Film Indiana Jones And The Last Crusade example essay topic

Steven Spielberg's third action-packed entry in the Indiana Jones trilogy evokes the cliffhanger Saturday matinee serials of yesteryear. It's 1938 and Indy (Harrison Ford) receives word that his archaeologist dad, Professor Henry Jones (Sean Connery), has disappeared while on a quest for the Holy Grail. Indy embarks on a search for both his dad and the much-coveted artifact. THE LAST CRUSADE has a unique twist to the series' traditional opening-sequence cliffhanger. Actor River Phoenix plays an adolescent Indy who, while on a field trip with his Boy Scout troop, finds adventure on a circus train.

Spielberg wanted to make the film about a father-and-son relationship, and Connery was his first choice to play Indy's dad. The selection was perfect, considering Spielberg and producer George Lucas first came up with the idea of the series as a rival to the James Bond movies in which Connery had starred. Before shooting THE LAST CRUSADE, Spielberg was planning on directing RAIN MAN with Dustin Hoffman and Tom Cruise but gave up the project to fulfill his contractual obligation with Lucas to make a third Indiana Jones movie. The third installment in the widely beloved Spielberg / Lucas Indiana Jones saga begins with an introduction to a younger Indy (played by the late River Phoenix), who, through a fast-paced prologue, gives the audience insight into the roots of his taste for adventure, fear of snakes, and dogged determination to take historical artifacts out of the hands of bad guys and into the museums in which they belong. A grown-up Indy (Harrison Ford) reveals himself shortly afterward in a familiar classroom scene, teaching archeology to a disproportionate number of starry-eyed female college students in 1938.

Once again, however, Mr. Jones is drawn away from his day job after an art collector (Julian Glover) approaches him with a proposition to find the much sought after Holy Grail. Circumstances reveal that there was another avid archeologist in search of the famed cup - Indiana Jones' father, Dr. Henry Jones (Sean Connery) - who had recently disappeared during his efforts. The junior and senior members of the Jones family find themselves in a series of tough situations in locales ranging from Venice to the most treacherous spots in the Middle East. Complicating the situation further is the presence of Elsa (Alison Doody), a beautiful and intelligent woman with one fatal flaw: she's an undercover Nazi agent.

The search for the grail is a dangerous quest, and its discovery may prove fatal to those who seek it for personal gain. Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade earned a then record-breaking $50 million in its first week of release. - Tracie Cooper The raider. net In my extremely humble opinion, I consider Indiana Jones And The Last Crusade to be the most fun, most entertaining of the three Indiana Jones films made so far. The Nazis are back in full force (with a cameo from Der F"uher himself, Adolf Hitler).

The leading lady is more beautiful than ever (and this time she's on the side of evil -- the prototypical Aryan goddess). And best of all, Indy has a partner in crime stopping -- in the form of none other than the former James Bond himself, Sean Connery, who knows a thing or two himself about foiling the bad guys. The movie starts off in 1913 Utah, twenty three years before the main story takes place, in a sequence starring the late River Phoenix as the young Indiana Jones. I loved this part of the movie, as it gives lots of exposition as to how Indy became the way he is in the 1930's. We learn how he got the scar on his chin, where he got his hat, how his fear of snakes came about, and his tenuous connection with his father, Henry Jones (Sean Connery). Cut to the present day, and Indy is sent off on a search throughout Italy and the Mediterranean, on a quest for the Holy Grail -- and for his father, who disappeared while looking for it.

Along with the quasi-senile Marcus Brody (Den holm Elliott), he meets his guide around the Mediterranean, Elsa Schneider (Alison Doody), who turns out to have more under her sleeve than first appears. Indy is taken to a castle where his father is held captive. They escape and run around Europe trying to stop the Nazis from getting to the grail before they do, all the while bickering like a great comedy team. Thrown in are a few tank battles, motorcycle chases, graf zeppelin fights, and the like. Indiana Jones And The Last Crusade is a rousing adventure film that in my humble opinion, is even better than the most famous (and critically acclaimed) Indiana Jones feature, Raiders Of The Lost Ark. Ford and Connery make a great team, and play off each other so well, it's a wonder they haven't appeared in more movies together.

Supposedly Connery added little details like the fact that both Jones Junior and Jones Senior have enjoyed the favors of Elsa. The whole film is just a great lark, and definitely worth a view. Apparently Lucasfilm is coming out with another Indiana Jones adventure in 2001. Hopefully it " ll be as good as this one. It's not as gritty as Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom -- in fact, Steven Spielberg said he made it to apologize for it -- but The Last Crusade just may be a little too bright. This is, of course, shameless nitpicking, for this third Indiana Jones film is loads of fun.

The highlight of this one is the appearance of Indiana Jones' father, ironically played by the same actor who played Jones' inspriation, Sean Connery. (Indiana Jones came from Steven Spielberg's desire to make a James Bond film.) The two work beautifully together, and we get to see a personal side to Indiana we have not seen before. I just have one question: Why didn't Indy wait for the Nazis to get the boat started and out a ways before he fired up the motorcycle? I love sequels to great movies, but a second sequel usually brings no surprises that aren't silly and contrived. (The ROCKY and LETHAL WEAPON series spring to mind). Not this sequel -- maybe because it begins as a prequel: we go back in time to meet Indi as a boy in 1912 Utah (played by River Phoenix).

We discover his real name and why he wears that hat, and glimpse the odd relationship between him and his father, the professor of medieval literature. ".. that students hope they don't get". This is the best in the Indiana Jones trilogy, and Spielberg's casting of Sean Connery as Indi's dad has much to do with it. What has kept stars like Connery and Clint Eastwood on Hollywood's payroll is the ability to keep reinventing oneself as one ages to take on roles that are completely opposite the characters that made them famous. (See Rising Sun.) There's no mistaking the elder Dr. Jones for James Bond. Clearly he's a person who's devoted his life to academic studies and avoided manual labor -- my grandmother would call him "book smart and life dumb".

Dad is so lovably inept that he's as much trouble to Indi as the people trying to kill him. (But yet in one great scene his knowledge of the Classics saves them from an angry Nazi. ).