Indiana Jones: the 40th Anniversary
The Blind Eternities forum
Posted on June 15, 2021, 8:16 p.m. by DemonDragonJ
This year is the 40th anniversary of Raiders of the Lost Ark, the first installment of the Indiana Jones franchise, one of the best-known and best-selling media franchises in history, which is certainly a significant milestone.
The Indiana Jones movies are the result of a collaboration between George Lucas and Steven Spielberg, their tribute to the adventure serials of the 1930’s and 1940’s, hence the dates in which the movies are set, and are also absolute proof that those two filmmakers should have collaborated more often; can you imagine what other masterpieces they could have created if they had worked together on other projects?
The movies in the original Indiana Jones trilogy are some of my favorite movies, and I can watch them repeatedly and not grow tired of them; no movie is perfect, but Lucas and Spielberg absolutely made the best choices that they could when they cast the roles in those movies and wrote the scripts. The characters feel authentic, and the audience can truly become involved in the action and story of the films; my only true dislike is that Willie Scott, the female lead of Temple of Doom, was nowhere near as good as were Marion Ravenwood and Elsa Schneider, the female leads of the other two films. As a fun fact of trivia, the giant German solider in Raiders of the Lost Ark and the giant Thuggee guard in Temple of Doom (both of whom suffer gruesome deaths) were both played by Pat Roach, who also had a role in The Last Crusade, but that role was sadly cut from the final film to help keep the film’s running time from being too long.
As a side note, has anyone here ever seen Secret of the Incas? That film was released in 1954, starring Charlton Heston, and heavily inspired Raiders of the Lost Ark, due to numerous similarities between the two films. I have not yet seen that film, but I plan to do so, at some point.
I have scarcely mentioned Kingdom of the Crystal Skull in this post because I feel that that movie was a mistake, a cash grab by the studio; Last Crusade ended with the characters riding off into the sunset, which was a perfect way to conclude the story, so any attempt to follow it only ruined the ending of the trilogy and could never match its legacy.
The Indiana Jones franchise has actually been expanded beyond the films; while not as massive as is the Star Wars expanded universe, there have been numerous other installments the detail Indy’s further adventures, including video games, comics, and a television series. I have scarcely delved into the other media, but I am glad that the franchise is sufficiently popular for its creators to expand it beyond the movies.
What does everyone else say about this? What are your opinions about this year being the 40th anniversary of Indiana Jones?
sergiodelrio says... #3
Loved the original trilogy as well as the old-school point-and-click video games, until they chose to go full tomb raider. If you haven't played those games, give them a shot. They are masterpieces and a steal on steam, especially on a sale.
Shire le Boof ruined the 4th indie movie.
June 16, 2021 4:42 a.m.
As a fun fact, both Raiders and Last Crusade are based in part on historical events. The Nazi high command, in a quest to prove its hate and bigotry was historically justified, spent a significant amount of money trying to find artifacts of German heritage. In addition, they set out on quests to find things like Atlantis, the Ark, or the Holy Grail, trying to prove that their "Aryan Race" was descendent from legendary figures.
This decision to weaponize archeology as a tool of propaganda meant that, despite the large investment in the field and numerous archeological digs conducted during this time, the discoveries of Nazi archeologist are pretty useless to the field. While there were some apolitical figures who attempted to use the Nazi's obsessiveness to conduct legitimate science, the centralized control over the digs meant they almost always were focused on the wrong details, including treating pseudo-science (like skull measuring) as legitimate archeological findings.
Entirely coincidentally, there seems to be a direct correlation between the films' relationship to its historical inspiration to how good of a movie it is. Raiders and Last Crusade, the two films involving Nazis seeking Biblical artifacts, are both excellent, capturing a spirit of adventure and discovery unrivaled by other movies.
Temple of Doom, on the other hand, is a mess. The plot is a bit jumbled and bloated, and it spends too much time trying to encapsulate horror, without ever really doing it well. I am not begrudging any who like it, but from an objective filmmaking perspective, it pales in comparison to Raiders and Last Crusade. And that is not just me talking--Spielberg himself has said that he isn't happy with Temple, and the only good thing about the movie was it allowed him to meet and eventually marry Capshaw (whose terrible acting is one of the big detriments of the film--though Spielberg has not admitted that fact).
The only thing I have to say about Crystal Skull is a disagreement with sergiodelrio--LaBeouf's acting was bad, and a major downside in the film, but it is so hard to pick just one thing that ruined that movie. Lucas--who can be quite talented when properly edited--inserted himself into the filmmaking more than he probably needed to, resulting in some of the decidedly dumb, un-Spielbergian scenes like the fridge. Their Soviet villains always felt like poor reflections of the Nazis in Raiders and Last Crusade, rather than than their own, independent villains. The plot with the aliens was exceedingly dumb. The extremely talented Cate Blanchett's extremely terrible wig. Overly focused on bad special effects firmly sitting in the uncanny valley (dear gods, the ant scene)... though, to be fair, the original films had special effects as well, but watch the opening of the Ark again--the special effects hold up surprisingly well; they do not look photo-realistic, of course... but they are not trying to be, and it works to their advantage. The effects come off as ethereal and otherworldly, and they work for the scene.
Anyway, there were a lot of things that ruined the 4th film--Shia was only a small part of that, and I do feel he deserves some credit for apologizing for his role in the movie.
June 16, 2021 9:43 a.m.
sergiodelrio says... #6
Caerwyn we do, in fact, not disagree. Should have specified more in my post, but didn't feel that portion deserved more text.
Did the actor refund the money he got for the movie? If not, the opportunity cost of apologizing is pretty low.
June 16, 2021 5:08 p.m.
It is difficult for me to pinpoint exactly what made said skull movie that much less enjoyable. I mean impossible survival moments and jumping the shark in that way is present in all of them. It is noticeable that fight or confrontations seem less inspired. Most the movies confrontations or chases historically show pretty ironclad character motivations. I felt like there where more moments in Skull movie where the scenes were more stunts for the sake of stunt without motivations. Like, why am I still sword fighting on this unstable surface?
Gleeock says... #2
I liked Willie. Indiana Jones is one of my favorite types of film; high adventure. I think it is a difficult type of story to materialize with the modern audience. I absolutely love those time periods where it seems like big brother didn't have their lectric eye on everything and there was more room for untold stories of great adventure. I'm a huge sucker for those stories from Napoleonic times or Imperialist Europe. Love 'The Mummy', liked 'Hidalgo' more than most people. Love fights that are choreographed to be more than a fight... Which Indiana Jones is pumped full of. For eg. Indie just wants an antidote, Willie wants a diamond, Chinese black market guy wants vengeance and the whole chaotic scene tells a story so well
June 15, 2021 11:21 p.m.