Raiders of the Lost Ark: He Brought A Gun To A Sword Fight?!

Raiders Of The Lost Ark has one of those rare openings you can feel in your bones, and watching it with fresh eyes raised a bigger question than we expected: is the movie’s legendary status built on story, craft, or just nonstop momentum? We jump from the boulder run to the Ark of the Covenant chase and keep pulling on the threads that make Indiana Jones such an enduring adventure hero, even when he sometimes survives by luck and stubbornness as much as skill.

We talk through the film’s 1981 context and the Spielberg and George Lucas origin story, then get honest about pacing. Does it feel like a clean narrative or a string of brilliant action scenes held together by just enough plot? From there we dig into characters, chemistry, and villains, including why Marion Ravenwood can feel both tough and trapped by the script, and why some of the most ominous bad guys don’t always get the payoff we expect.

The craft talk goes deep: John Williams’ themes and how they signal heroism, the practical stunts that still look incredible, and the behind-the-scenes problem solving that makes sequences like the truck chase work. We also geek out on sound design tricks and the unforgettable effects work in the finale, the kind of analog movie magic that helped define what blockbuster filmmaking could be.

If you love Indiana Jones, Spielberg movies, classic adventure films, or behind-the-scenes filmmaking stories, hit play, then subscribe, share the show, and leave a five-star review. What scene from Raiders would you defend forever?

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Transcript

Welcome And Listener Requests

Joe 0:16

Welcome to Have You Seen the Movie Podcast, where every movie is a premiere.

Dylan 0:22

If you enjoy the show, make sure to follow it on your favorite podcast app and leave us a five-star rating. It really helps the show grow.

Joe 0:28

And we want to hear from you. Text us your name and a movie suggestion using the link in the description.

Dylan 0:34

This week we're heading into one of the greatest adventure movies ever made, Raiders of the Lost Ark. And I am finally joining Indiana Jones on the hunt for the Ark.

Joe 0:44

This week's movie, Raiders of the Lost Ark, is rated PG for action violence in some intense supernatural moments. But its intense finale is one of the reasons the PG 13 rating was created just a few years later. So if that's not suitable for little ears, we hope you'll tune in next week. So when

Release Year And Creative Origins

Joe 1:04

did this movie come out? It was released in 1981.

Dylan 1:09

81. So off the top of your head, like what kind of came out around that time, too?

Joe 1:16

Oh man.

Dylan 1:18

Sorry throwing your curveballs.

Joe 1:20

You did. 81. Superman 2 on Golden Pond. Apparently Evil Dead. That's a good one. Cannonball Run. The Great Muppet Caper. Foxin' the Hound.

Dylan 1:45

Well, I have seen that one. Yeah. So came out in 81. Directed by Spielberg. We've got another Spielberg on our hands. Yep. Always the Great. Yes. So you're kind of saying before we even started watching, though, that George Lucas was also a part of it.

Joe 2:08

Yeah. Yeah, he wrote it. Um he uh had two ideas, and one was for like a Flash Gordon style old um kind of comic book style serial um space adventure. And then he had another idea of what would be uh an adventurous archaeologist um who went on uh different expositions and and and all that, and so choosing between the two, he ended up going for the Flash Gordon thing, yeah, and that was Star Wars. So this could have came out a lot sooner than it did.

Dylan 2:58

So we were kind of talking about it like in the in the movie as it was going on. Um but when was this kind of set to take place?

Joe 3:11

Uh

Setting And First Impressions

Joe 3:12

in 1930s. Um 1936, I think is when it starts. There's a little gotcha little slate that comes up.

Dylan 3:22

Oh, is there? Yeah, totally miss that.

Joe 3:25

Yeah. Sometimes there's words on the screen. No, I could read it sometimes. Yeah, right when they start in the jungle, uh, it comes up. Does it? Totally miss that. I know. So what did you know about Indiana Jones before we watched this?

Dylan 3:51

Oh man. So the hat. The whip. Yeah. I mean, just kind of the iconography. Is that what you'd say? Yeah. Like kind of the big, you know, he just that's what he's known for. Yeah. Um I thought it being the first one, I thought that it was going to start him off on the path.

Joe 4:17

Oh, okay. Like origin story.

Dylan 4:20

Right. Yeah. Not being like picking up essentially at the end of one adventure, yeah. Right. Rolling into the next one. Yeah. So totally was not expecting that. And so yeah, we started watching it, and I'm like, is this the first one? Yeah. Yeah. Did yeah. Did you put the right disc? Like, was this a to be continued situation? Yeah. Yeah.

Joe 4:46

Yeah. At the end of Star Wars.

