Review of Raiders of the Lost Ark (1981) by Cameronius_113 — 15 Jan 2017

Raiders of the Lost Ark was released in 1981 and was directed by Steven Spielberg. It is the combined efforts of Spielberg and George Lucas about an archaeologist determined to claim the long-lost Ark of the Covenant before the Nazis do.

Indiana Jones was a great main character; he was charismatic, intelligent and quite a daredevil but also feels like a regular human and you do feel a sense of danger when he is doing dangerous things- you can clearly see that he gets quite wounded in multiple situations and he is in fact vulnerable and not like a supehero or anything.

The action is amazing and incredibly well done and well shot. You can see how everything flows and the amount of tension is great as it is displayed clearly that every character is very vulnerable and can easily get hurt. All of the environments feel real and it really does feel like you're on the adventure with Indy.

The practical effects are also amazing, examples include the ancient relics and also the infamous face-melting scene. Some of the special effects do look dated however (for example some of the green-screen isn't particularly great) but this was 35 years ago so I guess I can kind of forgive it and it's not too distracting but I guess if they were unable to use this technology that well then maybe they shouldn't have used it as much.

This movie is rated PG and is pretty violent for a movie of that rating- there's quite a bit of blood and also the face-melting scene. They took it even further with the next instalment which resulted in a new rating needing to be created, PG-13.

I can't make a review on this without mentioning the soundtrack; John Williams is just amazing.

Overall, a great adventure movie with amazing action and a great main protagonist and a very fun ride.

8.