CHAPTER 12: THE CINEMATOGRAPHY
Saul Pincus: Douglas Slocombe’s photography is incredible, in no small part due to his lengthy experience as a newsreel cameraman during World War II and his vast experience lighting for black-and-white and color. He had a great ease with hard light, and no one lit like quite like he did.
M. David Mullen, ASC (cinematographer, The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel): Slocombe’s deep-focus and dramatic hard-light style that worked so brilliantly in his black-and-white movies was perfect for Raiders in terms of adding a darker film noir element to what is a period action-adventure movie. Outdoors in open spaces, the movie has a sort of sunny National Geographic travelogue feeling but as soon as scenes move into interior spaces, it is more reminiscent of Arthur Edeson’s shadowy work in Casablanca—just as the directing itself seems to use aspects of Michael Curtiz’ work. All of this helps give the movie just enough of a retro feeling of a 40s black-and-white movie without undercutting any of the visceral excitement coming from the big widescreen color image.
CHAPTER 13: THE EDITING
Charles de Lauzirika: My first viewing at the Chinese was not just an absolute thrill ride as the rousing entertainment it clearly is. It also triggered an intense interest in filmmaking that had awakened with Jaws and Star Wars, and developed with Close Encounters of the Third Kind, Superman, Alien and The Empire Strikes Back. I was thirteen years old, and I suddenly became especially fascinated by editing, because Raiders was the first film that I really connected to in terms of how it was cut together. I first noticed it after a few viewings, that Summer of ’81, but the opening scene inside the Peruvian temple was really the first time I understood how the tension and stakes of the scene were unfolding through editing. I think it became apparent to me because most of it doesn't have a ton of action or visual effects. There are no distractions. It has the same tension of a bomb diffusing scene, but we all know what a bomb is going to do. We had little idea what was to come if Indy failed in whatever it was he was doing. And then what did follow was completely nuts. And so much fun. That's a fairly small scene too, compared to what comes later, and way before the more obvious tour de force of the epic truck chase, which is probably still the most satisfying action sequence I have ever seen. The masterful pacing, structure, and rhythms of Michael Kahn's editing in Raiders were seemingly effortless and yet so powerful.
Saul Pincus: I once read an interview with Michael Kahn where he said that on Raiders, he was able to educate his director a bit about the power of adding or subtracting a couple of frames in an action picture. Though Spielberg is hands-on, he obviously trusted Kahn’s experience because it’s this kind of skill and finesse that really shows, the feel a capable editor can bring to a project that often defies verbalizing. Maybe the best way to compliment Michael Kahn’s work on the film is to compliment the way in which he nails every genre within it: Raiders is a solid action film, but it’s also a solid adventure film and love story, with an impeccable sense of comic timing and juxtaposition of tone. Yes, a lot of that’s a credit to Kasdan, Spielberg and his cast—but that material filtered through different hands wouldn’t have resulted in the perfect soufflé that’s the film we now know.
Michael Rubin: When I used to teach editing courses, I used the opening to demonstrate powerful storytelling through film editing, in particular the series of shots that first reveal Jones, how it establishes character elegantly and sets up the tone of the film. Editor Michael Kahn’s work is widely cited for editing students.
Saul Pincus: Kahn himself has said he thinks of the Indiana Jones films as comedies—which I guess is another way of saying he cuts for the set-up of the gag and the impact of the follow-though, whether that’s for a punch, a laugh, or a mine car jumping though thin air.
Michael Rubin: The opening dissolve from the Paramount logo to the mountain still makes me smile.
CHAPTER 14: THE MUSIC
Jon Burlingame (film-music historian; writer, Variety; author, Sound and Vision: 60 Years of Motion Picture Soundtracks): By 1981, composer John Williams had already scored four films by Steven Spielberg (including Jaws and Close Encounters of the Third Kind) and two more for George Lucas (Star Wars and The Empire Strikes Back). So, Williams—already a three-time Oscar winner—scoring Raiders of the Lost Ark was a foregone conclusion for both filmmakers, who were collaborating on the first Indiana Jones adventure.
Mark A. Altman: It’s hard to believe that John Williams, who crafted some of the most remarkable movie music of all-time with Jaws, Star Wars, Close Encounters, Superman and 1941, manages to top himself yet again.
Jon Burlingame: Williams wrote three main themes: a rousing Raiders March, essentially the heroic theme for Indy, first heard as we witness his hair-raising escape from the Peruvian jungle; a motif for Marion Ravenwood, part love theme and part world-weary character portrait for the woman we first discover running a saloon in Nepal; and mystical music for the mysterious and powerful Ark of the Covenant, which recurs throughout. Played with gusto by the London Symphony Orchestra, Williams' score propelled the action and underlined the suspense throughout, helping to ensure the film's success.