Dylan 4:48

Uh Han Solo gets if you haven't seen this movie in a while. Here's a quick setup for you. Archaeologist Indiana Jones races against Nazis to find the Ark of the Covenant, a biblical artifact believed to hold immense supernatural power. But yeah, just going back to that temp that opening tempo scene though. Yeah. How is that where the boulder comes from? Like almost a throwaway kind of moment. Right. Or you know, bit scene. Yeah. Because like there's not really much storytelling to that. Yeah. And it's like, you know, I feel like everybody knows about just the the boulder moment. Yeah. Even without watching it. Um yeah. That the guy at the beginning, though, he he got what was coming to him.

Joe 5:46

Yeah, he did. He did. He got. I think that's the thing about both of the guys is they got too greedy too fast. Yeah. And and tried to, you know.

Dylan 5:55

Well, that's a good way to put it.

Joe 6:00

Yeah, and it took them both out. Yeah. Yep. So should have should have listened. Yeah. Yeah. And I don't know if I had seen it right away either. Um I don't remember seeing it in the theater.

Dylan 6:19

The words at the bottom.

Joe 6:20

Yeah, yeah. Yeah.

Dylan 6:22

I think they added it.

Joe 6:25

Oh, that's why. I'm looking, I'm looking at the case. It says Indiana Jones Collections for Dummies. I'm just kidding.

Dylan 6:34

Not I just I'm like sitting here looking at it and I'm like, are you reading it upside down? I thought. Oh man.

Joe 6:51

That was a long weekend. Yeah. Oh. Anywho.

Pacing Debates And Serial Vibes

Dylan 7:01

Moving right along. So one of the things that I kind of thought about with this movie though, is that I felt like the pacing of the movie as a whole was really weird. Oh. Like, wow. I felt like it was just a bunch of action scenes cut together and then with just enough like story in between to kind of thread it together. Oh, wow. And I know that's kind of how movies are sometimes. Yeah. But like I felt like it was like, okay, we filmed a bunch of action scenes. Now we gotta figure out how to put it together. Yeah. You know, like uh towards the end of the movie when they're on the U-boat. Yeah. Is that what that was? Yeah. Sure. Yeah. Yeah. On the U-boat, uh-huh going to to the base.

Joe 7:55

Uh-huh.

Dylan 7:56

And it's on an island.

Joe 7:59

Yeah.

Dylan 7:59

And like they show like the island and it looks like green.

Joe 8:04

Uh-huh.

Dylan 8:05

And then like the next scene, they're like walking through the canyon and it's like back to the desert. Oh. And I'm I'm like, I I guess in my head, I'm like, do we skip something? I'm like, yeah. You know, I'm not following how it went from like, yeah, we're pulling into this base to oh, we're walking through the desert. Oh, yeah. Again.

Joe 8:29

Yeah.

Dylan 8:29

Right. Yeah.

Joe 8:32

Yeah, I don't know. I didn't I didn't really tie that together.

Dylan 8:36

I'll point it out to you next time.

Joe 8:38

Um I didn't feel that way. I mean, okay. I could see how putting this movie together would have been that way because it is that nostalgic um serial style of a movie. And so those those types of movies um at the time were like kind of movies that would be considered B movies. Okay. And so in the theater, you would have an A movie and a B movie. It's kind of like when an album is released and there's side A and side B. Right. So your main feature is your A movie, and then your sub-movie is your B movie. Gotcha. And so these little serials would be adventure stories. Like they they did like a Batman one, uh, or they would base them off of like adventure heroes and things like that. So I could see like, you know, it might have been maybe better to put more titles on the bottom saying where they were or why they were or whatever, you know, like like the like comic strips would. I don't know. Maybe I would do that if I did my own movies, but um, but yeah, maybe that would make it less confusing um for that reason.

Dylan 9:59

Yeah, and like with your title strips, I know I've kind of said it on the podcast before, but like you know, show me something, don't tell me something. Yeah, and I think that just more works into the narrative of it and storytelling side of it, yeah, than like let's just throw up the words up on the screen to catch you up to where we are now.

Joe 10:22

Right, yeah. So yeah, but if if there was a you know, if there was an original intention to go to an that island and then they changed midway, then it would make sense if they said, you know, um Dred, we're blown off course.

Dylan 10:39

Yeah, yeah, exactly.

Joe 10:42

Way off course, right? We're back where we started. Yeah.

Dylan 10:47

So I don't know. First first mate Joe has let us in a circle yet again. Yeah, yet again. Yeah, exactly.

Joe 10:55

Sorry. But my bad guys keep giving me the same job. You're holding the map upside down. Oh. I thought you were supposed to turn the map as we're heading this way, so I just turned it. Exactly.

Dylan 11:15

We want to see where we want to go. I know where we've been. Yeah, exactly. Oh my yeah.

