"He loved you like a son, it took a hell of a lot for you to alienate him."
"Not much, just you."
That line of dialogue gets lost sometimes, but I think it's great. I think Indy is a little treasure crazy, but when push comes to shove he does the right thing. He manages to leave the grail behind, perhaps that's the end of the character arc that begins in Raiders. Actually, when you think about it, he never gets to keep the artifacts does he?
I remember laughing at the scene where he folds the knife and looks away. "If I let you go, they'll start combing the place for us and this whole thing will be shot." If I remember right, they hadn't discovered the ark yet had they? The way the movie is set up, the ark was seen as a super weapon capable of destroying the Earth "The army that carried the ark into battle was invincible." So, a hero couldn't rightly skip out and leave the ark in the hands of the Nazis now could he?
The relationship with Marion is hard to justify, and it clearly hurt her "I was a child, I was in love, it was wrong and you knew it!" Do they mention the respective ages of the characters during this affair in the movie? Yeah, I have a big problem with 15, I have a huge problem with 11. I don't even really feel comfortable if Marion was 18 and Indy was 23. But the movie is intentionally vague there. Now, if Indy was a grad student and Marion was a freshman in college, that gets into a kind of uneasy gray area. I prefer to think of it along those lines, no matter what the writers might have speculated in the early meetings. I think Kasdan might have stepped in to save the day with some subtle edits, and no matter what anyone intended, those edits became canon.
Excellent analysis! I think we should spend more time analyzing what makes characters heroic. Indiana Jones is flawed and vulnerable, and I think that's what I like best about him. I'm looking forward to the chat today!
Great comment! You are exactly right about the stakes involved in the Nazis possessing the Ark as a superweapon, which makes him deciding to leave her behind a little less bad and more understandable.
Yeah but the rest of the dialog “I was a child! I was in love!” Highlights the fact that Indy was an adult graduate student and Marion was an underage teenager. In the prequel Temple of Doom (check the years it takes place before Raiders) Short Round is a literal child he just sort of keeps then later abandons since he doesn’t show up in Raiders or get mentioned ever again. Indy is a possible pedophile and child endangering thief.
Final note but one thing that has always bugged me is the Nazis in Egypt. At the time Egypt was nominally independent but still very much under British control. The Brits would never have allowed a Nazi military presence that close to the Suez Canal which was vital to its control of India and Asia. Ditto for that u-boat base near Greece that the finale of Raiders happened on. German U boats made it into the Med only one ever made it back out because the Rock of Girbralta and Malta were both British and essentially blocked access. I know it’s just movies but it still irked me even as a kid.
Actually until December 1936 (the movie takes place sometime in the spring /summer/autumn of 1936) the British Empire was under the command of the extremely German (and even Nazi) friendly King Edward VIII. Who if his good buddy Adolf had asked him to do a favor for archaeological science, would probably have said yes before Austrian Painter finished his sentence.
Incidentally, it was not Hitler but Himmler who was in charge of all the archaeological expeditions, through the Ahnenerbe, an organization devoted to finding archaeological evidence of past Aryan supremacy, and linking current Nazis with those steppe-chieftains of old.
I have also written about this extensively (you won't be at all shocked to hear).
To my mind, Indiana Jones is a far more interesting, complex, flawed character in Raiders of the Lost Ark. That's one of several reasons why it remains the greatest adventure film of all time (I will brook no argument with that) and the best Indiana Jones film. In the sequels, he's a much more straightforward hero, but in Raiders, you're quite right: He's a part-time grave robber whose unwise affair with a teenage girl makes him more than deserve Marion's furious tirade when they meet up again years later (I'm aware of the conversation you cited and that Spielberg insisted she be older during this brainstorming session). And yes, Belloq's "I am a shadowy reflection of you" speech (the we're-not-so-different trope among villains is one regularly trotted out in films of this kind) actually rings true for once, given that he twice abandons Marion, as you rightly point out. Is he just as obsessed as the villain?
