Raiders of the Lost Ark
“ I don’t know i’m making this up as i go”
Summary
Indiana Jones and the Raiders of the Lost Ark opens with the iconic scene of Jones stealing a priceless artifact, only to be stopped by his rival René Belloq. The movie then flashes forward a few years. Jones is teaching at a university but is then approached by the American military. From there, he is sent to Nepal to find the headpiece of Ra. This mystical medallion was to reveal the location of the Ark of the Covenant. After saving Marion, the two head to Cairo to find the lost treasure.
Characters
Indiana Jones, played by Harrison Ford, is an archeologist who splits his time between being a college professor and a field archeologist. Indiana Jones is a smart, resilient, and resourceful protagonist. Indy also isn’t afraid to get his hands dirty and is pretty useful in a fight as long as there are no snakes around. Marion Ravenwood, played by Karen Allen, is a fiery spitball who is a smart counterpart to Indy though they have some history. She isn’t afraid of a fight and she does what she can to help the mission.
Sebastian: 9.8/10
Well, we have once again reviewed one of my top 20 films of all time in the form of Raiders of the Lost Ark which was the first film to introduce us to the famous archeologist himself Indiana Jones. I remember watching this movie when I was a kid and just loving the iconic action, the memorable theme music, the iconic fedora, and whip, and just, in general, love this movie. This movie starts with a bang with one of the most iconic openings in film history with the boulder scene. We are then introduced to the man himself and Harrison Ford kills it as Indiana Jones with many quotable lines, memorable moments, and character traits all introduced here. The characters in general are all pretty different and interesting whether we are talking about Marion or Belloq; they each have personalities that make them memorable. The story is quite interesting and as a history buff I love to see stories about historical artifacts and the ark of the covenant definitely has that status. The detail level in this film is astounding as nothing is just mentioned and every thing that happens has a reason. The film is set in the 1930s also means we can have Nazis as villains and who doesn’t like seeing them get defeated. This movie is super action-packed and the stunt work is amazing with many memorable fight scenes sprinkled throughout where Indy barely makes it through but also manages to just survive. The practical effects in this movie are still really well done whether it’s exploding trucks, snakes in a temple, or real fire it also looks real because it is and while sometimes you can tell that when they fight, they aren’t always hitting each other I would say 80% of the time it looks pretty good. For the most part, the film is not too violent or scary for kids but it has a few moments that are on the edge of being intense for some viewers. I would also be amiss if I did not mention the iconic score by John Williams whose music for this film amplifies the whole experience and is still remembered to this day. If I had one criticism would be that some of the special effects don’t hold up but I can’t really fault the film because that’s what they had to work with at the time.
All in all, this is one of my favourites that I love revisiting and would recommend this to anyone who hasn’t seen it and to those who it has been a while since they last saw it. So hop on Netflix and check it out!
Austin: 9.0/10
Indiana Jones and The Raiders of The Lost Ark is a great movie. The action is really good, and the plot flows almost seamlessly. Indiana is one of the world’s most classic characters, although I didn’t find all the other characters to be anything special.
This is a fun movie to watch, no other way to put it. The opening scene gives you an instant look into what this movie is going to be about, and it really doesn’t slow down from there. The main plot is then introduced a few scenes later, and although you know things aren’t going to go perfectly for Indiana, you are never quite sure what’s next. The other piece of the plot I appreciated was the attention to detail. When dealing with historical artifacts and such, I find it really important to try and be as accurate as possible. It makes for a more interesting movie if the truth is stretched less and less to fit the narrative. This attention to detail applies to more than the Ark, with a lot of the movie surrounding the accuracies of the second World War. The fact that Hilter was obsessed with the Occult is a theory that historians have tossed around for years, with some seeing that statement as a fact.
The action scenes are pretty solid, and the visuals are bad at all. Obviously, we have to understand when this was filmed before taking the visuals into account, but based on other movies in a similar time period, the opening scene was awesome. Some of the other VFX closer to the end of the movie are also pretty decent. As with a lot of movies, we get a few questionable action scenes where you gotta wonder how that would plausibly be pulled off(good for at least a few chuckles), but overall I enjoyed the action.
Characters, characters, characters. I was torn with this movie because Indiana is a really well-written character and we don’t really see that from any other characters. This is not to say that we have any “bad” characters, but there isn’t one that is nearly as good as Indiana. We see flashes of greatness from a few other characters, but it feels more like a once-in-a-while moment instead of the standard. I think that a few more really solid characters take this classic movie to the next level of the hall of fame.
If you haven’t seen this movie, you have to. It is one of the better movies in this genre, and although it struggles in a couple of areas, it more than makes up for it in others. With rumblings of a 5th Indian Jones movie coming in 2022, this is a great addition to your Netflix list!
Nathanyal: 8.7/10
For my first time viewing this movie, I can see why it is considered a classic amongst a lot of people. The plot, the action, the suspense are all top notch. Knowing this movie’s reputation, I was impressed with what I saw.
The main strengths of this movie are the action sequences and the popularity of the character. This movie boasts some great action sequences that are heavy and suspenseful. The fight scenes are quite nice considering this movie is almost 50 years old. Another boon for this movie is Jones’ theme. It is a popular theme that everyone knows to some degree. It’s been sung on playgrounds by kids who might not even know the character. I also appreciate the character of Jones quite a bit. You can see that he is a smart person. During fights, you can tell when he has an advantage, but at the same time, he isn’t some overpowered monster who can kill anything and everything. When he was losing that fight with that German by the airplane, I appreciated seeing him in a losing situation, showing that he’s a real human. I also liked the plot of the movie and the tie in to history. I’ve always enjoyed learning about either ancient history or times around the World Wars. The plot felt pretty smooth, and I liked the progression.
Now, I do have some gripes about the pacing and the effects in the movie. First, I’ll talk about the effects. AS this is an older movie, it is an aspect that I can forgive. During fight scenes, you can clearly see that none of the punches or bashing of heads have any impact. You can see that the actor doesn’t ever make contact. This can be due to the older style of movie, which I can forgive. The other aspect that wasn’t so fun was the pacing of the movie. The movie opened with a strong opening. It had action and suspense. Perfect characterization of Indiana Jones. But then the middle of the movie slowed considerably. There were a few spikes here and there, which grabbed my attention, but there were a lot of instances where everything seemed to be crawling.
Overall, this was still a good movie and I did enjoy the action sequences. I can see why people like the character and his movies. Anytime an action sequence comes on and Indiana Jones’ theme comes on, you know you’re in for a ride. But be careful of the middle of the movie, because the pace does slow down considerably.
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