Characters And Casting What Ifs

Dylan 11:27

Okay, so let's talk characters. Yep. Uh first off, you have our our main man, Indiana Jones, played by Harrison Ford. Yep. I did recognize him. Um was this role like written for him? Like some of the others, or you would have thought. Really fits into it.

Joe 11:49

Yeah, yeah, he does. Um I think I think it kind of goes back and forth. Um, but I think Spielberg really wanted him up front, but George Lucas didn't because he didn't want to keep casting Harrison Ford and kind of the same or just oh yeah, because he was in Star Wars. He was on solo. Oh, so he didn't and he was also in a movie that they did um that he did like in the mid-70s called Um American Graffiti, and that was his first movie. Yeah. Um, he was uh he was uh a carpenter on a set. And he had him come in and read because he was like, Hey, I need somebody to read. Do you guys want to make a couple bucks? Yeah. So he goes in and reads, and then he remembered him when Star Wars came around. Wow. Asked him to read again. He was still doing carpentry work because the movie that he did, you know, didn't really. So so then that's how they they kind of got wow, that's so cool. So Spielberg was like, oh, you know, to get on solo, yeah, I guess. And George Zeus is like, I don't think I wanna.

Dylan 13:10

We are watching Star Wars later in the season.

Joe 13:13

Yeah. So uh I don't know if you know who Tom Selleck is, but uh he played Magnum P. I uh and he was on Friends and Three Men and a Baby, and he's done all kinds of stuff. Okay. Tom Selleck was the original person to uh he actually screen test uh for for the movie uh with uh when you know once they started to get an idea of what the costuming was gonna look like and all that, yeah, and they did a lot of things, but because of that show was coming up, um the producers of that show were like, no, he can't do it, he's contractually obligated to the show, and so he ended up you know being really successful. Oh this guy, okay. Yeah, sorry, I looked him up. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Mustache.

Dylan 14:08

Yeah, the mustachio man, blue bloods. So he was already committed to Magnum PI, yeah.

Joe 14:17

Oh, okay. He was already committed to it, so um, you know, he couldn't take it, and that you know, that was like but he you know, it's one of those things where even though he didn't take that role, the role he took was like successful. So we'll see. Right, right. So it's good for him, and so they kind of had some other people come in and famous guys come in and and and uh read, and they just they were just like, okay, Harrison Ford is gonna do the carpenter gets it.

Dylan 14:53

Yeah, yeah, the carpenter gets it. Something that kind of frustrated me about Indiana Jones is that I felt like there was sometimes where he he won by accident. Okay. Yeah, because like I don't know, the like when he's fighting the really big guy by the plane that's spinning in circles. Yeah. And uh like, you know, they're they're duking it out. Yeah. And uh Indiana Jones hits the ground and the guy gets dropped.

Joe 15:40

Uh-huh. Yeah. Yeah. Minced. Yeah.

Dylan 15:45

I still can't believe this would have been rated at a PG movie.

Joe 15:50

Yeah, well. It's it's a good thing they didn't show more than they did. Yeah, I know.

Dylan 15:56

Okay, and then who was the lady who who kind of the the side gal?

Joe 16:02

Uh Marion Ravenwood. Marion. Okay, who who played her? Karen Allen? Okay. They had they had uh I think Spielberg had worked with her on another movie, and she was in Animal House, and so that movie was pretty popular at the time. Gotcha.

Dylan 16:22

I mean that makes sense. Um she kind of annoyed me sometimes because instead of being like kind of the strong female character like she was trying to be, yeah, it was just like uh, oh help me, help me.

Joe 16:39

Damsel in distress sometimes.

Dylan 16:41

Yeah, thank you. Exactly. Yeah. And I'm like, you know, you try to be, you know, big and you know, big and bad. Right. You don't want to be all cool. Yeah. And then you're like, oh, help me. Yeah. And it's like, okay, yeah, help yourself. Yeah.

Joe 16:56

Right. Yeah.

Dylan 16:57

And there are times where uh the lid of your of your clothes hamper is being held down by a monkey. Right. I'm sure you could throw it off. Yeah. Yeah.

Joe 17:10

Yeah. That yeah. There are times like that. Yeah. And I mean she clocks them right when she sees them, you know. So it's right. Yeah.

Dylan 17:18

Like you have like kind of a uh epic uh introduction. Right. That she's like, oh yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And you're like, ooh, she means business.

Joe 17:31

Yeah, yeah. Like she can kick some butt. Don't mess with this one. Yeah.

Dylan 17:36

Yeah. And just yeah. I was disappointed. She definitely had the on-screen chemistry down though.

Joe 17:47

With in with Indy. Yeah. So there was Belluck. Um, he was his nemesis, Indiana's nemesis.

