Indiana Jones and the Raiders of the Lost Ark          

By Tom Keogh

Steven Spielberg and George Lucas's 1981 resurrection of the Saturday-matinee adventure genre was deservedly popular, and kicked off a successful trilogy. Set in 1936, this first feature introduces Harrison Ford as Indiana Jones, an archaeologist and adventurer whose quests for rare antiquities frequently find him running from one menace or another. Raiders finds Dr. Jones in the middle of a Nazi plot to use the mysterious powers of the Ark of the Covenant to win the war. Karen Allen plays the love interest with an old-fashioned "man's woman" appeal (she can drink anybody under the table and is free with her fists). The constant, cliffhanger appeal of the movie is great fun--one is always wondering how Indy will get out of one scrape after another--and Ford's career got a big boost with his self-effacing but masculine portrayal of the hero

Academy Awards

Raiders of the Lost Ark won Academy Awards for Art Direction/Set Decoration (Norman Reynolds - Art Direction, Leslie Dilley - Art Direction, Michael Ford - Set Decoration), Film Editing (Michael Kahn), Sound (Bill Varney, Steve Maslow, Gregg Landaker, Roy Charman), Special Visual Effects (Richard Edlund, Kit West, Bruce Nicholson, Joe Johnston), Special Achievement Awards (Ben Burtt - Sound), and Effects Editing (Richard L. Anderson - Sound Effects Editing). It was also nominated for Best Picture (Frank Marshall - Producer), Directing (Steven Spielberg), Cinematography (Douglas Slocombe), and for Music Scoring Awards (Best Original Score; John Williams).

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		Your Memories Shared!

"A classic!!!! My favorite Spielberg film. This is the role Harrison Ford will be remembered for. Like Connery's Bond, ford will always be Indy.(in the unlikely event the role is ever recast with another actor in the future)yet another film I missed on the big screen like most Lucas/Spielberg productions the John Williams theme is forever locked in my mind. My favorite part of the film is rather short scene involving the ark itself as the swastika-bearing crate its being carried in is burned from the inside out engulfing the hateful symbol. Powerful stuff!" --Rick1970