'Its Not The Years, Its The Mileage' - The creation of Indiana Jones
Forty years ago Saturday, two of America’s most beloved filmmakers — George Lucas and Steven Spielberg — teamed up to revive a style of action film that hadn’t been in vogue since before World War II.
Instead of a secret agent or a private detective, the hero was a college professor and archaeologist.
And he wasn’t after riches or revenge or a way to travel in space. Indiana Jones hunted for objects to put into a museum.
George Lucas Had A Better Idea
George Lucas and Steven Spielberg on location in Tunisia.
While trying to chill out on a beach in Hawaii after the completion of his epic space opera “Star Wars,” George Lucas spent some time with his pal Steven Spielberg — who, by that time, had directed “Jaws” and finished work on his own alien-fest, “Close Encounters of the Third Kind.”Spielberg happened to mention that his big wish now was to direct a James Bond picture. No, Lucas replied. He had something even better inmind than 007.
For years, Lucas had wanted to revive the old low-budget, high-adventure movie serials of the 1930s and 1940s. He had come up with something he called “The Adventures of Indiana Smith.” Indiana was his Malamute dog, the same one who had inspired his “Star Wars” character of Chewbacca.
The concept took some shopping around, but Michael Eisner of Paramount Pictures gave the pair a green light. Spielberg would direct. Lucas would produce.
The movie would go through a number of changes. Spielberg changed the swashbuckling hero’s name from Smith to Jones.
The low-budget concept went out the window as they decided to film in faraway places like Tunisia and London. And the supernatural-inspired ending they envisioned would need a lot of computer-generated imagery from Lucas’ new Industrial Light and Magic special effects unit.
Indiana Jones And The Blockbuster Debut
Lucas originally envisioned Tom Selleck playing Indiana, but CBS wouldn’t let Selleck out of his “Magnum P.I.” contract. Spielberg felt Harrison Ford would be perfect, but because Lucas had used Ford in “American Graffiti” and “Star Wars,” he was reluctant to hire Ford. They also considered David Hasselhoff, Sam Elliott and Mark Harmon before Lucas gave in.
Considered for the role of Marion Ravenwood were Sean Young, Debra Winger, Mary Steenburgen, Valerie Bertinelli, and Barbara Hershey. Maureen McCormick — who played Marcia on “The Brady Bunch” failed her audition because she was high on cocaine, she said. Spielberg hired Karen Allen after noting her performance in “National Lampoon’s Animal House.”
Novice actor Alfred Molina was warned about the small part for which he was trying out when Spielberg asked him: “You don’t have a thing about spiders, do you?” This was Molina’s first movie and the tarantula scene was filmed on Molina’s first day on the set. “Act scared,” Spielberg told him. “We’ve only got one shot.” Molina fired back: “I don’t need to act!”
Most of the cast and crew suffered from stomach ailments while shooting in 130° heat in Tunisia. Spielberg didn’t — he ate only cans of Spaghetti-O’s he brought from home. While preparing to film a complex swordfight, a very ill Ford asked Spielberg why couldn’t he just shoot the sucker. Spielberg took him up on it and let him improvise the scene.
Property masters brought in 2,000 snakes for the Well of Souls scene, but Spielberg said they needed more. Calls went out all over Southern England and eventually, 6,000 snakes — including 10 cobras — were used. The production’s insurance provider required Spielberg to fly in antivenom when the supply on hand turned out to be two years out of date.
What happens when the bad guys open the Ark of the Covenant? Lucas and Spielberg joked that Charlton Heston should jump out. Flashbulbs were placed under the shirts of the extras playing Nazi soldiers. Lightning bolts and ghost puppets wearing silk robes filmed in a tank of cloudy water were added later by Industrial Light and Magic.
The Nazis’ melting heads were one of the best-remembered features of the movie. Skulls were made with stone and then covered with plaster, gelatin and alginate, a material dentists use to make impressions of teeth. Muscles and tendons consisted of colored yarn. The heads were then filmed while under a heat gun and the footage sped up.
Eisner’s boss at Paramount, Barry Diller, would call him every week and say, “I’m sure I’m gonna fire you when this movie opens. There’s no way we can make money on it.” But “Raiders of the Lost Ark” became Paramount’s highest-
grossing film until “Forrest Gump,” 13 years later. It would win five Academy Awards and lead to four sequels and a TV spin-off series.