Dylan 17:57

So he was the guy with the Fedora man in the gray color suit, right?

Joe 18:03

Um the main guy who who was, you know, he was kind of like the the guy all in black. No, Bellock was a different one. Yeah, Bellok was the guy who um was the other archaeologist who was working for the gotcha. Yeah.

Dylan 18:21

How rude of him. Yeah, exactly. How rude. Yeah, I had to laugh though, because for him being kind of the the rival archaeologist to Indy, it's like he was just spicking spans clean the whole time. Yeah. And I'm like, did you do anything?

Joe 18:43

Right, yeah. Well, yeah, because he had the money to pay everybody to do what needed to be done. Right.

Dylan 18:49

That's true.

Joe 18:50

Taking the wrong spot.

Dylan 18:51

Yeah.

Joe 18:52

Yeah, exactly. Whereas Indy was like, well, I'm getting paid to do this, but I'm not gonna, you know, I'm not gonna share that. Yeah.

Dylan 19:03

Who was Indy's friend that would help him out?

Joe 19:09

Um Sala. Salah. Yeah.

Dylan 19:14

Um his ally. His ally. Yeah, it kind of made me laugh though, because uh it's like it reminded me of like a dog, just how dogs are loyal no matter what.

Joe 19:29

Oh yeah, yeah, yeah, in a good way.

Dylan 19:32

Right.

Joe 19:34

Yeah. Yeah. Originally uh he was supposed uh that character was supposed to be Danny DeVito, and on paper it says he's five foot, you know. And the and you know, John Reese Davis, who you know, he was in Lord of the Rings by now, and he actually was the first kingpin uh on a Marvel Kingpin live action. Oh really? Yeah, he played him in uh one of the Hulk movies, yeah. Yeah, so right early in his career, you know, and now he's become this amazing guy. Yeah, yeah. But um, yeah, so uh so like he uh Spielberg told him like you know to to like make the performance more Shakespearean and and like to like like you know just to be yeah more theatrical, yeah, more theatrical.

Dylan 20:37

Gotcha. Yeah, because there were parts where he was like quoting something, you know, from from some sort of play. Yeah. I was like, what? What a sudden turn.

Joe 20:48

Yeah, yeah. And I guess he had played a a character in show uh TV mini-series called Shogun, and he was like, kind of play more that character, be more, you know, yeah, like um, yeah, because he's yeah, just way more like he's intellectually what Ballock looks like, you know, yeah. And hey, he he's got some good threads. Yeah.

Dylan 21:21

So who was the um the German bad guy who wore all black?

Joe 21:29

I think that was is it major tot or something like that? Um how do you pronounce it? I think it's just tot. Major tot. Yeah. Gotcha. Ronald Lacey. He Freulein.

Dylan 21:51

He did not play a b as big of a role in in it as I was expecting him to. And I was kind of disappointed. Uh yeah. Because like when I'm when I was watching it and the the scene where they're like in the uh in Marion's tavern, if you will. Uh huh. Oh yeah. That's burning to the ground now. Yeah. Um and he like walks in. Marion's bar and grill. And he walks into the bar and grill. Yeah. And like you just get this ominous presence. Yeah. He's flanked by the shadowy guys. Right. And you're like, oh, yeah. This is the guy. Yeah.

Joe 22:44

Yeah.

Dylan 22:45

And like, you know, that like it's such a memorable moment there. And then I guess you could say that that kind of follows through. At the end, it feels more like he's just tagging along for the ride. Right. And like when they're walking, you know, the kind of the last bit on the very lush desert island. Um and they're like walking through the bit, and Andy stops them and is like, I'm gonna blow up the ark. And like you see Major over there, and he is sitting down wiping off his glasses.

Joe 23:27

Yeah.

Dylan 23:28

Or like, you know, there's another part where he takes off his hat and like dabs at the very large bold spot that he's got. And it's like, come on. Yeah. Like, you could be so much cooler than that.

Joe 23:40

Right. Yeah. Oh, henchman.

John Williams Themes And Musical Story

Dylan 23:45

All right, Joe. So we've got to talk about the music.

Joe 23:48

Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Well, you can't do a Spielberg without a Williams. That's true.

Dylan 23:56

I think John Williams is probably one of our favorite movie composers. Yeah. Yeah.

Joe 24:03

Yeah. Um, yeah, he wrote two themes uh for for the movie, like two separate themes. Really? And played them for Spielberg, and he liked them both as well. So he ended up using one theme as a bridge to the main theme.

Dylan 24:22

Oh yeah.

Joe 24:22

Oh, that's cool though. Yeah. And so he worked them both together. So it was like he he sewed them together to be one long theme. You know?

