So today marks the 39th year to the day that Dr. Indiana Jones first graced our screens. George Lucas wrote The Adventures of Indiana Smith, he wanted to portray this onto the silver screen and discussed the idea with Philip Kaufman. They decided on the project Ark Of The Covenant, but Clint Eastwood, would hire Kaufman to write The Outlaw Josey Wales, hence stalling the project. in 1977 while George Lucas took a vacation instead of going to the premiere of Star Wars, as he expected it to flop, he met up with Steven Spielberg in Hawaii. Steven Spielberg was there working on Close Encounters Of The Third Kind, and expressed to George Lucas, his desire to make a James Bond Movie. Well George Lucas seized his opportunity and said he had an idea "better than James Bond" and pitched his plot outline of Raiders Of The Lost Ark (The projects new name). Steven Spielberg's eyes lit up as he loved the whole concept and said "it's James Bond without the hardware". As they discussed the idea, it was Steven Spielberg that wanted to change the name of the hero from Smith, he chose Jones. Once the idea was coming together the 2 directors made a deal for a 5 movie package with Paramount Pictures.
June 12th 1981 the first movie is released. Raiders of The Lost Ark is set in 1936, with an archaeology professor called Indiana Jones (played by Harrison Ford) searching for a golden statue in a South American jungle. The statue is guarded by traps, that Dr. Jones activates. After managing to escape and returning to normal life, a museum curator, Marcus Brody (played by Denholm Elliott) comes to talk to Dr. Jones regarding a biblical artifact called The Ark Of The Covenant. The Ark was said to hold the tablets that contained the 10 Commandments, and was believed to have incredible power. The Ark is being pursued by the Third Reich, so Indiana Jones is hired by United States officials to get to it first. Indiana Jones stops in Nepal to get something off of old girlfriend Marion (played by Karen Allen) before heading to Cairo to meet up with his friend and ally, Sallah (played by John Rhys-Davies).
3 years after the success of Raiders Of The Lost Ark, came the prequel to Indiana's life in the movie Indiana Jones And The Temple Of Doom. Set in India in 1935, our hero is asked to find a mystical stone, while here he stumbles across a cult that is enslaving and sacrificing humans in the catacombs of an ancient palace. In this movie Indiana is joined by Willie (short for Wilhelmina) Scott (played by Kate Capshaw), a nightclub singer and Short Round (played by Ke Huy Quan), who is a 12 year old Chinese boy who is very streetwise.
In 1989, Indiana Jones And The Last Crusade came to our lives. Now this movie is special and also aptly named as George Lucas had decided that this would be the end of the series. He was cutting the 5 movie deal short as he could not thing of how the series would or could progress. He would chose instead to concentrate The Young Indiana Jones Chronicles which explored the characters early years. Anyway back to The Last Crusade. Set in 1938, Indiana is asked by an art collector if he would embark on a search for the Holy Grail. A precious and powerful artifact that, again Hitler is trying to gain the power of. It is at this point that he finds out that he is not the first archaeologist to go in search of the goblet, someone has already disappeared in the search, that person is Indy's father Professor Henry Jones, Sr. (played by Sean Connery). He is joined on this mission by the returning Denholm Elliott as Marcus Brody, John Rhys-Davies as Sallah, and seeks Dr. Elsa Schneider's (played by Alison Doody) knowledge on how what clues are there regarding the whereabouts of the Holy Grail.
So onto the movie that very nearly wasn't. In 2008 after a 19 year absence we have our Indy back, set in 1957, Dr. Henry "Indiana" Jones Jr. is called back into action. The Soviets are looking to discover, and uncover the secrets of the artifacts known as the Crystal Skulls. The movie titled was derived from this as Indiana Jones And The Kingdom Of The Crystal Skull was aired. Indiana is bought a coded message by Mutt Williams (played by Shia LeBeouf) from Indy's aged, demented colleague Professor Harold Oxley (played by Sir John Hurt). Using the code given to them by Oxley, Indiana, Williams and returning Marion Ravenwood (again played by Karen Allen) set of for Peru, oblivious to the fact that a team of Soviets, led by Irina Spalko (played by Cate Blanchett) are hot on their tails. If our team of heroes can get to, locate, and return the legendary skull to its rightful place, all will be good. On the other hand, if the Spalko led Soviets manage to retrieve it first, then the powers she will gain will endanger the whole of the Western World.
Fun Fact about this movie, Steven Spielberg's daughter Sasha Spielberg plays a small role
Indiana Jones 5 or the Untitled Indiana Jones Project is the final piece of that jigsaw that all those years back Spielberg and Lucas had promised. It has a date of release of 28th July 2022 at the moment. I just hope that sentimental values will prevail and they are able to deliver this movie on the anniversary of Raiders Of The Lost Ark. Little is known of the plot as it is completely unwraps, the only thing is that Harrison Ford will again pick up that whip and hat and be trying his best to save us all from impending dangers.
The 5th Movie will be the first movie of the series since Disney acquired LucasFilm production company from George Lucas in 2012. I think he may have made a little bit of a profit, but worked hard to build the reputation we know and love with this series of films being near the top. The company was sold for $4 Billion. And just think, if that meeting didn't happen in 1977, would we have Indiana Jones in our lives?
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