Customer Reviews

Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom (Widescreen) [VHS]

5 star:		(48)
4 star:		(20)
3 star:		(13)
2 star:		(10)
1 star:		(10)

 

 

This set of movies were given as a gift at Christmas and after christmas, I learned the movies were scratched and not able to be seen without skipping. I was very diddappointed and hope the next set I get will be in better shape since their are no more sets available.Also a complete set of thwe Mummy set. The set of the Mummy were fine but the other set has not arrived as of yet.I had dissappointed me to no end to have this happen. I try to buy new when getting DVD's to get away from this problem. Is there no way of previewing them before you send them out. This kind of leaves a bad tastes in your mouth when this happens and the dvd costs so much for the sets.

The "now standard Indiana" formula is there and there are a lot of fun parts to this movie. However the bad guys are too bad and the situation is too spooky. Be sure to watch "Riders of the Lost Ark" first even thought this takes place chronologically earlier.

Once again James Bond has nothing on Dr. Jones (Harrison Ford) as he negotiates for a treasure and is double crossed at every turn, barely escaping with his life, also the acquisition of a steriotipical blond singer Wilhelmina Scott (Kate Capshaw), and his new sidekick Short Round (Jonathan Ke Quan).

In his hasty retreat he does not realize that there are greater forces at work insuring that he fulfill his destiny to recover a sacred object and all the children of a beleaguered village.

Is he up to the challenge?

In this case does being blond help or hinder?

Will Short Shot prove that size does not matter?

Take heart!

Be prepared for a dark passage "a little too dark for my taste".

The opening is my favorite in all movies. My next favorite is the opening for Men In Black. I became a fan of Kate Capshaw when I saw her in this movie. She shows three times the personality of the female leads in Raiders of the Lost Arch and The Last Crusade. She made the movie a standout to me. I enjoy Short Round too. I believe that there is plenty of character development in this movie, and character development in a movie is extremely to me. I honestly don't understand some other reviewer's complaints.

By far,The temple of Doom is the weakest in the trilogy of Indiana Jones.It focuses too much on action that there is hardly any room for character development or,more importanly,plot.Overall,watch it if you liked yhe first film.Otherwise,skip it and watch the third film instead. Note:there are two things to note: one,this film is set before Raiders of the Lost Ark,making this a prequel and two:if you have children younger than thirteen,DON'T let them watch this one.This has very graphic violence.The PG rating is a joke!!!!!!!!

Watch this movie if you want to pass an afternoon with a bland movie. Kate Capshaw is a great actress but her character was very annoying. Karen Black's strong female lead in 'Raiders' is by far the better of the female leads from the trilogy.

"Oh *h*t." - Indiana Jones is deep in it when he discovers he is trapped on a rope bridge, courtesy of Thugee soldiers, that leads to freedom in "Indiana Jones and The Temple of Doom".

Steven Spielberg's first prequel, the blockbuster "Indiana Jones and The Temple of Doom" is a rollercoaster ride that, after 20 years (and one day), is still effective long after its 5/23/84 release.

Taking place a year before the events in "Raiders of the Lost Ark", Indiana Jones, with the help of his sidekick Short Round and lounge singer Willie Scott, does battle with a strong religous cult, known as the Thugee, trying to retrieve a sacred stone (called The Sankara Stone that is one of four stones, & if combined could make the Thugee all powerful) for a battered, decaying village. Along the way, Indy also frees the village's children that the cult has kidnapped (the kids are used for slave labor to dig for the missing fourth stone).

Much darker than "Raiders" (and is the dark heart of the trilogy), "Temple of Doom" doesn't let up until the last frame fadeout. The opening is a classic, with the Cole Porter song "Anything Goes", with "Temple of Doom" then taking a nose dive into its first big action sequence - an allout chaotic nightclub brawl that has Indiana searching for the antidote vial to the poison he drank while fighting off anything that gets in his way, including cigarette girls. The viewer also gets a crash course in avation (not a good one though, since Indy crashes the plane), a lesson on how to be more specific when ordering soup in a foreign country (just ask for broth, no eyeballs & also stick to munching on fruit), the correct way in waking someone up "from the black sleep of the Kali" (make sure to have a torch and lighter fluid handy), and Dr. Jones demonstrates the correct way on cutting a rope bridge (make sure to hang on...tight).

