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When one considers the source material - the cliffhanger serials of the 30s, 40s and 50s - and really examines the different levels of homage both to the serials, and to itself, the film succeeds on almost every level.
Pocorn entertainment that defies every known law of gravity, physics and plausability is exactly that: entertainment.
Gene Autry battled aliens in a serial. Sherlock Holmes outsmarted Nazis, as did Batman. These movies (and Star Wars before Lucas convoluted it beyond recognition) share more in common with Flash Gordon, The Lost City, The Phantom Empire, The Lone Ranger, Frank Buck's Bring Em Back Alive, Spy Smasher, and Zombies of the Stratosphere then they do with Iron Man. As far as Raiders comparisons go, both Star Wars (77) and Raiders succeed in their first chapters because they were both "new" and both offered strong character development, which laid the groundwork for future sequels.
For me, the movie hit all of my checkpoints of greatness:
Atomic test
Area 51
Red Menace
Flying Saucer
Ancient Astronauts
Hot chick villain
Rock n' Roll youth culture
Fonzie
I entered the picture with low expectations, this being the post Phantom Menace era, and was happy.
Was it perfect? No.
Was it fun? Yes.
I could have done without the Close Encounters alien at the end, but other than that and the Tarzan/Jungle Book sequence, I was cool with it.
Since they did have a Close Encounters-shaped alien, Richard Dreyfuss should have poked his head out of the flying saucer and said "Come on, already! Let's get back to that other movie!"
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