Indiana Jones-type films: Why does the "lost city/treasure area" always fall apart?
06-01-08, 09:34 PM
#1
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Indiana Jones-type films: Why does the "lost city/treasure area" always fall apart?
Indiana Jones, Mummies, National Treasures, etc....
Has there ever been one of these movies where the "secret ruins/lost city/treasure area" does not fall apart at the climax? I would like to see a movie in which the main characters find the "treasure area," and nothing falls apart, no booby traps, nothing caving in, in which they don't have to run out of there before they get trapped inside...
As clichéd as National Treasure 2 was, I was happy that the scientists could
Has there ever been one of these movies where the "secret ruins/lost city/treasure area" does not fall apart at the climax? I would like to see a movie in which the main characters find the "treasure area," and nothing falls apart, no booby traps, nothing caving in, in which they don't have to run out of there before they get trapped inside...
As clichéd as National Treasure 2 was, I was happy that the scientists could
Spoiler:
06-01-08, 09:35 PM
#2
DVD Talk Hero
Because it's the Indy trademark and the other movies are copying Indy 
06-01-08, 11:06 PM
#4
Originally Posted by chris_sc77
Seriously, 5 separate Indiana Jones threads on the 1st page alone is way too many.
My theory on why it falls apart...it serves a lesson to all those involved they should have left well enough alone.
06-02-08, 02:18 AM
#8
Originally Posted by PopcornTreeCt
I don't remember the treasure tomb falling apart in National Treasure.
That's the first thing I thought, too. Weird to include this series in the OP, when both of those movies didn't have the 'treasure' get destroyed.
And even though the Ark was put into storage, it didn't fall apart.
06-02-08, 04:27 AM
#9
DVD Talk Gold Edition
The pyramids contain sandtraps and stuff like that. The last workers on the pyramids were usually buried alive within the tombs. There is evidence that people were living inside the pyramids for a short amount of time before dying scattered about the place. It would certainly have scared a lot of grave robbers into not breaking in to steal stuff, which is what happens in the movies you mentioned.
06-02-08, 07:05 PM
#11
DVD Talk Gold Edition
Originally Posted by calhoun07
Did you read the original post...this isn't an Indiana Jones thread. It's about movies that borrow on the Indy type premise.
My theory on why it falls apart...it serves a lesson to all those involved they should have left well enough alone.
My theory on why it falls apart...it serves a lesson to all those involved they should have left well enough alone.
It harks back to the eras when most stories had some (usually rather childish and intellectually simplistic) moral to make... "There are some things man was not meant to know!"... "If God had meant for man to fly, He would have given us wings!"... Blather, blather, blather.
It's pretty much why I hate those sort of endings and have been disappointed in certain otherwise entertaining, well-known films.
06-03-08, 06:34 AM
#13
Suspended
It harks back to the adventure fiction of the late XIXth Century - early XXth Century, e.g. She. The kingdoms don't actualy self-destruct as a rule but the way back to them usually caves in, which allows for a suspenseful escape for the hero and a moral along the lines of "I guess man wasn't meant to know those things/have access to that kind of power/wealth/scientific discovery", but unfortunately precludes a sequel. God knows, Hollywood writers have found many ways around that problem since...
06-03-08, 06:47 AM
#14
DVD Talk Legend
Correct me if I'm wrong but nothing "fell apart" in Raiders of the Lost Ark.
Indy was chased by a boulder in the begining, but that hardly counts. Indy himself knocked down the wall in the Ark room. And only Nazis fell apart at the end.
In Temple of Doom the only falling apart happening was intentionaly done by those present (the flood and cutting the bridge).
Indy was chased by a boulder in the begining, but that hardly counts. Indy himself knocked down the wall in the Ark room. And only Nazis fell apart at the end.
In Temple of Doom the only falling apart happening was intentionaly done by those present (the flood and cutting the bridge).
06-03-08, 09:38 AM
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Originally Posted by baracine
It harks back to the adventure fiction of the late XIXth Century - early XXth Century, e.g. She. The kingdoms don't actualy self-destruct as a rule but the way back to them usually caves in, which allows for a suspenseful escape for the hero and a moral along the lines of "I guess man wasn't meant to know those things/have access to that kind of power/wealth/scientific discovery", but unfortunately precludes a sequel.
06-03-08, 09:40 AM
#17
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Originally Posted by Sean O'Hara
That didn't stop Haggard from writing two sequels to "She" -- "Ayesha: The Return of She" and "She and Allan" which is also a sequel to his Allan Quatermain novels.