Perhaps for much of the film, but then he sees the light at the end (thus making this an important character arc for Indy and rendering the silly it-would-all-work-out-the-same narrative argument null and void) by remembering Old Testament stories like Sodom and Gomorrah, warning Marion not to look so she doesn't become the proverbial pillar of salt. The fact that they emerge unscathed from the fiery wrath, with only the ropes burned off, also echoes the fate of Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego, when Nebuchadnezzar chucks them into a fiery furnace, but then God rescued them. In short, Steven Spielberg and George Lucas know there is nothing scarier than the Old Testament God. Imagine how pissed he'd be at the prospect of Nazis and French collaborators blasphemously appropriating Jewish rituals with sacred artefacts for their evil purposes? Pretty damn pissed.
By contrast, in Temple of Doom, Indy doesn't really have a character arc in the same way (his brief bewitchment in Temple of Doom doesn't count as a character arc as that is magically induced). He is pretty much a heroic white messiah figure assisting helpless peasants (a trope rightly criticised, but I still love the film) by rescuing their children and bringing back their sacred stone.
In Last Crusade - a film that comes close to matching Raiders, but not quite - Indy does have a character arc concerning the relationship with his father, which is rather poignant ("Indiana, let it go..." - the most moving scene of the series, in which, hilariously, another Elsa couldn't let it go). But again, he's a straightforward hero and nothing like the more complicated character of Raiders.
I can't be bothered to comment in detail on Kingdom of the Crystal Skull and especially not the Dial of Destiny, suffice it to say, he's just a regular hero in both.
Great comment. Considering all this, and knowing it might be sacrilege to ask, do you consider Indy a better character than Bond? Better in the sense of being a flawed and very human character, and not just an avatar of masculinity.
Interesting question. I’d say it depends whether you mean the Bond from the novels or the Bond from the films. If the latter, then Indiana Jones is perhaps the “better” character in the sense you mean here. I certainly prefer Raiders of the Lost Ark to any James Bond film.
I love this look at this particular film, which I also really, really love. I never considered Indy a hero, but more like a pirate-ish figure, maybe? It's not greed that motivates him, but it is hubris--being the best of the best artifact finders. He's like a treasure hunter junky. I think you hit on it when you say that it's not just about getting the Ark out of Nazi hands, but getting it into HIS hands. It's also pretty interesting that he really doesn't have to answer for his moral failings (Marion is the one we know of, but there are certainly others..right?). That also kind of positions him as a kind of cowboy figure, that perpetually transient figure who slips the ropes of authority, commitment, consequence other than life or death. Great stuff as usual my friend!
Love this! "That also kind of positions him as a kind of cowboy figure, that perpetually transient figure who slips the ropes of authority, commitment, consequence other than life or death." So accurate!
Related: Would it sort of ruin things if Indy WERE a true hero in that classic sense? He’s certainly not up to anything particularly noble…you know what I mean? Get on this right after your Deadwood essay series, after your Star Wars compendium Volumes 1-6, after….:)
He's a protagonist. He's only a "hero" when it suits him or the narrative to be so. But his central role is as a protagonist, since the movies (and the short-lived TV show about his younger days) demand one.
Lucas and Spielberg were inspired by the old kiddie-matinee movie serials, which were about fast-moving action over and above characterization. In a serial there was no time to go deep because you only had until the end of the episode to wrap things up on a cliffhanger. That was why the format was so good for adapting fictional characters who arguably had no character depth.
That's what Indy is supposed to be. He goes from one cliffhanger to another as directed by the script. The main differences are that he's in a feature-length film with higher budgets than most serials ever got.
Point being: he's too flawed to be a true hero, but he's also too heroic to be an anti-. Somewhere in between...
I have written stories about a female canine character who shares a lot of his amoral qualities (I will be publishing her stories here in the near future), but she is extremely dumb compared with the street-smarts he has. Thus, her companion and business partner must compensate in ways his never had to.
