Indiana Jones fans are still furious about the alien twist in divisive 2008 sequel Kingdom of the Crystal Skull – but Steven Spielberg and Harrison Ford weren’t happy about it, either.
Star Wars filmmaker George Lucas, who produced the adventure franchise, was the one who wanted to introduce extra-terrestrials into the Indy universe, but the film’s director Spielberg and lead star Ford “kind of got into a fight” with him about it.
“I wanted it to be kind of a War of the Worlds-sort of thing,” Lucas recalled to Vulture, revealing that Ford and Spielberg categorically told him: “We’re not going to do another science-fiction movie.”
Producer Kathleen Kennedy added: “Steven was struggling with that movie. Harrison was struggling with the movie. They didn’t want to do a Raiders of the Lost Ark movie that involved aliens, and they kind of got into a fight with George about it.”
But Lucas fought for the addition, telling Spielberg: “This is perfect because it’s the 1950s, when flying saucers were a whole thing.”
However, Spielberg declined, and the pair reached a compromise after five script rewrites – to make it so that the extra-terrestrials were from a different dimension.
Overall, though, while Kennedy thinks that listening to Lucas “was probably the right thing”, she thinks Kingdom of the Crystal Skull – co-starring Shia LaBeouf and Cate Blanchett – is the weakest of the five Indiana Jones films as Spielberg and Ford “were not 100 per cent onboard”.
Lucas noted that Spielberg “did make a science-fiction movie after that” – 2018’s Ready Player One and his new film Disclosure Day – and Ford went to star in “alien movie”, 2011’s Cowboys & Aliens.
While Kingdom of the Crystal Skull received middling reviews from critics, it was a box office hit, making $786.6m (£586m) worldwide. Ford returned for a new Indiana Jones film – James Mangold’s Dial of Destiny – in 2023, which Spielberg produced.
Spielberg is dividing critics once again with Disclosure Day, a thriller following a television meteorologist (Emily Blunt) who attempts to reveal the truth behind an alien conspiracy being hidden by the government.
While The Independent’s critic Clarisse Loughrey enjoyed the “funny and sentimental” film, awarding the film four stars, writer Adam White was left cringing at the film’s goofier moments.
