After almost twenty years of waiting, Indiana Jones is back and once more on the trail of an elusive artifact. Harrison Ford reprises the character in the fourth movie, Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull.
The time frame has been moved to 1957 and the movie opens up with Elvis Presley blasting “You ain’t nothin’ but a hound dog.” Ironically, the song was written with a female singer in mind who would be singing about her boyfriend. The singer didn’t quite fit the song, but it still made a big hit.
That’s kind of what’s happening with Indiana Jones this time. I think Indiana has a hard time fitting into the 1950s. I much preferred him in the 1930s and 1940s. The world was still so big and so raw during that time. By the Cold War, we’d become aware of how small the world was getting, and how everything seemed to be about the coming days instead of the past ones.
The pulp magazines and serial movies that Indiana Jones had more or less sprung from were dead by this time. It was the end of a fantastic era for heroes. So, in a way, maybe it’s fitting that the last Harrison Ford/Indiana Jones movie would be set in this time frame.
Harrison Ford is simply an amazing actor. After twenty years, he swaggers back into the role and leaps into the saddle. My God, but it was fun watching him square off against the villains, against overwhelming odds, and figure out clues to archaeological mysteries. No one could have ever done this role as well, nor will they ever do it again. Harrison Ford is the epitome of a down-to-earth hero rising to meet outlandish circumstance. His facial expressions alone are with the price of the ticket.
In previous movies, Ford did most of his own stunts. This time around, he didn’t have that luxury. But I was surprised at how lithe and spry he was as he performed the ones that didn’t risk significant injury. He leapt and climbed and ran with grim authority, if not with the alacrity of his younger years. The man is in fantastic shape. Again, the sheer beauty of the Indiana Jones character is that, like Batman, fans can aspire to do what he does. Even when he’s a senior citizen.
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Article comments
1 - Maurice Colgan
"The singer did not quite fit the song"?
The funniest thing I have read for a long time.
Elvis Presley's riveting treatment of "Hound Dog" totally eclipsed all other versions at the time and no other version in the last 50 years or more has come close.
It's a classic example of the greatest voice in Rock 'n' Roll and popular music in general, making a song his very own.
2 - Mel
"While working with another Peacock artist, Johnny Otis, [Big Mama Thornton] recorded "Hound Dog", a song that composers Jerry Leiber and Mike Stoller had given her in Los Angeles." (Wikipedia entry)
It was just a sidenote of interest. No one remembers that the song was written for a woman and not with Elvis in mind. The song shouldn't have worked as well for him, but he made it his own.
My point is that Indiana Jones doesn't quite fit in the paranoid, red-scare 1950s. Yet he claimed the time period for himself.
I'm an Elvis fan. :)
3 - Maurice Colgan
That's ok Mel, I know the history of the song and have heard Big Mama's version.
The Indiana movie is just that. Far fetched escapism.
We suspend our disbelief.
Coincidently two young hungarian girls served us dinner at a hotel tonight. The Hungarian uprising against the Russians in 1956 had us all sitting on the edge of our school desks back then. Could we have been facing a nucleur war?!
The Hungararian girls corrected my pronunciation of Franz Lizst :-) Another wonderful musician.
Nice to know you are an Elvis fan. All discerning listeners are.