This is both funny and troubling. First, I love anti heroes for the very reason you state-- they're flawed. They're focused, tho and they operate well being in the present. But Lucas has a very creepy edge to him.
Have fun tomorrow with Ben. Hopefully I'll be up by then. Thanks for your sharp analysis of Indie.
My only memory of Indiana Jones is something about snakes that haunts my nightmares. So your whole post was a great read. Like reading an honest synopsis. I can't believe they were even considering making Marion 11. What is wrong with some people?!
Two comments: One, a fifteen year old in 1926 was like a 19 year old in 2026. Young, naive, but probably old enough to know better, or at least to receive “knowing better” advice that she can, in her teenage wisdom, ignore because she already knows it all and she’s having fun. That said, Kasdan, Lucas, and Spielberg were way too creepy about this “By the time she’s fifteen, it’s no longer interesting, she’s too old” conversation. In fact, before I found out about this conversation, I assumed that Indy had merely stolen her v-card, that she was looking for a happily-ever-after while he was just looking for a good time.
Second (“Two”) movies always underportray the weight of gold. If the Hovidos idol were made of solid gold (and why wouldn’t it be, as a depiction of a tribal god?) that little figurine would weigh 75 lbs (what kind of dust was Indy pulling out if that bag? Pitchblende?), but Indy palms it pretty easily. Also, it is a major plot point that the Staff of Ra (which appears to be about six inches taller than Harrison Ford) must be only five feet high, maximum. Every cinephile analyzes Indiana Jones’ character incessantly, finely dividing it to the skin of the teeth of a gnat’s whisker, but no one ever seems to notice that Indiana Jones is built like Popeye.
"He loved you like a son, it took a hell of a lot for you to alienate him."
"Not much, just you."
That line of dialogue gets lost sometimes, but I think it's great. I think Indy is a little treasure crazy, but when push comes to shove he does the right thing. He manages to leave the grail behind, perhaps that's the end of the character arc that begins in Raiders. Actually, when you think about it, he never gets to keep the artifacts does he?
I remember laughing at the scene where he folds the knife and looks away. "If I let you go, they'll start combing the place for us and this whole thing will be shot." If I remember right, they hadn't discovered the ark yet had they? The way the movie is set up, the ark was seen as a super weapon capable of destroying the Earth "The army that carried the ark into battle was invincible." So, a hero couldn't rightly skip out and leave the ark in the hands of the Nazis now could he?
The relationship with Marion is hard to justify, and it clearly hurt her "I was a child, I was in love, it was wrong and you knew it!" Do they mention the respective ages of the characters during this affair in the movie? Yeah, I have a big problem with 15, I have a huge problem with 11. I don't even really feel comfortable if Marion was 18 and Indy was 23. But the movie is intentionally vague there. Now, if Indy was a grad student and Marion was a freshman in college, that gets into a kind of uneasy gray area. I prefer to think of it along those lines, no matter what the writers might have speculated in the early meetings. I think Kasdan might have stepped in to save the day with some subtle edits, and no matter what anyone intended, those edits became canon.
Excellent analysis! I think we should spend more time analyzing what makes characters heroic. Indiana Jones is flawed and vulnerable, and I think that's what I like best about him. I'm looking forward to the chat today!
Great comment! You are exactly right about the stakes involved in the Nazis possessing the Ark as a superweapon, which makes him deciding to leave her behind a little less bad and more understandable.
Yeah but the rest of the dialog “I was a child! I was in love!” Highlights the fact that Indy was an adult graduate student and Marion was an underage teenager. In the prequel Temple of Doom (check the years it takes place before Raiders) Short Round is a literal child he just sort of keeps then later abandons since he doesn’t show up in Raiders or get mentioned ever again. Indy is a possible pedophile and child endangering thief.
