"This... this is history."

Impression : Raiders of the Lost Ark

I will start this post with the most hyperbolic statement I will ever make on this blog: "Raiders of the Lost Ark " is the greatest action movie ever made.  Personally I don't think it's that bold a belief. If you ask most movie lovers past a certain age, there's no doubt in my mind that many of them would rank "Raiders..." in their top three if not at number one.  So what makes this movie tower over all the action films that have come before it and afterwards? I'm going to do my best to tell you why.

First and foremost, this film was lovingly created by a group of talented individuals who were at the height or reaching the pinnacle of their creative natures.  Lucas (producer),  Spielberg (director),  Kasdan (screenwriter), Williams (composer), Edlund (visual effects), Ford and Allen (actors) were all at the top of their game. And I didn't even mention the unsung heroes of film, the director of photography (Slocombe) and editor (Kahn).   This film was a perfect storm of creative collaboration. I'd be hard pressed to name another film that contained as many individuals to come together to assemble such a fantastic product.  Usually that comes from a single individual who wears many hats during the making of the film. 

Secondly is the impetuous behavior of the film. The movie is in a constant state of motion, always moving forward and never dawdling to save its breath. The action can be fast and quick as when avoiding dangerous booby traps and outrunning a runaway boulder or interesting and humorous as when delivering the exposition that sets up the movie by slightly chiding characters (and the audience) for having to explain itself in the first place ("Didn't you guys ever go to Sunday School?").

Part of the frenetic yet cohesive nature of this film comes from the impromptu creation of certain scenes in the film, most notably, the fistfight sequence at the airfield. What was a skeleton of a sequence on the pages of the screenplay, Spielberg, Ford and company slowly added moments and events ("Can I throw sand in his face? Can I bite him?" Ford was quoted as saying) to lovingly create a domino-style chain of events that from the moment the first tile fell to the last created a wonderfully superbly staged action piece,

That off-the-cuff nature wasn't solely limited to part of the film-making process, it was also incorporated into the main character. Indiana Jones presented a hero who added a dimension of uncertainty with his character. Murphy's Law is in full effect when Dr. Jones is involved and he is duly aware of it. It's a fact of life I completely empathize with but it was Indy's dogged persistence in the face of this fact that endeared him to me and many others as a hero to root for. One of my favorite small moments in the film is early in the picture, when after Indy jumps the chasm of a pit, he finds himself literally cliffhanging on the other side. He desperately reaches out for  a withered vine to pull himself out. As he grabs the vine, a smile of satisfaction comes across his face only to be quickly replaced by desperation as the vine loosens from its roots and starts to give way. Ford's reaction in this scene always seemed to me to show the annoyance and expectation of this slight mishap. It was a reaction that while I laughed, I also completely understood. Throughout the movie there are small moments like these (such as searchng for a basket suddenly thrust into a sea of baskets) to the more mundane hindrances ("Snakes. Why did it have to be snakes?") to full out obstacles (hanging off the grill in front of a moving truck). Yet through out it all, Indy persevered to get the job done. That's what made him such an iconic hero and probably the last to have such a widespread cultural impact.

Finally, the movie was and is inspirational to me. Since I was a kid, this movie gave me dreams to aspire to. Before this movie, I always thought of an archaeologist as a bespectacled professor poring over boring texts and objects. After "Raiders...", I dreamed about becoming a globe trotting adventurer and seeker of lost antiquities. After discovering that the profession depicted might have been a bit embellished, I became enamored with the ideas of creating stories filled with such imagination. While writing has always been something of a bane to me, I did realize part of that dream when I would write adventures in the role playing hobby of which (even though I don't play anymore) I am still a fan of. After learning what went into the making of the film, I became more interested in film-making as an art form. And while I may be past my prime to become a movie director, I still fancy myself being one and often watch movies these days with a directorial and critical eye. And now that I've started a film blog, it serves as the initial impetus for going ahead with this foolish endeavor and hopefully continue to express my love for film, to push past my resistance to writing and to relive the dreams of my youth.

"Raiders of the Lost Ark" has been an influential film not only to myself but also to others, like the youngsters who created a fan-recreation of the film many years ago and to Damon Lindelof who recently expressed his love for the film in a short essay. On behalf of myself and the many others with whom you've allowed to share this jouney with you:

"Raider of the Lost Ark" and what all of those five words encompass, we thank you.