Film critic David Hughes summed it up: "Good things come to those who wait". As soon as the news was broadcast all over the world this summer, that Steven Spielberg and George Lucas confirmed the title of their long-awaited fourth instalment in the popular adventure series - Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull - the public has been nothing but ecstatic, at the prospect of seeing yet another Indy movie starring Harrison Ford. I mean where have all the entire original, real action heroes gone? Clint Eastwood and Mel Gibson have retreated to solely directing, Arnie the politico is busy pushing Republican pencils with no official confirmation as yet that he will be starring in Terminator IV and The Cruiser (Tom Cruise) has gone back to acting in probably Oscar worthy roles (Valkyrie, Lions for Lambs).
It's been 18 years since Indiana Jones last rode off into the sunset, and the prospect of seeing another Indy movie has never been rubbed off from every film fan's top 10 wish list. Without a doubt Indiana Jones remains that timeless roguish, loveable hero that we can't get enough of!! With all of the annual CGI- (computer graphic imagery) infested flop summer movies, that promise more than they can actually deliver, Indy IV's slated 2008 release comes as a relief, as they sure don't make them like they used to! In fact, Mr Spielberg wants to keep the filming of action scenes as realistic as possible, with the emphasis on shooting live action scenes where Mr Ford performs all of the stunts himself, reducing completely the number of CGI scenes to a bare minimum.
There is currently a lot of speculation and curiosity regarding the latest Indy plot: What adventure will the intrepid archaeologist get himself into next? The script is being kept under a tight leash. But this much is true: The story will take place in the 1950s Rock 'n' Roll era and it will star Britons John Hurt, Cate Blanchett and Ray Winstone. Unfortunately, fans who are expecting a surprise appearance from Sean Connery will be sadly disappointed as Mr Bond has expressed on more than one occasion that he is enjoying retirement too much. In order to target the younger audience, the producers have drafted in the young rising star Shia LaBeouf, who has recently starred in Dreamworks' Transformers and Disturbia, to play the new young sidekick. Indeed, die-hard Indy fans were given a teaser at the San Diego Comic - Con conference, where they were shown a video link available on www.indianajones.com showing Karen Allen who starred in Raiders of the Lost Ark reprising her role as Indiana Jones's love interest Marion Ravenwood. It is only recently that Mr Spielberg spilt the beans and confirmed that the bad guys in question will be Russian Communists, not German Nazis.
One thing's for sure - Indy's aura of intrigue and speculation off-screen is as exciting as it is on celluloid. Since filming began last June not only were there fans who snuck in to catch a closer glimpse at their hero in between scenes, but thieves managed to break into Mr Spielberg's and Mr Lucas's production offices and steal laptops containing over 2,500 onset photos of the latest Indy instalment. Luckily, the police managed to arrest the perpetrators and retrieve the stolen items. To add insult to injury, a young extra who plays a dancing Russian soldier revealed some of the major plot anecdotes with the Oklahoma newspaper The Edmond Sun. Luckily, the story was removed from the newspaper's website.
Indy IV is once again set to reinvigorate the classic adventure for the big screen. The comeback marks a triumphal return of the things we love most. All of those instantly recognisable trademarks spring to mind: That hat, the whip, the brown leather jacket, Mr Ford's unshaven stubble, composer John William's rousing orchestral music score, damsels in distress, golden artifacts, Indy's comic one-liners in the face of danger, the booby traps, oh and the snakes, did we mention the snakes...
Talk about déjà -vu but way back in 1981, the time was ripe for a new breed of adventurer. Raiders of the Lost Ark was originally intended as a small low-budget film. No one could have chosen a better poster tagline - The Return of the Great Adventure was short and concise. Mr Spielberg and Mr Lucas wanted to cast an unknown, in fact Tom Selleck was originally cast, but lost the part due to his contract with television's Magnum PI. Mr Selleck said: "When I lost Raiders through no fault of my own, I thought, well, that was my shot." He added: "Now I've seen the film it's hard to imagine anyone better than Harrison Ford. He was wonderful!"
With a twist of irony, it was thanks to Mr Selleck that Mr Ford became a household name, with his excellent Bogartish portrayal of archaeologist Dr Indiana Jones, a distinguished scholar who sheds his spectacles to live a life of high adventure outside of the classroom.
Raiders was a throwback to the classic Saturday adventure matinees from the 1940s (Zorro, Captain Marvel, Flash Gordon) not to mention the influences from Humphrey Bogart in the classic The Treasure of the Sierra Madre and Charlton Heston's Harry Steele role in The Secret of the Incas.