Final note but one thing that has always bugged me is the Nazis in Egypt. At the time Egypt was nominally independent but still very much under British control. The Brits would never have allowed a Nazi military presence that close to the Suez Canal which was vital to its control of India and Asia. Ditto for that u-boat base near Greece that the finale of Raiders happened on. German U boats made it into the Med only one ever made it back out because the Rock of Girbralta and Malta were both British and essentially blocked access. I know it’s just movies but it still irked me even as a kid.
Actually until December 1936 (the movie takes place sometime in the spring /summer/autumn of 1936) the British Empire was under the command of the extremely German (and even Nazi) friendly King Edward VIII. Who if his good buddy Adolf had asked him to do a favor for archaeological science, would probably have said yes before Austrian Painter finished his sentence.
Incidentally, it was not Hitler but Himmler who was in charge of all the archaeological expeditions, through the Ahnenerbe, an organization devoted to finding archaeological evidence of past Aryan supremacy, and linking current Nazis with those steppe-chieftains of old.
I have also written about this extensively (you won't be at all shocked to hear).
To my mind, Indiana Jones is a far more interesting, complex, flawed character in Raiders of the Lost Ark. That's one of several reasons why it remains the greatest adventure film of all time (I will brook no argument with that) and the best Indiana Jones film. In the sequels, he's a much more straightforward hero, but in Raiders, you're quite right: He's a part-time grave robber whose unwise affair with a teenage girl makes him more than deserve Marion's furious tirade when they meet up again years later (I'm aware of the conversation you cited and that Spielberg insisted she be older during this brainstorming session). And yes, Belloq's "I am a shadowy reflection of you" speech (the we're-not-so-different trope among villains is one regularly trotted out in films of this kind) actually rings true for once, given that he twice abandons Marion, as you rightly point out. Is he just as obsessed as the villain?
Perhaps for much of the film, but then he sees the light at the end (thus making this an important character arc for Indy and rendering the silly it-would-all-work-out-the-same narrative argument null and void) by remembering Old Testament stories like Sodom and Gomorrah, warning Marion not to look so she doesn't become the proverbial pillar of salt. The fact that they emerge unscathed from the fiery wrath, with only the ropes burned off, also echoes the fate of Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego, when Nebuchadnezzar chucks them into a fiery furnace, but then God rescued them. In short, Steven Spielberg and George Lucas know there is nothing scarier than the Old Testament God. Imagine how pissed he'd be at the prospect of Nazis and French collaborators blasphemously appropriating Jewish rituals with sacred artefacts for their evil purposes? Pretty damn pissed.
By contrast, in Temple of Doom, Indy doesn't really have a character arc in the same way (his brief bewitchment in Temple of Doom doesn't count as a character arc as that is magically induced). He is pretty much a heroic white messiah figure assisting helpless peasants (a trope rightly criticised, but I still love the film) by rescuing their children and bringing back their sacred stone.
In Last Crusade - a film that comes close to matching Raiders, but not quite - Indy does have a character arc concerning the relationship with his father, which is rather poignant ("Indiana, let it go..." - the most moving scene of the series, in which, hilariously, another Elsa couldn't let it go). But again, he's a straightforward hero and nothing like the more complicated character of Raiders.
I can't be bothered to comment in detail on Kingdom of the Crystal Skull and especially not the Dial of Destiny, suffice it to say, he's just a regular hero in both.
Great comment. Considering all this, and knowing it might be sacrilege to ask, do you consider Indy a better character than Bond? Better in the sense of being a flawed and very human character, and not just an avatar of masculinity.
Interesting question. I’d say it depends whether you mean the Bond from the novels or the Bond from the films. If the latter, then Indiana Jones is perhaps the “better” character in the sense you mean here. I certainly prefer Raiders of the Lost Ark to any James Bond film.
I love this look at this particular film, which I also really, really love. I never considered Indy a hero, but more like a pirate-ish figure, maybe? It's not greed that motivates him, but it is hubris--being the best of the best artifact finders. He's like a treasure hunter junky. I think you hit on it when you say that it's not just about getting the Ark out of Nazi hands, but getting it into HIS hands. It's also pretty interesting that he really doesn't have to answer for his moral failings (Marion is the one we know of, but there are certainly others..right?). That also kind of positions him as a kind of cowboy figure, that perpetually transient figure who slips the ropes of authority, commitment, consequence other than life or death. Great stuff as usual my friend!
