It's Not The Years, Honey, It's The Mileage

Raiders Of The Lost Ark is one of those movies that constantly vies for the prestigious position of 'greatest film of all time', along with a small handful of other stunning films. It's certainly director Spielberg's best movie and ranks alongside The Empire Strikes Back as the best thing George Lucas has produced. The first time I saw it was on VHS when I was 13, as we'd rented it for the weekend. My parents had gone out for the night and my brother and I were under strict instructions not to watch Raiders as my parents wanted to see it too...and we'd all sit down as a family and experience the hit movie together. Of course my brother and I were compelled to peak. Just the opening 10 minutes we promised ourselves...but considering the addictive nature of the story...we just couldn't stop watching. Raiders still has that power today as, once it's started, you can't take your eyes off the screen.

Raiders is inspired, like Star Wars before it, from the Republic serials of the 1930's and 40's having cliffhanger conclusions to the majority of it's scenes that prompt the audience to wonder how Indy and Marion will 'get out of that'. It's also a World War II (even though it's set in the mid-1930s), men-on-a-mission movie with a clear military objective laid out in the doom laden exposition scene at the beginning of the film. The heroes must obtain the super weapon (of God himself, it would seem) with the fate of the world at stake (the stakes are higher in Raiders than any of the sequels). Finally, and to my constant delight, it's a caper movie where something must be recovered from those that already possess it; the heroes have to execute the heist, stealing the artifact from underneath the villain's noses and get away, all while 'making it up as they go' when things don't go to plan.

As with all the Indy movies, the South American opening sequence sets up what to expect from the movie. Indiana Jones himself is established in the very first shot as the silhouette of Harrison Ford's fedora donned hero walks into frame. Indy's profession of archeology is revealed, along with his side-occupation of grave-robbing, as well as the cliffhanger nature of the narrative. In the opening sequence alone Indy must escape from traitorous guides (twice), tarantulas, a bottomless chasm (twice), poison darts, a disintegrating temple, impenetrable stone doors, bone crushing boulders, his arch nemesis and a tribe of poison dart gobbing natives. Hows that for cliffhangers?

The opening also establishes Belloq, a rival archaeologist to Indy that will plague his progress when the story starts good and proper. The relationship between Indy and Belloq is an interesting one that goes beyond hero and villain. They're rivals...not only in archeology with both man after the same objects (the Gold Idol, the Ark)...but rivals in women as Belloq clearly desires Marion, Indy's ex-flame, for himself. It's made all the more interesting that Indy is clearly the more successful of the two, always retrieving the artifact first and winning the heart of the girl. Belloq, the less capable rival consumed with jealousy, has to cheat, bully and steal things away from Indy in order to succeed. Of course, when he does finally gets what he wants, his greed leads to his demise, but it's the battle of wits between the two that leads to a lot of the suspense being generated.

As with all masterpiece movies, every single scene, whether its centred around dialogue, suspense or action, is memorable...essential to the story and perfectly constructed in its own right. Each scene stands brilliantly on its own, away from the rest of the movie having cleasrly defined beginnings, middles and endings. There's no better examples of that than in two of my favorite sequences in all moviekind...scenes that all other movies should look up and worship:-

1/ The first of these is the dialogue free Map Room sequence which is structured with Indy breaking into the Map Room, preparing the Staff Of Ra, and finally rising to a powerful conclusion as the beam of light shows the location of the Ark (*all to John Williams stunning Ark theme).

2/ The second is what must surely qualifies as THE greatest action sequence in cinema; the desert chase, as Indy single handedly attempts to repossess the Ark from a convoy of armed Nazis. The sequence has got a clearly defined set-up which establishes the location of the Ark, the order of the vehicles, and which charts Indy's approach to the convoy. The middle section has Indy take control of the truck carrying the Ark and assert his near-dominance over the convoy while the finale has him nearly losing everything, including his life, only to bounce back with one of THE greatest stunts of all time. Recreating the old western stunt of the cowboy being dragged underneath the stagecoach, but revamping it to use a contemporary truck was a stroke of genius and is amplified not only by the fact it looks bloody, bloody dangerous but it's topped off with Indy crawling back onto the truck to triumphantly take control of it once more. Maybe someone should sit Michael Bay down one day and make him watch this.



But each other sequence is memorable in it's own right from the sequence with the old man, "Belloq's staff is too long. They're digging in the wrong place!!" complete with it's own cliffhanger (bad dates), Marion's Tibetan drinking contest, the basket chase, the threat of torture with a hot poker, "Snakes! Why did it have to be snakes", Indy's smitten female students, and the romantic and humorous, "It's not the years honey, it's the mileage" all stand the test of time. Even a throw away scene like with Indy and Belloq in the bar has it's own cliffhanger, which is resolved with Sallah's kids coming to rescue Indy, is much stronger than it has any right to be. Individual moments too remain iconic like the coat hanger gag (improved upon from Spielberg's shoddy 1941), the sword swirling arab, Indy versus the cobra, Sallah singing Gilbert and Sullivan and the final warehouse scene. All demonstrations of Spielberg's genius.

For me it's the serious, adult tone which sets this apart and above from the sequels. Deepite lots of humour, this is treated as a thriller first and foremost not pandering to a family audience as Temple Of Doom and Last Crusade did. It's only in the fun basket chase through the streets of Cairo that Raiders adopts a sillier attitude, but it's thankfully blesses with it's tongue ending up firmly in it's cheek. It helps to have the best cinematography of the series having the rich colours you'd expect in a David Lean movie but having the strong contrast that Last Crusade lacked. It's got the best score too, being the best of composer John Williams long and illustrious career...alongside The Empire Strike Back, I'd argue. And ILM's groundbreaking effects, especially the head exploding, ghost filled climax.

It's quite a ride which ends up making Raiders one of my top 5 movies of all time. It's certainly Spielberg's best, with Jaws coming a close second. It has everything I could want in a movie and it keeps getting better every time I see it. What could be better than that?