Dylan 24:32

So yeah. Like when you're watching it, I love how it has the music underneath it. And then when Indy does, you know, something indie. You know, uh you it like pops in with the yeah, yeah, right. Yeah. Yeah. You have these key moments, right? And it really just drives it home.

Joe 24:58

Yeah, yeah. It's like the hero song or something, you know. Yeah. Yeah. And and to me, it's like looking at Indy and how he goes about things. Um it he kind of reminds me of Superman in some ways. Yeah. Or a you know, a character like that, or like a Batman. Because like when he's in school, he's like kind of preppy. Oh yeah, Bruce Wainton. You know, yeah, yeah, exactly. Yeah, he's got the glasses, you know, so it's like Clark can't. And then when he goes on his adventure, he has his leather jacket and his fedora and like oh yeah, and he's got contacts in or something.

Dylan 25:33

Right. I don't know.

Joe 25:36

Heavy glass. Um, so yeah, it just yeah, it's just one of those things where you know, and so then that that music that brings it in, it's like it's like the Superman music coming in, you know, which is John Williams, but you know. So um and then the cool thing is that he uh kind of referred to old 1940s movies where they would have like the German bad guys, and so he took some of those chord structures that they would use at the time, oh yeah, and kind of put that into the villain kind of so like you kind of have like a a like uh counter counteractive keys and stuff. So you have like the majors of of Indiana, and then you have like the minors of the bad guys. That's so cool, yeah. It's like yeah, it it's that's that's the cool thing about being able to compose and and put music together, is you can have those themes, and it not you know, you might not say, you know, this is this or that is that, but you can almost sense it because it's it's built into the right, you know.

Dylan 26:49

So yeah, yeah. See, it goes back to tell me, don't show me. Right. What?

Joe 26:58

Yeah, show me show me, don't tell me, yeah, right, yeah. But yeah, you get that feeling that once that that music kicks in, you're like, oh, yeah, yeah. Wait a minute.

Dylan 27:09

Yeah, take a step back.

Joe 27:11

This is yeah.

Practical Stunts And Sound Design Tricks

Dylan 27:12

So let's talk about the filmmaking then. It definitely kind of has that Spielberg feel to it. Yeah, yeah, kind of has his signature style. Yeah. Um I liked all the practical stunts in it though. Like that was great.

Joe 27:29

Yeah, that that's yeah, that's a favorite thing of mine because they um they wanted as many practical stunts, as many practical sets as possible to work on. Yeah, that's great. They went back and used the studios that they use for Star Wars. Oh yeah, yeah, and they so it was like in England, I think, and they built all the the huge sets and you know, pyramids and the caves and all that kind of stuff. Yeah. Um, so they're they were just like, we want we want it to be big, we want to be able to see as much as possible. Um, and so yeah, so there was like two different, or I think there was like maybe four different, specifically four Harrison Ford. Um, and uh the main stunt man's name was Vic Armstrong, and he looked the most like Harrison Ford, like side-by-side comparison. Yeah. It's like so what that does is you're able to move shots closer in so that you're believing that it's the actor. Yeah, and so that's like a payoff for everybody. Yeah. Because you never want to like be far away all the time, and then you see a stunt happen, and you're saying, Oh yeah, that's that would have been cool if it wasn't grainy.

Dylan 28:53

Yeah, yeah.

Joe 28:54

Or like, you know, you go back on home video and pause it, and it's some like, whoa, who's that guy? You know, yeah, yeah. So I think like they really took the time to find those guys to do that.

Dylan 29:08

Yeah, it pays off so well.

Joe 29:10

Yeah. There was uh I was telling you earlier about uh there's a stepman named Terry Leonard, and he had tried a stunt on um another movie, and it just didn't work and it didn't land. Oh yeah. And so when it came to uh doing stunts, he he had the idea of the car chase, and he was like, Hey, I want to try to do the stunt. And he's like, I know it's dangerous, but here's how we're we can pull it off. And um, and so it's that the car chase where Indy gets um pushed up to the front of the car and then goes underneath it. Yeah, um they you know he's like he's like I know a way to do this, and and so what they did was they like the track that they went across to to uh drive on, they dug a trench right between the whole the whole truck, and so when he goes under, then it gave him enough clearance under the car to to be safe, and then get pulled back up and then go.

Dylan 30:19

Yeah. Right before that scene, I pointed out to you too. I was like, oh look, good some Mercedes. Yeah, yeah. German, German company, German company, yeah. But yeah, um like having to dig the trench just so he wouldn't get taken out by the rear diff. Uh-huh. Like, that's crazy. Yeah, exactly. It's one of those things that you're like, hey, so if you do this wrong, you will probably die. Right, right. So good luck, don't mess it up. Yeah. Have fun, don't die. Yeah, yeah.

Joe 30:58

But that's part of the job. We make it fun.

