A few weeks ago, I wrote a retroactive review of Raiders of the Lost Ark after having viewed it in its entirety for the first time. I was honestly let down, especially since people love the film so much. But I don’t think my review was as thorough or even as honest as it could’ve been, mostly because I was in a bad headspace at the time. Basically, I held back. While I am miffed at the story quality and Marion, there was one thing that I alluded to that made me really dislike the way the movie was set up: the way Indiana Jones is portrayed versus the indigenous people of whatever country he’s in.
First a disclaimer: I am not talking about the plot of this film per se. What I am going to talk about is a cultural and time-specific thing that was happening in movies of the past, even as recent as the mid ’90s. I would talk about race portrayals not only in movies I’m not particularly fond of, but also in movies or tv shows that I actually like; for instance, I really like The King and I, but I’m aware of the stereotypical way in which the King, his children, and his wives are portrayed. I still like those characters, but I recognize their limitations and flaws. It’s really Yul Brynner’s dramatic, seductive, and comedic performance of the King that makes the movie, at least for me.
Anyway, my biggest gripe among my other gripes about Raiders deals with when Indiana Jones is interacting with non-white people. Take for instance when he was in the Peruvian jungle. His Spanish-speaking guides, Satipo, Barranca, and another unnamed guide, are skiddish at best, but their comedic blundering and their ability to be easily scared is off-putting. Example: the scene where the unnamed guide runs away screaming after coming across a scary Mayan-esque stone head while Indy stands stoic, almost as if he expected to see the stone head no one would have expected to see. Why is it that the guide runs away like a buffoon? This kind of writing is indicative of when ethnic people were written as buffoons in the ’40s and ’50s, while the white leads were portrayed as fully-developed characters.
There are plenty of other jungle scenes that could be written about, like Satipo leaving Indy to fend for himself, only end up dead, and how René Belloq, Indy’s archaeologist nemesis, has control over the indigenous tribe (when in reality, they probably wouldn’t blindly trust an outsider and do their bidding, even if he knew their language). But the jungle isn’t the only place where native buffoonery is rampant. When Indy goes to Egypt to find the Ark, he encounters the native Egyptians, who are mostly portrayed as either smiling, overtly-welcoming people, or totally nasty and evil. There really is no middle ground. The closest to a fully-realized Egyptian is Indy’s excavator friend Sallah, but even he has a scene where he becomes scared by the sudden sight of a huge statue while Indy, also seeing the statue for the first time, isn’t afraid in the slightest.
The biggest, most problematic scene for me is after Indy as discovered where the Ark is located and has Sallah’s excavation team working on the digging. While the men are working, Indy is standing over them, silhouetted, in a heroic pose. This scene, while not disturbing to some, is disturbing to me because there have been many movies in the past that have featured the white lead in some sort of heroic pose while the ethnic workers are slaving away (pun intended) and are rather happy about doing it. Take for instance scenes in films like Gone with the Wind and Cat on a Hot Tin Roof (another movie I love) where the black servants are content, if not happy, to be working under the fully-developed white characters.
Other scenes in Egypt include when what seems like everyone in the Egyptian town yelling happily as Indy races away to catch the bad guys. On the one hand, it’s great that Indy gets recognition for wanting to catch the bad guys, but the way the scene is played out is also like one of those Gone with the Wind or Show Boat scenes where the servants are happy to see the master or mistress of the house come back/the riverboat show up (as if they are going to be allowed to see the shows on the boat).
As I’ve alluded to, this movie isn’t the only movie that is guilty of portraying the indigenous people as extremely happy, extremely helpless, or extremely evil. The ’80s was a time in when the idea of playing up racial stereotypes for laughs was finally in its deaththroes. Or, at the very least, it’s not as rampant as it was in the ’80s and the time before then. The ’80s saw movies such as Short Circuit, which had the stereotypical Indian character Ben Jabituya (played by Caucasian actor Fischer Stevens), Sixteen Candles‘ Long Duk Dong, the stereotypical Asian character, and any ’80s movie (or ’90s movie for that matter) where the black guy dies first.
In any case, even though I am bringing up what I don’t like about Indiana Jones doesn’t mean that you have to dislike it, too. Like I said, I like a lot of things that have significant racial problems, for instance, to go along with the other examples I’ve given about myself, I Love Dragonball Z, but I recognize that Mr. Popo is a total blackface character. I overlook him, partly because there’s a lot of other elements and characters I like about the show, and in general, the negative stereotypes of blackface aren’t totally defined in Japanese culture as they are over here (keep in mind I said “in general.” I’m not excusing everybody in Japan). I feel that you can like something and still recognize where some elements went astray. If I hated every show or movie that had some stereotype, I’d never watch anything. It only so happens that with this particular movie, the story wasn’t there for me, coupled with the fact that there was more than one scene where extreme stereotypes were used.
So … to recap your 21 century PC sensitivities are bothered by a 1930′s time capsule pulp fiction film? Sounds like you need a hug.
But the film’s made in the 1980s. Even though it is set in the 1930s, it’s still offensive. Even if it was a film that was made in the 1930s, it’d still be offensive to me. It sounds like you need a history lesson on how Hollywood has ALWAYS mistreated minorities.