A Steven Spielberg Poll (1974-1993)

Raiders has p much the same racial content as ToDoom w/ the non-Nazi supporting characters

disagreed!

do you remember Alfred Molina waggling his fingers in the first scene? "Adios, Dr Jones." Can't trust em.

it's extremely racist against the French

I love the Indiana Jones movies (well obviously not the fourth), I would probably rank them in the order of release.

I've said it elsewhere but I think there's a particularly haunting undercurrent of dread that builds throughout, leading to the opening of the Ark, that is more effective here than in any other film I've seen. it's in the background of the entire movie and usually plays out with a bit of wind or unsettling pauses. it's exceptionally well done.

also Brody and Sallah are outstanding characters as opposed to buffoons (though Elliott and Rhys-Davies both play buffoons well.)

Always is my least favorite Spielberg and that's including Hook. A totally charming cast wasted in a totally superfluous remake. I'd much rather watch the original.

Sallah is a buffoon by the time we get to Last Crusade; we've long forgotten he's the "finest digger in Egypt" when he's reduced to saying shit like, "in the belly of that steel beast."

yeah i mean those guys in Raiders are great characters vs their revisitation in LC.

all that shit about his brother in law's car is good for a smile, but he's playing a cartoon (like Brody is)

my least fave Spielberg is his Twilight Zone segment

Brody in Raiders had a sort of extremely casual confidence and wary nature and was clearly Jones' equal, just more of a university guy as opposed to an adventurer. I liked the knowing looks they'd share during the initial expository scene w/the government agents.

Denholm Elliott's name was Brody? why do you ppl remember that?

(i know youve watched RotLA 36x)

cuz he's called Marcus or Marcus Brody in two of the films?

omar little so otm about the "undercurrent of dread" throughout Raiders. it's in the supernatural music queue that comes up when the Top Men are informing Indy of the Biblical reality his mission, the queue pops up again on the ark's reveal, etc. there is a spookiness and a heaviness to the macguffin that works really well as isn't as strong in any of the other films. Temple of Doom feels way more cartoonlike in that aspect.

also i love Sallah's little singing "I am the monarch of the sea..." just before they find the bad dates.

xps well yeah, when it comes to Twilight Zone, Miller = Dante >> Spielberg >>>>>> Landis. (Killing a pair of kids moves you way down the list.)

so i gather, Alfred, and why wd a person use up memory with that?

You mean ears?

It's okay we don't know that the head German in Raiders is called Dietrich; he's only referred to by name once.

i prefer 'cartoonlike' to Frank Buck/James Bond with a whip, if such a distinction can be made

i can't help it, I'm like Marilu Henner over here, I can't forget anything, even the fact that she played Belinda in Noises Off with Denholm Elliott in his final film role.

i also remember that it's Sallah who calls him Dietrich. I don't think Toht is ever referred to by his name.

yep

(i know youve watched RotLA 36x)

this is an odd zing from one of the only people on ilx who seems to be expecting good things from ready player one, whose premise could be boiled down to "the protagonist has watched RotLA 36x"

I'm pretty sure I have seen Raiders at least 36 times. I think I saw it three times in the theater!

It takes more effort to push a memory out than to just let it hang around.

haha Dr C, I expect nothing, I just roll

probably have seen Raiders 3x total, 4 tops, i was in lolcollege when it came out (went opening night)

ive probably seen Raider 36 times. in none of those times there was an extended food gross out sequence where our heroes are disgusted by the food of their hosts. and that happens twice in Temple.

gotcha. love the monkeybrains sequence, wish i had em tonight.

i prefer raiders because it feels more like a classic carl barks uncle scrooge story. plus temple just feels like it goes on forever, i always start to feel claustrophobic about an hour from the end.

Thought you guys were referring to Roy Scheider re "Brody" for a moment

xxxxpost

Schindler's List, easily.