Dylan 31:00

Yeah, yeah, I guess.

Joe 31:03

Just wouldn't look the same if he was wearing a helmet. Yeah. I think the cool thing um kind of goes along with with it's uh not with the music, but more with the world building and sound and stuff is is just how many sounds they used. Like yeah, they actually had uh so Harrison Ford was trained to do uh work with the whip. And so they had him, they originally were gonna have him recording whip sounds, but uh they ended up having the having him having Harrison Ford teach the sound guy how to do it. Really? And then they went into a closed environment and they just did multiple whip sounds just to yeah, just to get that, and then they just layered those over different scenes and and all that. Um the boulder, which we can talk about in favorite scenes, but the boulder, uh, the sound of it was they were driving from one set to the other and they were trying to figure out how to make this sound. Like, what should we make it sound like? And they had the windows open and they could hear the the tires on the gravel. And they were like, Oh, so they got out and they got all their stuff and they started recording it, and that that sounds so cool. It's a Honda Civic uh they said it was a Honda Civic station wagon. So that gravelly sound, and then like the hits for for uh punching and all that uh was leather jackets and baseball gloves, and they were hitting him with baseball bats, so it just gets this thump just the thud. Yeah, wow. Um the snakes uh were made with um why has it got to be snakes? Right. Uh they the sound they had um uh macaroni casserole. I guess the sound guy was eating at home, and his wife made a great casserole, and he they were eating this macaroni casserole, and it made the sound, and so they recorded it, and so like there's layers of macaroni casserole sounds over each other to sound like all the snakes. So it's like you never know when you're gonna find the right sound. That's so cool, yeah. Just and they use synthesizers and they used a lot of different things for that. And yeah, you can hear, you know, I think you pointed it out when it happened, but there is uh some Wilhelm screens. Yeah.

Favorite Scenes And Effects Secrets

Dylan 33:43

So favorite scenes. Um I have to say, one of my favorites is it just it has to be the sword versus gun scene. Yeah, yeah. Because that is just so like the guy, like crowd parts, big reveal, yeah. Yeah. Of the of the guy with the sword. Right. And you're like, oh boy, we're gonna get some good stone work, like it's gonna be kind of a drawn-out fight scene. Yeah, like Indy, you know, is bare arms versus a sword.

Joe 34:16

Yeah, Indy looks close.

Dylan 34:18

Indy looks at his whip a second, yeah, and then he just goes boom, pulls out the gun, just shoots him, yeah, takes off, and just the funniest moment.

Joe 34:34

Yeah. And the you know, the whole thing about that set was apparently people were getting sick on the set from the food and different things. Yeah. Um, and Spielberg had flown in like all his own food, which was like a lot of um what was it? Spaghettios. Like he just had his own food, so he never got sick. Well, Harrison Ford was sicker than a dog on that. Really? I just thought it was hot because he was sweaty the whole time. Right? No, why he had the sweats.

Dylan 35:11

So and uh feed a fever, starve a cold. I could have used that.

Joe 35:16

Yeah. So they kept trying to film it and they just couldn't get through it. And so he finally had the idea, well, how don't why don't I just, you know, just pull out my gun and shoot him and we're done with the scene. Yeah, that's great. Just and it just makes it because it's just like, uh yeah, I guess, yeah. You brought a gun to a sword fight. I I think one of my favorite scenes, and I was looking looking things up yesterday, is the boulder scene. Yeah, is the first scene, partly because I never I didn't realize for a long time that that that was Alfred Molina in the in the beginning of that, which he's done all kinds of great movies. Oh yeah, I mean this was like his first role, yeah. And that's why he looks so young and everything. But uh not only that, but so Carl Banks was a uh Disney comic book writer.

Dylan 36:13

Yeah.

Joe 36:14

Um, and uh he used to draw, um, he used to do these comic books for Disney, and he did a Uncle Scrooge comic. Um, and it was like these Uncle Scrooge comics were kind of a precursor to what became DuckTales on animated. So there's all these like cool old comics out there with with like kind of precursor to DuckTales. Oh and so they they um so there's a comic called The Seven Cities of Cebola, and that inspired that opening sequence. Really? Yeah, that like that whole opening sequence was inspired by this one comic book, uh, and they took that and basically made it real. Wow, the whole boulder, everything, everything that goes into it. It was like, you know, so it would be instead of you know indie going through it, it's like you know, Scrooge McDuck and the boys going through going through the caves and all of that. Wow, it's just totally cool. That's so funny, yeah. So that's like one of my one of my favorites for that reason.

