Iro's Top 100 Movies v3.0

Yeah, count me among those who think it didn't really make it into the film proper. Until I'd read the story sessions it'd never even occurred to me that "child" in that context meant anything other than "impressionable" or "in a quasi-subordinate position."

This might be influenced a bit by how generally mature Karen Allen seems. I might feel differently if they'd cast someone with a different look or different qualities, but Karen Allen's just nine years younger than Harrison Ford in real life, and as an actress she has a confidence and worldliness that belie that initial intent. And casting aside, our introduction to the character, winning a drinking contest in a foreign country, seems designed to show us how savvy and tough she is, though you could argue that she was made this way prematurely by men like Indy. Either way, she doesn't seem like someone you can manipulate by the time we meet her, which makes it easier to disregard.

I guess the issue is, did our hero commit statutory rape, was he a pedophile, or did he just take advantage of the maturity and power differential to exploit a teenage girl, could actually be relevant to how we perceive the character and whether or not we can actually ride with him.

I don't disagree with you but it seemed like there was an undercurrent of her being this tough, hard-drinking, ass-kicking woman living in Siberia or wherever was because of the damage she felt from her relationship with him.
But that may not be the case. It's not something I meant to dwell on too much but I thought it was interesting reading that Allen claims it was her idea and they changed the script to include it so I shared.
Otherwise, I'm more playing devil's advocate than anything.

Certainly. I was trying to account for that with "though you could argue that she was made this way prematurely by men like Indy." I'm not sure if I think that or not but it's a reasonable position.

I think the prequels revealed that Lucas is clearly insane.


But yeah, I don't think the child comment plays literally in the finished film.

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I suppose it very well could. If it was in the movie.


Now maybe that's how George Lucas still prefers to read the movie. And would be totally fine riding with such a character. But her uttering the word 'child' can be taken all manner of ways, and there is hardly enough in the film to warrant thinking he's a pedophile because of it.


While it's fair to think that word is a hold over from Lucas' initial intentions, I can't think of anything else which remains in the film from that. Now if we want to let this extraneous fact color how we interpret this word....fine? But, at least in the strict confines of the film, I think it is close to a pointless exercise to do so.

It's almost like if we heard Spielberg spitballing some stupid idea about making Indiana Jones an alien, and at some point a character utters the phrase 'yeah, Indiana, you sure are out of this world'. And we start speculating if he's from outerspace, even though literally nothing in the film supports this.

I feel like the Indy film that got the most play (on TV) when I was a wee lad was Temple of Doom. Last Crusade hadn't come out yet. So, when I say, "Indiana Jones is part of my childhood, but weirdly not a nostalgic, cherished part of my childhood, and have no great love of it as an adult. At brief moments like this, I wonder how much of it was being in the thin slice of years when the least popular (in retrospect, by fans) Indiana Jones film of the trilogy happened to be the predominant one when I would have been the ideal age for the movies affects this fact.


Actually, probably not very much. But it does have the weird effect that I think I've seen Raiders the least out of any of the three movies.

I'd argue that the underage relationship, while not a textual part of the film, still certainly counts as subtext. I get that Spielberg said to ignore what was in the original script where he and Lucas were discussing the idea, but given that the "I was a child" conversation made it into the film, it's hard to watch that scene without thinking of the implications that the transcript give to it. If either the transcript or the conversation in the film didn't exist, this would've resolved my issue. Regardless, I can certainly understand why someone wouldn't be bothered by that aspect, but I think it's certainly fair game to interpret that scene in more than one way.

Besides, even without that, I'd still find Indiana unlikable since the opening scene outright paints him as a colonist. I normally don't mind unlikable characters, but I think Ford is intended to come off as charming and noble in the film, so I think the film is trying to have it two ways with him.

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What if Ford got a creepy reaction shot during the line? What then?

Ok, it's been a few minutes and I'm still laughing about Indiana Jones secretly being an alien. Thanks a lot, Crumb.