Charles de Lauzirika: Raiders is basically two hours of non-stop favorite sequences. It goes without saying that in addition to Spielberg, Lucas, Ford, ILM and the rest of the cast and crew, the one collaborator who serves as the best guide through the film's highlights is John Williams. When those spy photos from the new film leaked recently, and I saw Ford back in the old costume, I immediately put on the Raiders score. And as wall-to-wall phenomenal as that score is, I think there were two big standout cues for me during that re-listen: The Map Room: Dawn and Desert Chase. The former magnificently captures the enormous awe and timeless mystery of Indy's quest, while the latter is basically a theme park ride in music form. I mean, the entire stretch of Raiders from Indy and Marion escaping the Well of Souls, through the Flying Wing fight, through the truck chase...it's all just absolutely breathtaking. And it never, ever gets old.
Jon Burlingame: Williams earned his 16th Academy Award nomination (of his 52 to date, a record for composers) for this score, and if Oscar voters were choosing today, might well win, given the iconic nature of that film and what we now know as the launch of a franchise. But he lost to Chariots of Fire, the Vangelis synthesizer score then enjoying a wave of popularity.
Mike Matessino: There is, naturally, a focus on the famous Raiders March theme that is universally recognizable, but there are subtleties in the score that elevate it above the material’s B-movie and serial origins. The theme for the Ark is incredibly rich and intriguing, suggesting an ancient spiritual power the instant you hear it. And consider how Williams introduces Marion’s theme before we even meet the character. It is like an echo from a decade in the past. Williams musically reflects the characters and the backstory with incredible economy and hits a bull’s-eye in doing so. The action music is great, of course, but what happens in the rest of the score, for me, helps turn a B-movie into a serious piece of art that absolutely deserved its Oscar nominations for Best Picture and all the other accolades it has received.
Jon Burlingame: There is, of course, a lot of great music in Raiders, but my favorite cue has always been the four-minute The Map Room: Dawn, which uses the Ark theme but adds choir to heighten the drama of Indy's discovery of the precise location of the Well of Souls. The scene itself is beautifully realized, but Williams' score quadruples the thrill and power of the sequence—just another brilliant musical moment in the long history of the Spielberg-Williams collaboration.
Neil S. Bulk: Getting the expanded score album was a revelation. It must have been one of the first expanded albums I ever bought, and though I was aware of music in the movie that wasn’t on the original [soundtrack album] release, it never occurred to me that the extra music could be released. And then they released it on LP with even more music, so I had to get that, too.
CHAPTER 15: THE VISUAL EFFECTS
Joe Fordham (writer, Cinefex): Raiders was ingenious. It was classic serial adventure, writ large, with luminous photography, dynamic editing, and one of John Williams’ most energizing scores. But it didn’t do things the traditional way. Visual effects used every trick in the book and then some. Apocalyptic mayhem, lighting, fire, face-melting gore, angelic hordes, and many happy accidents. Gut-wrenching stunts, mechanical effects, hand-drawn animation, pyrotechnic and fluid tank photography, models, spectacular matte painting, optical effects. It’s a heady brew, and hard to beat that final pullback. Through Cinefex, I had the honor of meeting a handful of artisans who put this film together: George, Robert Watts, Kit West, Richard Edlund, Thaine, Messrs. Gawley, Van Vliet, Pangrazio and Barron—thank you all for your vision and your vigor. Happy birthday, Raiders.
William Kallay: For me, the opening of the Ark scene is such a dynamic combination of practical effects and ILM’s trademark visual effects. I remember as a young teenager saying “Whoa!” when the burst of light streams raced out of the Ark and started killing the Nazis. Of course, the real selling point of the scene were the practical make-up effects of faces melting and a head exploding. How the film got a PG rating still surprises me, but that scene was oh so cool!
CHAPTER 16: THE SOUND
Steve Lee: Film sound went through a technological revolution in the late 70s. Dolby Stereo gave filmmakers the opportunity to create layered, detailed soundtracks in a way we hadn’t heard before. And the new title of “Sound Designer” emerged—the three I consider the founding fathers of that term being Ben Burtt, Walter Murch, and Alan Splet. They all created amazing imaginative and completely original sonic worlds for every film they were a part of. And they gave us a reason to seek out the films in the best-sounding venues we could find. For Raiders, it was the late great Mann’s National in Westwood, California…in 70mm Six-Track!
