the movies looks amazing on Blu-Ray! It’s clearly the the best it’s gonna look, until the next best thing comes out. I had the movies on DVD but really glad these movies finally got a worthy upgrade. Raiders of the Lost Ark looks like it’s the most improved out of the movies, which is surprising since it’s the oldest. Perhaps that’s just the case because the other ones didn’t need as much re-mastering?

There’s a whole disc dedicated to the bonus material, which is nice. There’s a new featurette that has a lot of behind the scenes footage, including some deleted scenes and bloopers. I can’t remember what was on the DVD boxset but not sure this stuff was on it. Probably some stuff but not all of it. I believe that might be the only real bonus content that was new for this set. I wouldn’t say this is a true bonus disc but it’s still worthwhile to see if you’ve never seen any of this stuff before.

If I had to complain about the actual set, it’s the way the discs are held. They are held in between cardboard pages, which will add markings and scratches on the Blu-Ray over time. The same will happen to Star Wars as well. The set itself looks really nice but something should have been done to help these discs not get scratched.

Some might want separate Blu-Ray releases instead of a boxset. As much as I don’t like the 4th movie, I’d still rather have all the movies together. I still feel like there could have been more newer featurettes for the Blu-Ray release. On Set With Raiders of the Lost Ark is the newest bonus material for Indy and worth watching. The entire set is worth watching and now I can with a nice Blu-Ray upgrade of all the movies!

Features:
On Set With Raiders Of The Lost Ark
Film Foursome: The Making Of All 4 Indiana Jones Films
Cast & Creator Interviews
Behind The Scenes Peeks

Video:
Widescreen 1.78:1 Color

Screen Resolution:
1080p

Audio:
ENGLISH: DTS-HD MA 5.1
SPANISH: Dolby Digital 5.1
FRENCH: Dolby Digital 5.1
PORTUGUESE: Dolby Digital 5.1

Subtitles:
English, Spanish, French, Portuguese

Bottom Line: Great Indiana Jones Blu-Ray set that is worth the upgrade!
Running Time: 481 mins
Rating: PG-13
Extras Rating:
Overall Rating: