My Favorite Collection: Raiders of the Lost Ark (10/10)

“It's not the years, honey, it's the mileage.”

So I’m continuing to write these short reviews for some of my favorite films which I’ve never had a chance to comment on. It’s about time I give Steven Spielberg some love for one of the earliest films I have the memory of seeing. I don’t know how old I was when I first watched Raiders of the Lost Ark, but if my memory isn’t playing a trick on me I have to say this is the first movie I actually fell in love with (perhaps it has to do with the fact that it was released on my birth year). Raiders, First Blood, The Goonies, Romancing the Stone, Back to the Future, the Star Wars trilogy, and ET (I’m not including animated films) are the films that made an impact on me during my childhood; and either I watched them on repeat or the images have simply stuck in my memory. The opening scene where we are introduced to Indiana Jones (Harrison Ford) as he is trying to steal a golden idol from a cave deep in the Peruvian jungle has always fascinated me. He’s forced to escape when he’s crossed by Belloq (Paul Freeman) and the traps go off as we are introduced to the adventurous tone of the film accompanied with the fascinating score by John Williams that has changed the fast-paced blockbuster genre forever. That is all we needed to be introduced to such a fascinating character. As a young boy I imagine I’d easily get distracted by a feature film, but all it took were those opening minutes for me to be hooked to the TV screen for its entire runtime. What followed was one action-packed adventure after another like the scene where Indy faces off a swordsman with his gun, the snake pit scene, the chase sequence involving a truck and some jeeps, and several others that continue to excite me today. It helps that Harrison Ford was playing the titular role and he absolutely owned the part. This is one of the best collaborations between George Lucas and Steven Spielberg and everything about this film was a thrilling experience. Harrison Ford turned Indiana Jones into an iconic figure, and several sequels have followed the success of Raiders without ever being able to match it. Even the romance between Ford and Karen Allen works in this film along with the comedic moments that make this adventure such an exciting and thrilling ride.