Dylan 37:29

Yeah, yeah. Um another one that pops out for me is the opening of the arc because it's such a hold your breath moment, yeah. Because like it's this big reveal, the the German bad guys like reach their moment, this is their victory, and they take off the lid, and the guy reaches down, and it's just sand running through his hands, and you're like, what? Oh like are they really? Yeah, like that's it, yeah. This whole movie, yep. And like looking when it's oh when the camera is over top of them, yeah, looking down into the covenant, and it just starts to glow and like steam out, yeah. And you're like, oh, this is it, yeah, this is the moment. And then all of the work that just went into that scene. Uh-huh. It like that's so cool.

Joe 38:39

Yeah, yeah. There was just so much. I mean, uh this whole movie just I mean, with that um scene at the end where the fire is going through, it's just a miniature of you know, little model guys, you know, and and then the matting the way they do it, and just you know, just so much time and there's so much energy put into it. The uh makeup guy had the task of having the guy's face melt. Yeah. And you know, there is actually two there's the first guy on the left and then the guy on the right, right? And then the other guy just kind of explodes. Yeah. So that was probably a pretty easy task to do. Right. But uh they he had to layer um gelatin. Like I think a lot of people think think it's wax, but it's actually gelatin. And so they took uh a mold impression of the actors, and then they um took that mold and just painted gelatin inside like flesh-colored gelatin. Wow. And then they layered uh like to make the veins, they put they soaked um yarn in like you know, different colored gelatin to make like the vein colors, and then they would put veins in the middle of those layers and then just keep piling and piling and piling. That's crazy. And so once once they got everything together, they would they experimented on how fast it would go, uh, or how fast they could melt the gelatin. Yeah. And the first attempt was like so fragile that it just melted in seconds and peeled off and it didn't work the way they wanted it to. So they made it a little thicker and a little heavier and kind of did the layers differently. Uh, and then it took two propane space heaters that that they kind of look like rockets if you see them. Um, and then they used a heat gun to get the right uh so if it would start to melt on one side too much, they would use the hilt heat gun to like eat a little the other and to balance it out, yeah, and to kind of move things around. But all in all, it took about 10 minutes for the whole thing to to melt, yeah, and then they just sped it up in post and just kind of yeah, so yeah.

Dylan 41:12

Yeah, so something that we were talking about last season is in the Fright Knight episode. Um Jerry the vampire melts and collapses when exposed to the sunlight. Yeah, or was it him or was it the it was the henchman, yeah. Yeah, yeah. Um the ghoul, the ghoul. But yeah, so like that's widely noted as being inspired by the melting effect, um, as well as who frame Roger Rabbit. So the Judge Doom gets melted by the dip.

Joe 41:51

It's played by Christopher Lloyd, Doc Brown.

Dylan 41:54

If y'all wanted to know. There you go. Um, but yeah, it gets melted by the dip. So the dip.

Joe 42:04

So the other the other scene that I like is the hanger scene, and it was a gag that was originally written that Spielberg wrote for a movie um called 1943, but it didn't get used, it got scrapped. Oh, yeah. And so they still had the prop, and he still wanted to use that somewhere, and so they decided to add that to the tent scene. And the tent scene, that whole scene was a complete improv. They didn't they they had the description of what would happen, yeah, and then they took the two actors and then just had them uh you know impro improvise the whole thing, like hiding the knife, and because you know, you see her plotting to do everything, right? Right, and she takes her dress that she changed and puts uh top of the knife and they start drinking, and he's like, Well, I I grew up with this, you know, yeah, you could just tell in her face in that moment. She's like, Oh no, because she thinks she's gonna drink him under the table. And so then he walks in with this hanger, it seems to be this on ominous device that he's gonna, you know, uh torture her with, yeah, and then it ends up being a hanger for his coat.

Dylan 43:26

Right. Oh, we were watching that, he did that, and then hangs his coat, like just died laughing. You're like, it's a hanger, right? I was mad about that. I'm like, it's a hanger. It's like such a disappointment.

Joe 43:42

Yo, yeah. So, yeah, there's so many good good scenes that you know, even if they do feel stitched together, I think.

Dylan 43:52

Like Yeah, right.

Joe 43:54

Uh one last behind the scenes to to go back to season one. Is um sp uh Steven Spielberg and M Melissa Matheson wrote a script during shooting breaks on the location of this film. And um Matheson was there to visit her husband, Harrison Ford, and Spielberg uh dictated to her a story idea that he had. And the script that um they eventually filmed was E.T.

Dylan 44:27

Really? Yeah.

Joe 44:28

Wow. So that whole thing started on this movie.

Legacy Ratings And Final Thoughts

Dylan 44:35

So what kind of legacy did this movie have?

