SPOILERS ALERT!!!

Hello everyone! 🙂

Welcome to ‘Bradley’s Basement’ blog and I’m Tim Bradley!

This past month or so, I’ve been checking out the ‘Indiana Jones’ films – the first four on Disney+ and the fifth and latest film at the cinema. I’ve enjoyed checking out the five ‘Indiana Jones’ films. They’ve been fun and thrilling adventures, starring Harrison Ford as the intrepid archaeologist and adventurer.

Here are my thoughts on each of the five movies. The first film ‘Raiders of the Lost Ark’ is of course the one that started it all. 🙂 Incidentally, the ‘Indiana Jones’ films have been a collaboration between film director Steven Spielberg and ‘Star Wars’ creator George Lucas, especially for the first three movies. 🙂

I once had the original ‘Indiana Jones’ film trilogy to check out on DVD lent to me by a friend . In ‘Raiders of the Lost Ark’, the film takes place in 1936. Indiana Jones competes with Nazi forces to recover the long-lost Ark of the Covenant, which was carried by the Israelites in biblical times in the Book of Exodus.

The Ark is claimed to make an army invincible. Indiana Jones teams up with his tough former romantic interest Karen Allen as Marion Ravenwood. They both race to stop rival archaeologist Paul Freeman as Dr. René Belloq from guiding the Nazis to the Ark and its power. But is claiming the Ark all worth it? 😐

The film’s cast also includes Ronald Lacey as Major Arnold Toht, a sadistic Gestapo agent who almost looks like Herr Otto Flick from ‘Allo, ‘Allo’. 😀 There’s John Rhys-Davies (Gimli from ‘The Lord of the Rings’ movie trilogy) as Sallah, a friend of Indy’s, and Denholm Elliot as museum curator Marcus Brody.

‘Raiders of the Lost Ark’ is a thrilling action-packed adventure that I enjoyed thoroughly. It was quite disturbing when Belloq and the Nazis looked into the Ark and were burned alive whilst Indiana and Marion had their eyes closed. Also, poor Alfred Molina’s character got killed off at the film’s beginning. 😀

The second film ‘Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom’ is probably the darkest and most horrific of the five ‘Indiana Jones’ films. Apparently, it’s a prequel to ‘Raiders of the Lost Ark’, as it takes place in 1935. Whether you choose to see ‘Temple of Doom’ first before ‘Raiders of the Lost Ark’, it’s up to you.

But it’s bound to be confusing when watching the films in release order. Whilst ‘Raiders’ was released in 1981, ‘Temple of Doom’ was released in 1984. In the film, Indiana Jones is asked by the villagers of an Indian village in the British Raj to recover a very mystical stone and rescue their children from a cult.

The cult is a Thuggee cult that practices child slavery, black magic and ritual human sacrifice in honour of the goddess Kali. A lot of the film is pretty horrific and quite gruesome in places. It’s pretty compelling to watch, especially when you want to root for Indiana and his new friends to save the day.

The friends that join Indy on his adventure include Kate Capshaw as Willie Scott, an American nightclub singer who becomes a love interest for Indy. She can be annoying at times, especially when unprepared for this adventure. There’s also Ke Huy Quan as Indy’s 11-year-old Chinese sidekick named Short Round.

There’s also Amrish Puri as Mola Ram, a Thuggee priest who performs rites of human sacrifices and is pretty frightening. There’s Roshan Seth as Chattar Lal, the Prime Minister of the Maharaja of Pankot; Phillip Stone as Captain Phillip Blumburtt; and there’s Roy Chiao as Lao Che, a Shanghai crime boss. 🙂

The third and final film of the original ‘Indiana Jones’ trilogy is called ‘Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade’. Released in 1989, this comes after ‘Temple of Doom’ and ‘Raiders of the Lost Ark’ in chronological order. It’s a thrilling adventure film that has Harrison Ford starring with Sean Connery. 🙂

The film takes place in 1938 where Indiana searches for his father, Sean Connery as Henry Jones, Snr (Yeah, Indiana’s real name is Henry). Sean Connery as the father is a Holy Grail scholar, who has been kidnapped and held hostage by the Nazis whilst going on a perilous journey to locate the Holy Grail. 😐

Unlike ‘Temple of Doom’, ‘The Last Crusade’ is a more light-hearted adventure. I think ‘The Last Crusade’ is the best film out of the original ‘Indiana Jones’ film trilogy, especially as it features familiar faces in terms of the cast as well as an enjoyable father-son relationship with Indiana and his father. 🙂

As well as Harrison Ford and Sean Connery, the film also features the return of Denholm Elliot as Marcus Brody and John Rhys-Davies as Sallah from ‘Raiders of the Lost Ark’.  There’s also Alison Doody as Dr. Elsa Schneider, an Austrian art professor and Indy’s love interest, who’s in league with the Nazis.