I'm not saying I don't get why people have an emotional reaction when they learn what Lucas' initial intent was. And why hearing the word child might raise their eyebrows. We all have elements outside of a film that colours how we interpret what we see.


But if we are talking about what is actually in the film, this one is a stretch. And when some people want to talk about this film for what is actually in it, and someone points out 'well, did you know he's a child molester', it kind of forces fans of the film to explain why this 'fact' doesn't factor into their evaluation. No one wants to be on the side of pedophile action/adventure films.



Now if others can't look past it, fine. They don't have to. And I also don't think it is an irrelevant point if we want to dig into the creative decisions where Indiana Jones was born from. But it is still the kind of comment that takes a discussion hostage. And (while not necessarily in this instance) sometimes very deliberately. And considering how little any of this is actually part of what can be seen on screen (one word, that if removed, completely ends any relevant point), it can't help but make us lose sight of what the film is, or what it's actual intentions are.

Despite not having the great affection for the franchise some people have, I'm still trying to conveniently forget Crystal Skull exists when talking about them. This, "he was an alien all along," hypothesis would probably be aided by bringing in that film.


So... not feeling all warm and fuzzy over here.

I think it's certainly fair to bring the criticism up as long as you word yourself in a non-confrontational way. That's why I wrote "Regardless, I can certainly understand why someone wouldn't be bothered by that aspect, but I think it's certainly fair game to interpret that scene in more than one way." up above to make it clear that I wasn't looking down on anyone in this thread not bothered by the controversy. I'm aware that, since there's no textual evidence in the film, not everyone is going to be bothered by this and that's fine. I don't think anyone here is required to explain/defend themselves.

In fact, I wasn't even the one who first brought up that criticism in this discussion. Someone else did and I was merely providing my own thoughts on the issue.

However, I do see your point as I've encountered all kinds of people who take the exact opposite approach when discussing art with supposed problematic material who hurl all kinds of accusations towards people who don't take issue with whatever supposed problematic material they're discussing, but I generally try to avoid that as best as I can and I hope my posts in this thread didn't come off that way since that wasn't my intention.

Speaking pedophiles and pedophilia, I do love Aguirre for it's ability to border on the ethereal of the sublime. I also share at least some of Herzog's apparent interest in what keeps human society together, as opposed to it collapsing (that was a common dramatic thrust of a lot of his fictional work - the notion of removing something and having society collapse also shows up in Nosferatu and Heart of Glass).


Kind of... contextually weird(?) to see the pedophile talk surround the movie that came after a movie on the list that had Klaus Kinski in it - particularly Aguirre where there were indications about the character he played.

I haven’t seen it in ages, but my memory suggests that while it definitely isn’t up to the standard of the previous entries, Spielberg has a sure enough hand in directing the action that it’s far from unwatchable. But that’s my high school aged memory talking.

I haven't seen Kingdom of the Crystal Skull in years, but while it had its cheaper moments like that nuclear bomb scene, I remember thinking it was still pretty good.

For me, it's the combination of "I was a child" and his callous "You knew what you were doing" (which also aligns with that gross Lucas/Spielberg idea that she, a 12 year old, seduced him).

You'll be shocked, shocked!, to learn that I'm one of the people who can't not think about that transcript when watching the film. And I think that Allen's delivery of the word "child" does a fair bit of heavy lifting in that department.

Thanks for sharing it, appreciated.

That's why they give him an antagonist like Belloq who is at once his obvious opposite (the clean white clothes versus Indy's dirty brown outfit) but also very similar to him in so many ways, to say nothing of how a major part of his arc is realising that the Ark has genuine power and is more than just another artifact to recover and sell off. It's why the films mostly stick to the idea that he never really succeeds at collecting the artifacts and profiting off them, whether it's whatever he's chasing during the cold opens or the main one that drives the plot (though it is a problem that Last Crusade walks this back by finally allowing him to retrieve the Cross of Coronado after a lifetime of searching).

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Iro's Top 100 Movies v3.0