The film's production did have its problems.
Kate Capshaw didn't read the entire script before she got the part and was scared stiff to find out that some of her co-stars were going to be snakes and bugs. The scene where Willie falls off her elephant was cut short to her whining that she could lose her voice. In the original treatment of the script, Willie was to be surrounded in the mudpuddle with a bunch of snakes. Since Capshaw is deathly afraid of snakes (the day production was set to shoot the scene she was pale as a ghost and shaking) Spielberg opted to cut the scene from the film in exchange for the python, elephant trunk scene instead.
Harrison Ford had a severe herniated back problem after filming the fight between Indiana Jones and the Thugee Guard (the guard winds up getting hung up in the ceiling fan) in Indiana's quarters (the backflip while the guard is choking Ford is what caused the back problem). With Ford being out for 5 weeks, Jack Dearlove, Harrison Ford's stuntdouble, can be seen in all the long, tracking shots in the fight scene that leads up to the mine car chase (that includes the fight between Indiana and the huge Thugee Guard on the rock crusher). Ford and Spielberg did all the close up shots six weeks after shooting concluded on that particular sequence.

The film caused major controversy over the violent content in the film (an impaling, a hanging, and a heart sacrifice are heavy stuff for the PG going crowd). Spielberg went to Jack Valentii, the head of the Motion Picture Association of America, and asked if there could be a middle ground between PG and R ratings. By the end of the summer of 1984, and with the release of the Patrick Swayze film "Red Dawn", the PG-13 rating was born.

I watched the film last night (the first time in a long time & to celebrate its 20th anniversary) and I still say that "Indiana Jones and The Temple of Doom" is decent enough entertainment and belongs in any video library (preferably DVD).

I just had a brief comment to make on this film, which is more in the way of a fun piece of trivia for you movie trivia buffs out there like me rather than a full review.

Back when Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom was being made, a young physicist went out to Skywalker Ranch to interview for an engineering job. Unfortunately I don't recall his name at this point, but anyway, when he arrived, they weren't ready to see him yet, so they said why don't you go into the mixing room and watch and see how it's done? So he went in and sat down.

Inside the audio engineer and an assistant were trying to mix the scene where the evil head priest is tearing the heart out of the guy's chest. To do the scene, they needed to get the schlurping noise of the victim's still beating heart, so the assistant had a big bucket that was filled with calamari and a big plunger that he was smushing the calamari with to try to create just the right noise effect. The engineer would run the tape and then have the guy go at the calamari with the toilet plunger. But it wouldn't be just right so he'd ask the guy to take it from the top again.

This went on for a while until the smell for the overripe calamari filled the room and the young physicist was getting nauseus. Finally, just when he thought he couldn't stand it anymore and was about to get up and leave the room, someone came in and said they were ready for the interview.

Well, the young physicist said there was a point to the story, too, which was that before Lucas built the first big all-digital studio that was used to create later movies, until then movies were very labor-intensive, even for seemingly little things like needing to produce the heart's beating noise. After that many things could be done on a computer, which vastly reduced the cost, especially as the price of computer equipment and software came down.

Anyway, I just thought I'd mention that for you movie trivia buffs since I hadn't heard that story before about the film before.

Well well well. If it isn't the most contriversal Jones film of the trilogy. I have to say, this film was a bit too much. To this day I'm surprised this movie didn't get an "R" rating. Although this film is the reason why there is a PG-13. The biggest flaw with this movie is that it doesn't give us a chance to breathe. It could have been a lot better if only it weren't so violoent and dark. Spielburg said himself that this was his least favorite of the Raiders films. Lucas also agreed that it was a bit too dark for it's own good. They wanted to make a different movie from Raiders of the Lost Ark and I guess this was just a little too different. Not the worst move ever made, but the least of the series.