Gianluca Sergi (author, The Dolby Era: Film Sound in Contemporary Hollywood): Although not as celebrated as its predecessors like Star Wars, Close Encounters, and Apocalypse Now, Raiders played a key role in the development of film sound. While it may have been a throwback to the B movie genre of the 1930s, going over well-rehearsed plot structures, hero story-arcs and damsels in distress needing saving (not to the mention the stereotypical and frankly uncomfortable portrayal of Arabs throughout), the film was extremely inventive in its use of sound. Instead of relying on old sound libraries that had dominated film sound since the days of The Adventures of Robin Hood (think flying arrows, swords clicking, etc.) Ben Burtt and his team jumped in the deep end and recorded brand-new sounds for virtually all those “B-movie sounds.” Everything from fist punches, body hits, gun fire, arrows flying to explosions and pops of all kinds sound fresh and give the film a sense of “modernity” that it may have otherwise lacked.
Ioan Allen (Senior Vice President, Dolby Laboratories): Raiders was a film that we at Dolby were really proud to be involved with. It had all the elements that led to its success—obviously a great script and acting—but also an amalgam of film creatives from Elstree studios in London, then Northern California and Los Angeles. From a sound point-of-view, I'd highlight the post-production crew at Goldwyn—Bill Varney, Gregg Landaker and Steve Maslow—supported by Dolby consultant Don Digirolamo—and all brought together by the imagination of sound-designer Ben Burtt! A sound-track format will only ever sound as good as the elements it's presented with—here was a movie where it all worked!
Gianluca Sergi: The film also proved beyond any doubt that the new school of sound that the team at Skywalker Sound (then Sprocket Systems) was creating—wittingly or otherwise—worked marvels not just with sci-fi, special effects driven movies like Star Wars but also with genres that were rooted in real life sounds by their nature. What worked for spaceships worked for 1930s cars, and the sound of a handgun could sound just as effective as that of a laser blaster.
Steve Lee: Ben Burtt and Richard Anderson were awarded Special Achievement Oscars for their brilliant sound effects on the film…and I have endlessly riddled them with questions about the experience. It truly is—in my opinion—one of, if not, the best-sounding contemporary action-adventure film ever.
F. Hudson Miller (sound editor, The Hunt for Red October; supervising sound editor, Star Trek VI: The Undiscovered Country): Raiders is probably just about as perfect an edit/mix job that has ever been done.
William Kallay: Ben Burtt created sound effects that seemed to match the time period and feel authentic, yet they sounded modern. The scene that has always stood out for me was the bar shootout. I had heard hundreds of times gunfire in films before I saw Raiders. But this film’s gunfire effects, just as one example, felt visceral. Indy’s pistol shots resonated and had sonic impact to my ears. They had a massive kick. The machine gun fire had an almost Star Wars laser fire sound to it. For me as a young teenager, that was totally rad! As an adult, it is still totally cool.
Saul Pincus: Spielberg’s Close Encounters was really his only film to date to have made profound creative use of Six-Track Dolby Stereo (I think Frank Warner’s sound design for it still resonates), but with Raiders he had team Lucas at his disposal—AKA team Star Wars. Ben Burtt, John Roesch and Richard L. Anderson really outdid themselves, and years later, when asked, lead re-recording mixer Bill Varney still cited Raiders as his favorite mix. I still remember the joy of those Burtt punches landing so satisfyingly, thick with character, a new fidelity and frequency range that really sold each wallop as the thing of fun it was meant to be. The pleasure Burtt took in his work—his collaboration with Anderson, the ace Foley team and Varney’s group—can’t be overstated.
Gianluca Sergi: The opening sequence sets the tone perfectly in this sense: as the camera meanders through a thick jungle—made to come alive by the sounds of many exotic and somewhat otherworldly birds that populate it—we never see the face of Indiana Jones. The camera stays behind him all the time and goes at great length to avoid seeing his face. He also never speaks throughout. His whip does the talking: threatened by the sound of a gun being cocked, his head tilts slightly and the whip comes into action. The sound is not simply loud, it has length, it is an “event” that reverberates across the auditorium in glorious Dolby Stereo. That sound is Indy’s visiting card: it introduces the character in a way that no spoken word or look could have done and melds forever that character with that sound and nobody can ever conceive of Indy without his trusted fedora and whip by his side. Burtt replicates the trick he had pulled off so effectively with Darth Vader’s breathing and sets the tone for the entire film for the audience: this is going to be a fun ride.
Michael Rubin: In the Spring [of 1981], the top sound guys at Lucasfilm—including Tom Holman and Ben Burtt—went down to the Blumenfeld [Regency I] Theater in San Francisco to set up for the big premiere. While the theater was top end, the team discovered how poor theater sound was, which was frustrating after all the effort they put into creating the amazing acoustic tapestry of their films. It was specifically from the Raiders release that Lucas and Holman created the THX Sound system—they were committed to guaranteeing that audiences wouldn’t get crappy theater sound anymore. It’s one of the lesser-known legacies of the movie.
