DVD Review HTF REVIEW: The Adventures of Indiana Jones (Highly Recommended) (1 Viewer)

[Larry Sutliff]

Did it bother anyone else that Indy tries to help the big guy from getting sucked under the rock smasher?

In the novelization of the film, the rock falling on his head woke the guard up from the Black Sleep of Kali, and Indy tries to save him because he knows from personal experience how effective that drug destroys the conscience of the one who takes it.

 

[Clay-F]

That's your imagination.

Whats strange about that end scene is that I copy and pasted that question from another site. I remember seeing that it seems. Except I think I remember their being some serial numbers that were burned as well. It looks like several people had written in to the site asking about it....

I wanted to see if anyone here remembered it.

On the big guy waking up....

That makes sense. I could understand Indy helping out there, but as it stands without the deleted scene and without any clue that the guy wakes up, it looks really strange to me. Oh well.....

 

[Richard Kim]

In the novelization of the film, the rock falling on his head woke the guard up from the Black Sleep of Kali, and Indy tries to save him because he knows from personal experience how effective that drug destroys the conscience of the one who takes it.

But I thought only fire can break the spell.

 

[Colin Jacobson]

But I thought only fire can break the spell.

I don't think the film indicates that ONLY fire can break the spell. I don't believe it ever gets that specific. Based on the sequence in question, I think we could figure that any sort of strong jolt to the system - burning, bonking on the head - would shock somewhat out of the stupor...

 

[Kristoffer]

Ok just got these and a new player ( Denon 2200 )
Are the color tones of the skin ( on indy per example ) a bit oversaturated or is just me?

 

[Dave H]

I too think the skins tones are too saturated on all three movies. But, that maybe the intent or original source.

 

[Kevin Grey]

I thougt that some of the blues in Last Crusade were way too oversaturated. They seemed distractingly bright. Didn't notice that on either of the other two movies.

 

[Anthony Neilson]

I've always been amazed by the wussy "too dark" naysayers in regards to TOD.
However - having the discs on R4 has allowed me to FINALLY see the uncut version . . . and it's pretty damn dark !
Here in the UK, we've NEVER seen Mola Ram's fist penetrating that guy's chest. We've NEVER seen the shots of the guy being lowered into the lava pit. We've NEVER seen
Short Round getting whipped or heard Indy shouting "Leave him alone, you bastards!" ; and we've NEVER seen that punishingly hard punch to the chest that Indy gets from the big guy beside the mine car.It's all pretty brutal but totally great, almost like seeing a Director's Cut.

I think we should all be relieved that no revisionism has gone on with TOD, as it seems a prime candidate for Spielberg / Lucas tinkering.

As regards the set, I'll second the fulsome praise about the quality of prints. But, as an overall package, I'm still a bit disappointed. The documentaries are great but considering packages like BACK TO THE FUTURE or the STAR WARS films, there really could've been more here. I'm sure the original press releases mentioned over four hours of extra material as opposed to the three we've got here.
In the days of the LOTR E.Es and the ALIEN QUADRILOGY, this just isn't up to scratch.

I wouldn't mind so much if I thought this purist, streamlined DVD presentation was a principled stand by the film-makers. But I'd bet good money on new editions surfacing when/if INDY IV gets released.

 

[Ric Easton]

Well, I finally got around to watching the extras as well as Raiders. I have to say... That is one perfect movie, and it looks great on DVD! I'm going to jump right into the next two.

Now can anyone answer me this? Why was it decided that Temple of Doom was to be a prequel, taking place a year before Raiders? It just doesn't seem to make sense to me. Obviously the gag with the two guys with swords and Indy's missing gun wiorks better if you've at least seen Raiders first. But the thing that really bothers me is that when

 

[Carlo_M]

I also knew it was a "prequel" and thought about the gag w/ the gun and the swordsman not making sense (he smirks like "I've seen this before..." and then is shocked when there's no gun).

But watching the movie without thinking "this is supposed to be a prequel" one would really never know it was intended as such.

I now just watch it as the second of three movies, and don't really think of it as a prequel.

 

[Jeff Jacobson]

I also knew it was a "prequel" and thought about the gag w/ the gun and the swordsman not making sense (he smirks like "I've seen this before..." and then is shocked when there's no gun).

Maybe Indy frequently shoots swordsmen.

 

[Ric Easton]

Yes, the sword/gun thing was not that big a deal and works either way. I was more bothered by the Indy/Marcus discussion in Raiders. After being thru all the magic mysticism in ToD the conversation just doesn't hold water for me.