Also, lotta Kate shrieking in Doom, lotta Short-round, Kane Hodder in Indian-face... The Orientalism very much in character of cheesy, dubious old serials, though that is a weird defense. From an interview I did with Kal Penn:

I was probably in fourth grade when Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom came out. I remember when we went to see that movie, and there all these Indian characters that were eating monkey brains and snakes for dinner, and doing all these things that had absolutely nothing to do with being Indian at all. I went into school, and myself and every other Indian kid I know, and nobody would sit next to us at lunch, for months, because they were convinced we had monkey brains in our sandwich. Similarly, when the Simpsons first started airing, the character of Apu was so degrading, in my opinion. A lot of people disagree with me, but those are the media images that go into people’s heads, and if you don’t have close friends to disprove that, or even if you do but you’re only in fourth grade, that’s pretty powerful. That’s something I was very aware of/

That said, I own this shirt:

https://lastexittonowhere.imgix.net/uploads/catalogue/productimage-picture-lao-che-air-freight-2809.jpg

Dr. C, watch Sugarland Express! I first watched it as sort of a perfunctory completist gesture but I got converted. I really don't understand why it's so consistently underrated.

if anyone doesn't know why Raiders feels like Carl Barks: http://www.dialbforblog.com/archives/429/

i'm pretty sure Spielberg would not make Temple of Doom the same way today. I think he would still marry Kate Capshaw.

capshaw another major block on recommending that movie; i can picture very few of my non-male friends finding that character/performance enjoyable.

i dig it. less misogynist than drag. #challops

yeah I have no problem with Capshaw. She played the Dizzy Dame about as well as anyone could in 1984.

one shriekin' gold-diggin' blonde does not necessarily represent women any more than I Love Lucy did. Sometimes a comic stock character is just that.

and I've said before on ILX that Marian's value as a character is overrated too -- she turns into a screaming wuss by the second act too!

yeah but she also pulls a knife on a Nazi in that second act. and after that she comedically slaps a wounded Indy with a mirror.

also that intro where she drinks the patron under the bar at the frozen Nepalese tavern she runs is pretty badass

sometimes you would rather see something like that then a lady complaining about having to ride an elephant

it being a comic stock character doesn't mean it's something one wants to watch for ninety minutes! there are lots of stock characters that i think we're all glad have bitten the dust after all. in this case, the stock from which the character is ladled is sexist as well boring. willie is stupid, slow on the uptake even in the most obvious situations, cowardly, unhelpful, and rude, and the film's main interest in her is how to take her down a peg. spielberg doesn't do anything to reinvent or recontextualize or renew this very dicey material and occam's razor (given the racism and general laziness of this film's conception) would suggest he just thinks it's crowd-pleasing entertainment to watch a woman screw things up and be annoying. call me when this kind of worthless role for the leading female character has been abandoned by hollywood and i'll entertain the idea that including one could be some kind of clever throwback to a forgotten archetype. meanwhile though i still don't think any women i know would find this enjoyable. maybe you two dudes are right though.

This is a movie in which everyone, including Indie, gets taken down a peg and made a fool of; everyone's a cartoon.

I don't mind if someone dislikes Willie, nor will I fight it.

pop culture of all eras sure is rigorously vetted these days (except for Fay Wray)

I like Kate Capshaw in TOD (she's pretty funny in the comic scenes and quite good at being seductive once she gets Indy in her sights), I just don't like her more than Karen Allen in ROTLA.

I got no problem with Franklin Pangborn's prissy fags ftr

"Is there anyone I haven't offended?" - Lenny Bruce, who's glad he's dead

vetted? i mean all i was saying was i don't think I'd recommend the film to a friend. out of all the thrills-and-chills adventure movies out there, why pick one with THIS stuff in it? if it doesn't bug you that's fine but i was, as i said, thinking of non-male film buff friends of mine, so you going "hey, *i* find it entertaining, what's the big deal??" isn't really answering to that. obviously i can't speak for their tastes either, just my own barometer of "will i later feel like an asshole with male-privilege blinders for blithely proclaiming this to be a fun popcorn movie that lets you have a good time and forget your cares" ?

You can recommend the film with caveats? That's my job as a reviewer.