From "Weird Al" Yankovic's comic Indy homage in The Vidiot from U.H.F to Disney's Duck Tales, Raiders of the Lost Ark is part of popular culture. Jam-packed with so many comic scenes and astounding filming locations, how can anyone forget Raiders' opening teaser sequence that involved a booby trapped ancient Peruvian temple. After recovering the golden idol, Indy stumbles upon a gigantic rolling boulder and as he ran for his life the audience yelled "Run, Run" at the screen! Possibly one of the funniest moments in the movie that deserves top place in cinema comedy history books alone, is Indy's encounter with a black-clad swordsman, who starts wielding and spinning his sword only to be anticlimactically shot by Indy with a bored look on his face... Simply hilarious!
Karen Allen's feisty heroine Marion was more than a match for the intrepid explorer. Ms Allen's flirty catchphrase: "Indiana Jones, I always knew someday you'd come walking back through my door..." and afterwards punching him in the face is a classic. Last but not least, Raiders' chilling scenes are those in which Indy and Marion are trapped in a slithering, snake-infested catacomb with Mr Ford uttering the classic one-liner: "Snakes... Why did it have to be the snakes?" and when finally the Ark of the Covenant is opened and all hell breaks loose, and ghastly ghosts and apparitions scare the living daylights out of our heroes. The whole God's Final Judgment aura of mystery fuelled by the special effects in this scene was remarkable.
Soon after the successful release of Raiders of the Lost Ark which grossed $383 million at the box office, the next question on Mr Lucas's and Mr Spielberg's lips was: "How can we top this?" The answer was simple: A heart-pounding sequel namely, Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom, at a breakneck epic-scale that is double the action and moves at twice the pace of the original.
From its rousing Shanghai nightclub getaway opening sequence, where Ford and Kate Capshaw's Willie are aided by their 11-year-old sidekick Short Round (Jonathan Ke Quan) to an unforgettable gun battle that takes place in an underground helter skelter railway ride, Temple of Doom was non-stop action all the way.
This time the daredevil archaeologist had to contend with not one but two black-clad swordsmen wielding their swords, however this time the tables were turned as when he reached for his holster his gun was nowhere to be seen. Oh and lest we forget, Indy was served monkey brains for dinner and the secret passage way crawling with dreaded bugs made scratching among cast members the order of the day!
The threequel was inevitable; Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade is, in my opinion, the best Indy adventure. It revolves around Indy's search for the Holy Grail (Da Vinci Code... anyone?) and the rescue of his father from the Nazis, who to everyone's surprise turned out to be none other than Sean Connery.
On the other side of the pond, film connoisseurs and critics have been asking the big question: Is there a place for Indy in this competitive new world? The heroes of the adventure films that have swung to the screen in recent years, including Tomb Raider (Angelina Jolie), The Mummy (Brendan Fraser), Zorro (Antonio Banderas), The Pirates of the Caribbean (Johnny Depp) and National Treasure (Nicolas Cage) series, seem to have borrowed an awful lot from Indy in the action stakes.
This is nothing new as back in the 1980s, by the time the Temple of Doom sequel was released, there were countless adventure spin-offs that wanted a piece of Indy's action e.g. Romancing the Stone (Michael Douglas), King Solomon's Mines (Richard Chamberlain), Firewalker (Chuck Norris) and television series (Bring Them Back Alive!, Tales of the Gold Monkey). Not to mention that Mr Spielberg was the executive producer of The Goonies and Sherlock Holmes and The Pyramid of Fear that were essentially Indiana Jones for adolescents. Just like now, back then the stakes became higher, but this did not detract Mr Spielberg and Mr Lucas from producing the third 1989 instalment that was so successful and popular with young and adult viewers alike.
In an interview with www.theraider.net, Mr Lucas's quote was spot-on: "A lot of people now just do contrived action sequences, even though people think Indiana Jones is so outrageous, it is still credible".
I have no doubt that with all the enthusiasm and anticipation building up for Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull's 2008 release, Mr Spielberg and Mr Lucas are taking note of fans' high expectations to produce a worthy conclusion to the saga packed with thrilling action sequences and astounding set pieces. A run-of-the-mill sequel that might jeopardise the franchise is certainly out of the cards.
What has certainly improved in this new instalment is Indy's love interest with the return of Ms Allen's Marion Ravenwood; as in the Last Crusade, Indy's romance with Alison Doody's Dr Elsa Schneider just fizzled out into thin air because the script required her to collaborate with the Nazis.
