Timeless adventure classic

Rating: 10/10 (17 August 2014)

There are no set qualities for a great film. Some movies like Citizen Kane are towering Cathedrals, crowned with outstanding lead performances, their every shot awash with gravitas and innovation, two hour pieces of high art with relatively simple stories. Other films are great stories, superbly told, like The Shawshank Redemption, Braveheart and Slumdog Milllionaire. And then there are films like this one which are a joyous, fun celebration of all the things we love about movies and film making.
Every scene of this is fun and enjoyable. A rollicking chase between two rival archaeologists as they travel all over the world (the film using world maps so we can keep track of the action) in search of the mystical "ark of the covenant." Throw in some Nazis, snake phobia, cutting edge (for the time) special effects, a damsel in distress and the Saturday matinée feel and you have an adventure film like no other to that point in time.
For star Harrison Ford, this film, on the back of his turn as Han Solo in an expanded role in 1980's The Empire Strikes Back confirmed his status as the pre eminent leading man of his time, and from the start, this is his movie. We follow his adventures for an inordinate number of minutes before the director shows us his face, we see him fearlessly tackle big hairy spiders, leaps of doom, deadly arrows and rolling stone balls before the film is 15 minutes old. We also see him lose his first big battle on screen with his rival Belloq. And in those first 15 minutes we learn everything we need to about his character and the film. Indy is fearless, principled, a bit of a screw up and not a particularly good archaeologist. No wonder he has to work as a teacher to pay the bills. From that point on he becomes all things to all people. The film rarely lets up on the action, with chase after chase, and usually ending in Indy being outwitted by his smarter, better resourced rival.
Ford is absolutely superb. While I personally believe that the film still would have been a success had Spielberg's original choice for the role, Tom Selleck, been available, it is now impossible to see anyone else in the role. Spielberg has also surrounded Ford with a great supporting cast including Denholm Elliott, John Rhys Davies, Paul Freeman, Karen Allen and Ronald Lacey, as well as a very young Alfred Molina. Allen in particular is great as the love interest/ damsel in distress.
The effects, for the time were breathtaking, bringing the settings alive and nearly making us believe that the Nazis faces are melting at the film's end. Some of the blue screen shots leave a little to be desired, but it was still fairly early in the evolution of that film making technology, and so these are forgivable. The set pieces are expertly realized and the fight scenes well choreographed.
In the end Raiders is the finest example of the adventure genre, made the more entertaining for the fact that our protagonist is not a particularly successful adventurer. It has enough silly to be fun, without being stupid and remains, more than 30 years on, as one of the most entertaining films not just of its era, but in all of American cinema.