Joe 44:40

Man, it I I think it kicked off the the adventure genre because you know you had westerns and stuff, but this is a specific kind of niche, yeah, you know um like the mummy, you know, Brendan Fraser. Like it's just you just know, like that's and there were other adventure movies, but I think this one really took all the elements of um like even throwing back to the relationship with um with uh Indiana Jones and Marion, yeah. Um so there's a director named Fran Frank Capra, and he's done he's directed a lot of different um old older movies. Um and I feel like this kind of this movie gives that genre like another lift, and and it kind of gives um homage to those movies as well. Yeah. And just the the pairing of the couple and the way they're treating each other and the way he he like he just goes to drink after he thinks she's gone, and he just like is totally torn apart, and when he sees her for the first time, just that that love and endearment, and and so then when they're together and they're fighting together, and there's this just like sort of they're so in sync. Yeah, they're so in sync, and it's sort of like it's not so much a rom-com, but there's that feeling of it, and the feeling of like, you know, so the I I I really think like they put a lot into into it in that way, and so it just takes like, you know, again, like the mummy in National Treasure, where you kind of have a sort of damsel in distress, but she's also able to stand on her own two feet, you know, like in the mummy, like she's you know, she can throw a right hook every once in a while, too, you know.

Dylan 46:52

Yeah, I think the mummy is one we're getting into later this season, too. Yeah. Uh something that I kept getting vibes of from this movie, uh another Spielberg movie is Goonies. Yeah, yeah. I like how Goonies kind of is the same stitched together, you know, one action scene right after another. Yeah. And I just kept getting like strong Goonies vibes from the whole thing. Yeah.

Joe 47:22

Yeah. Well, it's Spielberg. So after finally seeing Raiders of the Lost Ark, did Indiana Jones live up to the hype?

Dylan 47:34

Oh, yes. Yeah, good. Um it's funny because I have seen the Indiana Jones stun spectacular at Disney's Hollywood Studios, which we're going to in a couple months. Yeah. Um, I've seen that so many times. And then watching this movie, I'm like, oh, yeah, like I get that. Yeah.

Joe 47:58

Yeah. Yeah. Um, I've I've only been on Indiana Jones the ride like a million times. But yeah, and I love that ride for that. You know, it's just um that's the one thing that with uh with Universal, like Mummy reminds me of Indiana Jones. Yeah, right. It has that same vibe. I I swear the cars are the same. Not at all, but anyways.

Dylan 48:30

But yeah, just out of the the whole thing, um, it just lives up to the hype so well.

Joe 48:38

Yeah.

Dylan 48:39

And it's it's not one of those things that gets all blown out of proportion. You know, how some how some movies people hype it up so much that you're expecting something, you know, really big. Like it just lives up to that expectation that was said.

Joe 48:56

Yeah. So and it's just interesting that like you said with the boulder scene, that's the first scene. Yeah and then the melting scene is like one of the very last scenes. It's like, and those are the two hugest things that that you see out of that movie, and there's so much more in the middle.

Dylan 49:15

Something else with the very last scene that we thought um was when they boxed up the arc and took it into the warehouse of all, you know, the the US uh I don't even remember what the box said. Yeah, but like, you know, the do not open. Yeah. And there's all those other boxes, and you're like, oh my gosh.

Joe 49:41

Like yeah, like part of it too is like, was some of this Indiana's previous adventures? Right, you know, like, you know, I think you were saying could there be a whole uh side series based on the artifacts or the people bringing the artifacts or you know, like just so many opportunities, yeah.

Dylan 50:07

So many ways you could take that, yeah, yeah.

Joe 50:10

Yeah, I think that's I don't know, I feel like that's their way that they set up sequels for that. Right.

Dylan 50:16

It's just like so yeah, but I think for me though, this movie, I would probably rate it uh a seven out of ten.

Joe 50:25

Okay.

Dylan 50:26

I th I like it's good. I would definitely rewatch it.

Joe 50:29

Uh-huh. Yeah. Yeah. I'd go seven. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. It's it's yeah, it's it's decent. And I'm gonna watch it with my wife because she wanted to watch it. Right. Yeah. She had to miss. But uh, yeah, so I'll I'll watch it again with her and we'll probably end up going through the series just because we've seen it. Yeah.

Dylan 50:52

So thanks for listening to Have You Seen the Movie Podcast.

Joe 50:56

Make sure to follow the show on your favorite podcast app, and if you're enjoying it, leave us a five-star rating. It really helps us to grow.

Dylan 51:03

And we want to hear from you. Text us your name and a movie suggestion using the link in the description. You can follow all of our socials in the description as well.

Joe 51:13

Everything you need is right there.

Dylan 51:15

We'll be back next week with another movie premiere.

Joe 51:18

So, Dylan, when does this episode come out?

Dylan 51:21

We have top men working on it right now.

Joe 51:23

Who?

Dylan 51:24

Top men.