After a film as critically and publicly praised as Raiders of the Lost Ark was, how does one make a follow up to it? That was the question on the minds of creators Steven Spielberg and George Lucas, who, during the time leading up to and during Raider's success at the box office, continued to make names for themselves in Hollywood. In that time, Steven Spielberg directed quite possibly one of the most memorable films in his career, E. T. Extra-Terrestrial, while producer George Lucas wrapped up his highly successful Star Wars trilogy. Indiana Jones himself, Harrison Ford, was reaping the benefits of success from both the Star Wars series as well as the first installment of Indiana Jones series and was eager for another go around with the hat and whip. But what adventures awaited the adventurous archaeologist? The possibilities were limit-less but choosing the right one with just the right story elements proved to be more difficult then many would think.

The story takes place nearly a year before the events of the previous feature, Raider of the Lost Ark, and shows the venturesome archaeologist in rare form, not battling Nazis for once. In 1935, we find the reckless Indiana Jones in China seeking an artifact from a dangerous Chinese businessman named Lao Che but in his turbulent escape with his child partner, Short Round, he becomes involved with a bombshell named Willie Scott, who ends up tagging along for the ride. The adventure places the group in a small village in India which finds itself under a curse after a group named the Maharajah of Pankot steals the sacred stone that has kept the town prosperous for hundreds of years. Not only that but it appears that at the same the time the stone was taken, all the children of the village mysteriously disappeared. The native shaman begs Indy to travel to Pankot Palace and discover the source of this unspeakable evil plot. After being welcomed grandly by maharajah, the trio discovers a secret passage that leads to the underground Temple of Doom, watched over by the evil Mola Ram, the high priest of a cult known as the Thuggees. Can the audacious adventurer find his way out of voodoo curses and perilous mines? The story for Indiana Jones & the Temple of Doom is a decent outing for those looking for escapism but it doesn't quite live up to the standards set by the original film. For one, the romantic angle between Indy and Willie Scott is lacking and doesn't match up to the one in Raiders. Secondly, the plot lacks the religious connection with the audience that Raiders and Crusade showcased, which is probably why it is the least enduring of the three films. And thirdly, as entertaining as he might, the addition of Short Round ends up being more of an annoyance then a plus to the story's plot line.

Another great thing about the Indiana Jones series is that it isn't afraid to switch up its supporting cast from film to film because the filmmakers know that the only thing that matters is how they interact with Harrison Ford on screen. Harrison Ford, who had just completed his stint as Hans Solo in Lucas' epic Star Wars series, gives another exhilarating performance as Indiana Jones and proves once again that he is fit for the role, no matter what is thrown at him in it. Ford works perfectly well by himself despite the annoyances of Kate Capshaw and Ke Huy Quan. Kate Capshaw, who would later marry director Steven Spielberg, just doesn't fit well into this film at all. Her hysterics come off as being more annoying then hilarious and she lacks chemistry when paired up romantically with Harrison Ford. Ke Huy Quan, who performs as Short Round in the film, is another case of a character being more of an annoyance and a distraction then an increment. Sure, his attitude and the way he speaks might be humorous, cute even, as the feature starts out but as it progresses, patience wares thin especially in the more serious aspects of the film.

Overall, Temple of Doom continues the thrilling adventures of Indiana Jones but fails to surpass the standards set by Raiders of the Lost Ark just a few years before. Unlike the previous installment, the supporting cast is more of a hindrance then anything else and just doesn't compliment the wonderful performance given by Harrison Ford. Also unlike Raiders, Doom lacks the romantic integrity and the religious implications that made the series so enduring to movie-goers. The darker overtones also alienate many who had grown accustomed to the series' light-hearted fare but not to such an extent that it ruins the experience entirely who do sit down and watch it. Despite its obvious inferior enduring quality behind Raiders of the Lost Ark, Temple of Doom remains an entertaining feature for Harrison Ford's engaging performance and the beautiful landscapes alone.

Raiders of the Lost Ark and Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade are great movies but I just didn't like Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom, despite being directed by a wonderful director like Steven Spielberg and having a great cast that includes Harrison Ford and Kate Capshaw I was just really disappointed with this movie and I would like to have the other two movies on DVD but not this one but I think the DVDs all come together in a boxset and I really wish you could buy the DVDs seperately because I only want Raiders of the Lost Ark, and Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade and not this movie!