There’s also Julian Glover (who’s been in the two ‘Doctor Who’ stories ‘The Crusade’ and ‘City of Death’, the ‘Star Wars’ film ‘The Empire Strikes Back’ and the James Bond 007 film ‘For Your Eyes Only’) as Walter Donovan. I enjoyed him as a villain in this ‘Indiana Jones’ film. Not sure about his American accent. 😀

Incidentally, Indiana chose his name from the dog that he and his family once owned, who was also called Indiana. I believe that George Lucas also had a dog called Indiana, which he chose to name for the character in these movies. I’m pleased a nod to that is made in the final scene of ‘The Last Crusade’.

After the original film trilogy from 1981 to 1989, we come to the fourth ‘Indiana Jones’ film which was released in 2008 called ‘Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull’. This was the last ‘Indiana Jones’ film to be directed by Steven Spielberg and the last to have a story contribution by George Lucas.

The film takes place in 1957, and instead of Nazis, Indy has to tackle Russians during the Cold War. Indy finds himself tackling Soviet KGB agents led by Cate Blanchett as Irina Spalko. They’re searching for a telepathic crystal skull located in Peru, which happens to be an alien skull belonging to a spaceship. 😐

Indy finds himself joined by Shia LaBeouf (who played Sam in the ‘Transformers’ movies by director Michael Bay) as Mutt, who turns out to be Indy’s son. Later in the film, Indy meets up with Karen Allen as Marion Ravenwood, his former lover, who eventually marries him by the film’s end, which is nice. 🙂

The film also features Ray Winstone as George ‘Mac’ McHale, a British agent who often switches sides in terms of working with Indy and working with the Russians. There’s John Hurt (who later played the War Doctor in ‘Doctor Who’) as Harold ‘Ox’ Oxley, and there’s Jim Broadbent as Dean Charles Standforth.

A lot of critics and fans have criticised ‘Kingdom of the Crystal Skull’ as an ‘Indiana Jones’ movie. I personally enjoyed the film for the most part, although I do think the aliens and spaceship part of the movie is out-of-character, as usually the ‘Indiana Jones’ films are more down-to-earth and not sci-fi. 😐

And there’s the fifth ‘Indiana Jones’ film, released at cinemas lately, called ‘Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny’. I’m pleased I’ve seen this film at the cinemas lately and I’m happy to say that I’ve actually seen an ‘Indiana Jones’ movie on the big screen, as I didn’t do that with ‘Kingdom of the Crystal Skull’.

Instead of Steven Spielberg, ‘Dial of Destiny’ is directed by James Mangold, who has also directed ‘The Wolverine’ and ‘Logan’ in the ‘X-Men’ film series. Steven Spielberg and George Lucas have contributed as executive producers to the film, and this happens to be the first ‘Indiana Jones’ film released by Disney.

The film takes place in 1969, during the hype of the first Earth moon landing by Apollo 11. Indiana Jones meets up with his estranged goddaughter, Phoebe Waller-Bridge as Helena Shaw, as they try to find the titular dial that can change the course of history before Jürgen Voller takes the dial for himself.

Mad Mikkelsen stars as Jürgen Voller, who is a Nazi-turned-NASA scientist that plans to change the outcome of World War II. The film’s cast also includes Antonio Banderas as Renaldo, an old friend of Indy’s who is an expert frogman. I’m shocked that Antonio Banderas’ character got killed off in this. 😮

John Rhys-Davies returns again as Sallah, and there’s Toby Jones as Basil Shaw, an Oxford professor who is a friend of Indy’s. There’s Boyd Holbrook as trigger-happy Klaber, who is Voller’s right-hand man, and there’s Ethan Isidore as Teddy Kumar, Helena’s young Moroccan sidekick. Karen Allen also briefly cameoes as Marion Ravenwood in the film’s closing scenes.

As I said, I enjoyed ‘Dial of Destiny’ on the big screen, though like ‘Kingdom of the Crystal Skull’, I wasn’t expecting the film to go into time-travel territory, as our heroes and villains travel back in time to where the Romans and Greek fought each other in the Siege of Syracuse in 212 BC. Archimedes was also there in 212 BC. 😐

The five ‘Indiana Jones’ movies have been thrilling action-packed adventures. The original film trilogy is arguably the best collection of films compared to their successors in 2008 and 2023, but what stands out for me is Harrison Ford’s determined and very enthusiastic performances throughout each film. 🙂

I’m sure there’ll come a point where I’ll be revisiting these ‘Indiana Jones’ films and do in-depth reviews on them, thanks to them being available on Disney+. Stay tuned! 🙂

Thanks for reading!

Bye for now!

Tim 🙂