The fact that there is also Brit beauty Cate Blanchett featuring in the new film, well I can somehow sense that there will be a love triangle on the horizon.
Let's just hope that with all that's happened already there won't be any more nasty surprises in store for the cast and crew till the film's slated 2008 release in the US on Memorial Day (May 28). One thing's for sure: We know Indy will prevail and save the day.
It's been 18 years since Indiana Jones last rode off into the sunset, and the prospect of seeing another Indy movie has never been rubbed off from every film fan's top 10 wish list. Without a doubt Indiana Jones remains that timeless roguish, loveable hero that we can't get enough of!! With all of the annual CGI- (computer graphic imagery) infested flop summer movies, that promise more than they can actually deliver, Indy IV's slated 2008 release comes as a relief, as they sure don't make them like they used to! In fact, Mr Spielberg wants to keep the filming of action scenes as realistic as possible, with the emphasis on shooting live action scenes where Mr Ford performs all of the stunts himself, reducing completely the number of CGI scenes to a bare minimum.
There is currently a lot of speculation and curiosity regarding the latest Indy plot: What adventure will the intrepid archaeologist get himself into next? The script is being kept under a tight leash. But this much is true: The story will take place in the 1950s Rock 'n' Roll era and it will star Britons John Hurt, Cate Blanchett and Ray Winstone. Unfortunately, fans who are expecting a surprise appearance from Sean Connery will be sadly disappointed as Mr Bond has expressed on more than one occasion that he is enjoying retirement too much. In order to target the younger audience, the producers have drafted in the young rising star Shia LaBeouf, who has recently starred in Dreamworks' Transformers and Disturbia, to play the new young sidekick. Indeed, die-hard Indy fans were given a teaser at the San Diego Comic - Con conference, where they were shown a video link available on www.indianajones.com showing Karen Allen who starred in Raiders of the Lost Ark reprising her role as Indiana Jones's love interest Marion Ravenwood. It is only recently that Mr Spielberg spilt the beans and confirmed that the bad guys in question will be Russian Communists, not German Nazis.
One thing's for sure - Indy's aura of intrigue and speculation off-screen is as exciting as it is on celluloid. Since filming began last June not only were there fans who snuck in to catch a closer glimpse at their hero in between scenes, but thieves managed to break into Mr Spielberg's and Mr Lucas's production offices and steal laptops containing over 2,500 onset photos of the latest Indy instalment. Luckily, the police managed to arrest the perpetrators and retrieve the stolen items. To add insult to injury, a young extra who plays a dancing Russian soldier revealed some of the major plot anecdotes with the Oklahoma newspaper The Edmond Sun. Luckily, the story was removed from the newspaper's website.
Indy IV is once again set to reinvigorate the classic adventure for the big screen. The comeback marks a triumphal return of the things we love most. All of those instantly recognisable trademarks spring to mind: That hat, the whip, the brown leather jacket, Mr Ford's unshaven stubble, composer John William's rousing orchestral music score, damsels in distress, golden artifacts, Indy's comic one-liners in the face of danger, the booby traps, oh and the snakes, did we mention the snakes...
Talk about déjà -vu but way back in 1981, the time was ripe for a new breed of adventurer. Raiders of the Lost Ark was originally intended as a small low-budget film. No one could have chosen a better poster tagline - The Return of the Great Adventure was short and concise. Mr Spielberg and Mr Lucas wanted to cast an unknown, in fact Tom Selleck was originally cast, but lost the part due to his contract with television's Magnum PI. Mr Selleck said: "When I lost Raiders through no fault of my own, I thought, well, that was my shot." He added: "Now I've seen the film it's hard to imagine anyone better than Harrison Ford. He was wonderful!"
With a twist of irony, it was thanks to Mr Selleck that Mr Ford became a household name, with his excellent Bogartish portrayal of archaeologist Dr Indiana Jones, a distinguished scholar who sheds his spectacles to live a life of high adventure outside of the classroom.
Raiders was a throwback to the classic Saturday adventure matinees from the 1940s (Zorro, Captain Marvel, Flash Gordon) not to mention the influences from Humphrey Bogart in the classic The Treasure of the Sierra Madre and Charlton Heston's Harry Steele role in The Secret of the Incas.