Love this! "That also kind of positions him as a kind of cowboy figure, that perpetually transient figure who slips the ropes of authority, commitment, consequence other than life or death." So accurate!
Related: Would it sort of ruin things if Indy WERE a true hero in that classic sense? He’s certainly not up to anything particularly noble…you know what I mean? Get on this right after your Deadwood essay series, after your Star Wars compendium Volumes 1-6, after….:)
He's a protagonist. He's only a "hero" when it suits him or the narrative to be so. But his central role is as a protagonist, since the movies (and the short-lived TV show about his younger days) demand one.
Lucas and Spielberg were inspired by the old kiddie-matinee movie serials, which were about fast-moving action over and above characterization. In a serial there was no time to go deep because you only had until the end of the episode to wrap things up on a cliffhanger. That was why the format was so good for adapting fictional characters who arguably had no character depth.
That's what Indy is supposed to be. He goes from one cliffhanger to another as directed by the script. The main differences are that he's in a feature-length film with higher budgets than most serials ever got.
Point being: he's too flawed to be a true hero, but he's also too heroic to be an anti-. Somewhere in between...
I have written stories about a female canine character who shares a lot of his amoral qualities (I will be publishing her stories here in the near future), but she is extremely dumb compared with the street-smarts he has. Thus, her companion and business partner must compensate in ways his never had to.
Good take. Side note: thanks for the recommendation on Trying. My wife and I loved it. Definite Ted Lasso vibes.
So glad to hear you loved Trying! It's criminally under appreciated.
Well, Indy kills. If we're using real world rules, a lot of cinematic legends are awful.
Also, Tim Olyphant + Josh Duhamel = Garret Dillahunt.
Fromtheyardtothearthouse.substack.com
This is both funny and troubling. First, I love anti heroes for the very reason you state-- they're flawed. They're focused, tho and they operate well being in the present. But Lucas has a very creepy edge to him.
Have fun tomorrow with Ben. Hopefully I'll be up by then. Thanks for your sharp analysis of Indie.
Interesting take.
My only memory of Indiana Jones is something about snakes that haunts my nightmares. So your whole post was a great read. Like reading an honest synopsis. I can't believe they were even considering making Marion 11. What is wrong with some people?!
It's pretty crazy! It's a great movie in spite of everything I said. 😆
Two comments: One, a fifteen year old in 1926 was like a 19 year old in 2026. Young, naive, but probably old enough to know better, or at least to receive “knowing better” advice that she can, in her teenage wisdom, ignore because she already knows it all and she’s having fun. That said, Kasdan, Lucas, and Spielberg were way too creepy about this “By the time she’s fifteen, it’s no longer interesting, she’s too old” conversation. In fact, before I found out about this conversation, I assumed that Indy had merely stolen her v-card, that she was looking for a happily-ever-after while he was just looking for a good time.
Second (“Two”) movies always underportray the weight of gold. If the Hovidos idol were made of solid gold (and why wouldn’t it be, as a depiction of a tribal god?) that little figurine would weigh 75 lbs (what kind of dust was Indy pulling out if that bag? Pitchblende?), but Indy palms it pretty easily. Also, it is a major plot point that the Staff of Ra (which appears to be about six inches taller than Harrison Ford) must be only five feet high, maximum. Every cinephile analyzes Indiana Jones’ character incessantly, finely dividing it to the skin of the teeth of a gnat’s whisker, but no one ever seems to notice that Indiana Jones is built like Popeye.
He was. He saved the day in the end. No heroes are bullet proof.
There’s nothing in the heroes’ journey about sexual ethics though! Loving and leaving them is practically built into the script.
Nazi punching counts as double.