Raiders of the Lost Ark

“Indiana Jones. I always knew some day you’d come walking back through my door. I never doubted that. Something made it inevitable…”

Sure, Marion might have been expecting Indiana Jones, but we sure weren’t. In June 1981, we got a new hero (as the poster told us) “from the creators of Jaws and Star Wars“. And he was unlike anything we had ever seen before.

With a leather jacket and fedora and a bullwhip clipped to his belt, Indiana Jones may have looked like Han Solo (thank you, Harrison Ford!), but this guy was wholly original. Was he a jet-setting adventurist? A book-wormy professor? A super-intense archaeologist? Yes, yes, and yes.

We’re first introduced to him in Peru, as he outwits the most deadly Rube Goldberg contraption ever invented, culminating with the now-famous boulder run…only to be forced to surrender the little golden idol to the evil Belloq. From there it’s off to Nepal (and his reunion with Marion) and then on to Cairo for his showdown not only with Belloq but with the even-more-evil Nazi Arnold Toht.

From start (literally…how cool is it that the image of the Paramount logo dissolves into a Peruvian mountain?) to finish (as the ark’s crate is stored in a warehouse that rivals Sam’s Club), Raiders is one of the 80s’ best and most memorable. Who can forget the face-melting; the staff’s headpiece burning Toht’s hand; Indy’s fight with that big, burly bad guy at the airplane (and then the big burly bad guy meeting the business end of the propeller); or Hollywood’s best-ever “fight” scene, as Indy watches an Arab swordsman’s flourishing display before dispatching him quickly with a single bullet?

Directed by Steven Spielberg from a story by George Lucas, Raiders of the Lost Ark (which has since, heinously, been renamed Indiana Jones and the Raiders of the Lost Ark) was easily the #1 movie of 1981, almost doubling the take of the #2 film On Golden Pond, and it’s still listed in the top 25 of all time. It was amazing then, and it still holds up today.

“Snakes. Why’d it have to be snakes?”

We ♥ Raiders of the Lost Ark

~ by weheart80s on July 5, 2017.