From "Weird Al" Yankovic's comic Indy homage in The Vidiot from U.H.F to Disney's Duck Tales, Raiders of the Lost Ark is part of popular culture. Jam-packed with so many comic scenes and astounding filming locations, how can anyone forget Raiders' opening teaser sequence that involved a booby trapped ancient Peruvian temple. After recovering the golden idol, Indy stumbles upon a gigantic rolling boulder and as he ran for his life the audience yelled "Run, Run" at the screen! Possibly one of the funniest moments in the movie that deserves top place in cinema comedy history books alone, is Indy's encounter with a black-clad swordsman, who starts wielding and spinning his sword only to be anticlimactically shot by Indy with a bored look on his face... Simply hilarious!
Karen Allen's feisty heroine Marion was more than a match for the intrepid explorer. Ms Allen's flirty catchphrase: "Indiana Jones, I always knew someday you'd come walking back through my door..." and afterwards punching him in the face is a classic. Last but not least, Raiders' chilling scenes are those in which Indy and Marion are trapped in a slithering, snake-infested catacomb with Mr Ford uttering the classic one-liner: "Snakes... Why did it have to be the snakes?" and when finally the Ark of the Covenant is opened and all hell breaks loose, and ghastly ghosts and apparitions scare the living daylights out of our heroes. The whole God's Final Judgment aura of mystery fuelled by the special effects in this scene was remarkable.
Soon after the successful release of Raiders of the Lost Ark which grossed $383 million at the box office, the next question on Mr Lucas's and Mr Spielberg's lips was: "How can we top this?" The answer was simple: A heart-pounding sequel namely, Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom, at a breakneck epic-scale that is double the action and moves at twice the pace of the original.
From its rousing Shanghai nightclub getaway opening sequence, where Ford and Kate Capshaw's Willie are aided by their 11-year-old sidekick Short Round (Jonathan Ke Quan) to an unforgettable gun battle that takes place in an underground helter skelter railway ride, Temple of Doom was non-stop action all the way.
This time the daredevil archaeologist had to contend with not one but two black-clad swordsmen wielding their swords, however this time the tables were turned as when he reached for his holster his gun was nowhere to be seen. Oh and lest we forget, Indy was served monkey brains for dinner and the secret passage way crawling with dreaded bugs made scratching among cast members the order of the day!
The threequel was inevitable; Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade is, in my opinion, the best Indy adventure. It revolves around Indy's search for the Holy Grail (Da Vinci Code... anyone?) and the rescue of his father from the Nazis, who to everyone's surprise turned out to be none other than Sean Connery.
On the other side of the pond, film connoisseurs and critics have been asking the big question: Is there a place for Indy in this competitive new world? The heroes of the adventure films that have swung to the screen in recent years, including Tomb Raider (Angelina Jolie), The Mummy (Brendan Fraser), Zorro (Antonio Banderas), The Pirates of the Caribbean (Johnny Depp) and National Treasure (Nicolas Cage) series, seem to have borrowed an awful lot from Indy in the action stakes.
This is nothing new as back in the 1980s, by the time the Temple of Doom sequel was released, there were countless adventure spin-offs that wanted a piece of Indy's action e.g. Romancing the Stone (Michael Douglas), King Solomon's Mines (Richard Chamberlain), Firewalker (Chuck Norris) and television series (Bring Them Back Alive!, Tales of the Gold Monkey). Not to mention that Mr Spielberg was the executive producer of The Goonies and Sherlock Holmes and The Pyramid of Fear that were essentially Indiana Jones for adolescents. Just like now, back then the stakes became higher, but this did not detract Mr Spielberg and Mr Lucas from producing the third 1989 instalment that was so successful and popular with young and adult viewers alike.
In an interview with www.theraider.net, Mr Lucas's quote was spot-on: "A lot of people now just do contrived action sequences, even though people think Indiana Jones is so outrageous, it is still credible".
I have no doubt that with all the enthusiasm and anticipation building up for Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull's 2008 release, Mr Spielberg and Mr Lucas are taking note of fans' high expectations to produce a worthy conclusion to the saga packed with thrilling action sequences and astounding set pieces. A run-of-the-mill sequel that might jeopardise the franchise is certainly out of the cards.
What has certainly improved in this new instalment is Indy's love interest with the return of Ms Allen's Marion Ravenwood; as in the Last Crusade, Indy's romance with Alison Doody's Dr Elsa Schneider just fizzled out into thin air because the script required her to collaborate with the Nazis.
The fact that there is also Brit beauty Cate Blanchett featuring in the new film, well I can somehow sense that there will be a love triangle on the horizon.
Let's just hope that with all that's happened already there won't be any more nasty surprises in store for the cast and crew till the film's slated 2008 release in the US on Memorial Day (May 28). One thing's for sure: We know Indy will prevail and save the day.