I guess I still don't get why they thought ToD had to be a "prequel" I think it would have worked better as taking place after Raiders.

Ric

 

[Richard Kim]

I guess I still don't get why they thought ToD had to be a "prequel"

I posted this earlier, but I'll post it again: I think it was so that Temple could start in Shanghai before the Japanese invasion of China in 1937.

 

[Carlo_M]

Bah! Who cares about being historically accurate! It's Indy!

 

[Vincent_P]

I got the DVD set a little late myself, and am mostly very happy with it, but am a bit disturbed by the 5.1 remixes. Observe:

Of the three films, INDIANA JONES & THE LAST CRUSADE was the one I was most familiar with. I owned the widescreen Paramount laserdisc and used to watch it all the time, and one thing that always stood out to me about the sound mix was that it was very directional in nature- even the dialogue was frequently directional instead of being completely centered like it is on most modern film mixes. The one scene that always stood out to me in particular was the scene that occurs on Chapter 27 on the INDIANA JONES & THE LAST CRUSADE dvd, as Marcus rides in the car with Elsa and the bad guy in the desert. The dialogue was very noticeably directional in this scene on the old LD, with Marcus's dialogue very perceptably steered to the left, as he himself is on the extreme screen left in the back of the car, and the Nazi who steals his water's voice coming mostly from the right.

WELL, while watching the scene on the new DVD set, ALL THE DIALOGUE IS DEAD CENTER. In fact, the mixes in general seem to be rather center-focused overall, whereas I remember the old mixes having a lot more panning of sounds. I even switched to the French 2.0 track during chaper 27 of LAST CRUSADE, and it has the same directional quality I recall from my long departed laserdisc of LAST CRUSADE, and sounds quite different from the "new improved" 5.1 mix.

Edwin's comments above re: the early bullwhip sound effect from RAIDERS being suddenly center-channel-centric whereas it used to be a front-to-back panning sound effect makes me think this entire set might suffer from this "re-thinking" and toning-down of the original highly-directional nature of these mixes. Anybody else have their Paramount LDs handy to do some comparisons of the sound?

Vincent

 

[Ric Easton]

I posted this earlier, but I'll post it again: I think it was so that Temple could start in Shanghai before the Japanese invasion of China in 1937.

Thanks, Richard.

I only would have had to go back to page 13 to find the original discussion! Sometimes these long threads are a little unwieldy, y'know?

Ric

 

[Kajs]

You know, I could swear before Willie gets lowered down the lava pit, she said "Indy! For God sakes, help me! What-what's a matter with you?" I could almost hear it in my mind from the VHS tape I had, on the DVD I could only hear one "What's". Was it my VHS copy, am I dreaming, or was that line slightly changed in the DVD?


And as I typed that I checked the DVD again..the subtitle does say "Wh-what's a matter with you?" but you can only hear the one "what's." I just thought it was odd, I'm not suggesting to boycott the DVD or anything, but its dialogue I can hear from memory since I've seen the movie so many times. And speaking of dialogue panning as discussed above, I thought Temple had way too much panning of dialogue across the front 3 channels, to the point where it was distracting.

 

[Tim Glover]

We just finally got around to seeing Last Crusade . Of course it's a charming movie and fun.

After seeing all three of these now on dvd, I think I would say that TOD may have the most natural video and best all-around audio mix of this set.

I need to watch Crusade & Raiders again though. TOD was great to look at; always looked pleasing and clean. I thought at times that Crusade-while looking great-looked a tad "edgy" or "digital" for lack of a better word. Still a terrific looking transfer. As I'm writing this I'm thinking to myself, "gosh, I'm being a hard-ass".

The audio mix on TOD stands out for several reasons. The one most important to me was the way John Williams fantastic score really stood out EVEN during intense action.

I'm just glad to have them all on dvd though. Terrific audio & video & very good behind the scenes stuff.

 

[Dave H]

Tim,

It's interesting you mention Last Crusade looking a little digital. I too thought the same - particularly in the daylight scenes it became most noticable. Though, as you stated, it looks very good.

I think Temple looked the best. Some of the scenes are phenomenal. Raiders looks good, but is definitely below the other two - though it does have a nice filmlike look to it.

 

[Dave H]

Tim,

It's interesting you mention Last Crusade looking a little digital. I too thought the same - particularly in the daylight scenes it became most noticable. Though, as you stated, it looks very good.

I think Temple looked the best. Some of the scenes are phenomenal. Raiders looks good, but is definitely below the other two - though it does have a nice filmlike look to it.