Raiders of the Lost Ark (1981)
My own experience with this film is one of the grandest movie adventures of all time. My Dad has clients in Los Angeles and so, once a year, we would head down to Los Angeles for a little Disney time and an occasional side trip to Hollywood. This particular trip was memorable for many reasons (We met Chubby Checker in our swimming pool and he propositioned my step-mom, amongst other things ;) but the one thing that I will always remember it for was my first viewing of Raiders of the Lost Ark.
When I arrived in Hollywood, my Dad had been down there a day ahead of us for meetings with this clients. The first thing he said to us kids was, "You've got to see this movie!" Now my Dad likes movies like most people - he goes, he enjoys them, he forgets about them the next minute. For my Dad to gush about a movie like a little fan boy, I was immediately intrigued. As he himself said to me the other day, "I don't go see movies twice. But with Raiders, I not only saw it twice, I saw it twice in the same day." Anyway, he then explained to us about the movie and it sounded okay. But then he noted that it had Han Solo in it and that was when I wanted to see it.
So, we drove on down to Graumann's Chinese Theater - YES, THE GRAUMANN'S! - and got in line. The line was around the block, but we managed to only have to wait about two hours to get in. We went into the nice air conditioned theater and sat down. The theater was HUGE. Then my Dad made me go and get popcorn and drinks for everyone. So I trudged back into the lobby and waited and waited and waited. And finally, popcorn and drinks in hand, I opened the doors to the theater and walked in.
There on this incredibly HUGE movie screen was a man running away from a giant ball that was chasing him through some sort of temple. The entire theater rumbled with the sound of that ball. And I very nearly dropped my popcorn and sodas. It was love at first sight.
After a recent viewing of this film, I noted that one of the things that made the film work for me more so than just about any other film was in how originally everything was executed. There isn't a mis-step in the entire film or script. Every scene is original, but in such a way as to convey familiarity. Raiders of the Lost Ark wasn't just an action film. It was THE ACTION FILM - the one all other films have tried to be throughout history and the one all other action films will be forever compared.
For that fact alone, Raiders of the Lost Ark deserves the title of Geek Film Champion of 2008.
We'll see if it can defend it's crown next year.
2 comments:
We met Chubby Checker in our swimming pool and he propositioned my step-mom, amongst other things
You CANNOT leave us with just that tidbit.
Cheers.
I'm getting good at leaving these hooks.
Okay, long story short, or actually, short story short, Chubby Checker was in the pool and we were all swimming. He was quite the Ladies Man not having quite given up the 70's just yet, if you know what I mean. Apparently, he invited my step-mom up to his hotel room for a little party and when she politely declined, he continued to press her until she left and went back to the hotel room. Of course, we had no real inkling of who Chubby Checker was, but weren't so ignorant that we'd never heard his music before. Fortunately, we all went to the movie instead.
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