Vanity Fair previews Indy 4.

"When we last saw him, nearly 19 years ago, everybody's favorite archaeologist was literally riding off into the sunset after having found the Holy Grail. This seemed as though it had to be the end of the adventure series that had gotten its start with Raiders of the Lost Ark, the big summertime blockbuster of 1981," begins Jim Windolf, opening Vanity Fair's cover package on Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull. "On May 22, the movie will hit approximately 4,000 US theaters. The story is set in 1957, and this time Dr Jones goes up against cold-blooded, Cold War Russkies - led by Cate Blanchett in dominatrix mode - instead of the Nazis he squashed like bugs in previous installments. Making a return alongside Ford is Karen Allen, as Marion Ravenwood, Indy's pugnacious true love... Rising star Shia LaBeouf joins the cast in a role that no one connected with the film will confirm is the love child of Indy and Marion."

VF's running Windolf's interviews with Steven Spielberg and George Lucas as online exclusives, along with video of Annie Leibovitz's photo shoots on the set.

Update, 1/6: "I think I may owe readers and my editors an apology," writes Windolf in a late entry Cinematical's Erik Davis's noticed. "I was so focused on nailing down the details of this fourth installment in the Indiana Jones series that I may have missed out on the big-picture story: that Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull may well be the film that kicks off a second Indiana Jones trilogy."

Posted by dwhudson at January 2, 2008 7:55 AM