If You Like Indiana Jones, You Might Like...

[cdmeredith]

My idea for this thread is to create a list of other media that fans of Indiana Jones might enjoy. Things that have a similar feel/tone to them, have similar motifs/elements, or are in the same spirit. This can be maintained as a reference for fans to find similar media that they would enjoy. Try to give a brief description with each new addition. Any media will do (Books, Music, Movies, etc.)

Here are some examples that I think fans of Indy might like:

- The Adventure stories of Louis L'Amour (BOOK) - Several stories in the two fisted pulp fiction format. The best ones revolve around 'Ponga' Jim Mayo, a tramp steamer captain, and soldier of fortune, as he sails around the Indies looking for adventure. Very similar to Indy, and a lot of fun to read.

- The Rocketeer (GRAPHIC NOVEL/FILM) - A very fun film. Like Indy, a nod to pulp adventure stories from the 1930s. A guy discovers a jet pack and battles nazis in Hollywood's golden era.

- To Have and Have Not (FILM) - A great Bogart film. The dynamic between Bogie and Bacall is very similar to Indy and Marion. This film is also very similar to Casablanca, a definite Indy inspiration.

- Only Angels Have Wings (FILM) - Another great Howard Hawks film. South American daredevil pilots face death while delivering the mail. Also, a tough lady from the hero's past meets up with him in a dirty expat bar to rekindle the romance. (Sounds familiar?)

- Romancing the Stone (FILM) - A great adventure film. A romance novelist gets caught up in the search for treasure in Mexico while trying to save her sister.

- Six Days, Seven Nights (FILM) - While not the best film, it is a fun adventure flick that stars Harrison Ford. It's got exotic locales, plane crashes, and pirates. Can't be all bad.

- Congo by Michael Crichton (BOOK) - A great adventure book. A modern retelling of King Solomon's Mines. It takes us into the heart of darkness with a talking ape. Adventure ensues!

- LOST (TV SHOW) - While not really in the same exact genre of Indy movies, it is a more cerebral adventure story, with tons of exotic locales, and a great story.

- Delerium by Karma (CD) - I think a lot of the tracks on this CD are very evocative of Indiana Jones, especially Lamentation.

There's a ton more out there. Please help add to the list.

[Morning Bell]

Good idea for a thread.:up:

Two immediately come to mind:

The novel King Solomon's Mines. If you're an adventure fan this book is a MUST have. It's fantastic.

The anime series Lupin the 3rd is great. I'm not even an anime fan but I LOVE this series. The characters are fascinating and many of the episodes and films have an Indy-esque feel to them. Highly recommended if you want action/adventure with some comedy thrown in.

http://www.pjfarmer.com/woldnewton/lupiniii_2.gif

[TheMutt92]

The Dirk Pitt Adventure series of books by Clive Cussler. Its like a hybrid of Indy and James Bond (though Pitt's first few adventures were published before the release of ROTLA). They did a film version of the novel Sahara a few years back (and one of Raise the Titanic, but thats not worth a mention) which, although it didn't follow the book too well, was still a very enjoyable action/adventure film (here's to hoping they are somehow able to continue the film series... but I doubt it :( ).

[Lon]

The Codex (BOOK) - Written by Douglas Preston, The Codex is about a cancer-ridden extravagant treasure hunter who secretly entombs himself and all of his antiquities and challenges his three sons to find his dead body in order to claim their inheritance.

[cdmeredith]

I think another good one for Indy fans is the original film Stargate (not the TV series). It's kind of a different genre, but it touches a lot of the same chords.

Also by Douglas Preston (and Lincoln Child) the book Relic. The opening is more like Indiana Jones than the bulk of the story, but the rest takes place in a museum?

Also, I would NOT recommend both of the books in the TAKERS series. they were written around the same time as raiders of the lost ark released, but they are pretty awful. I had high hopes for them too.

Another really good book in the pulp adventure vain is PLUNDER OF THE SUN. It has been reprinted by Hard Case Crime recently. A great book. They made a movie out of it starring Charlton Heston, but the book is better. Secret Inca treasure!

I am glad that people here are responding to this. As a big Indy fan, I have spent years searching for material in this genre, and so have many of you I am sure. It will be nice to see if somebody can come up with something I've never heard of that I will love.

[JerryKing]

Max McCoy's "Indiana Jones" novels. :D

Possibly some James "Rollins" Czajkowski's titles.

Preston and Child in general, especially "The Ice Limit" and "Riptide". Just skip their latest novels, since at least one of them seems to have lost interest in science and history, instead turning to New Age-ish nonsense... which resulted in their primary character being changed into a supermonk who levitates, teleports, travels in time and fights ghosts.

I haven't seen the "Librarian" movies, but I've heard good words about them and their supposedly Indy-lite nature.

[James]

- To Have and Have Not (FILM) - A great Bogart film. The dynamic between Bogie and Bacall is very similar to Indy and Marion. This film is also very similar to Casablanca, a definite Indy inspiration.

- Six Days, Seven Nights (FILM) - While not the best film, it is a fun adventure flick that stars Harrison Ford. It's got exotic locales, plane crashes, and pirates. Can't be all bad.

Bogart's character in To Have And Have Not always reminded me more of Han Solo. Bogie had his own ship and was a great smuggler, then eventually aided a cause and fell in love.

Six Days, Seven Nights is my favorite from Harrison Ford's "experimental" period of the late 90s/early 00s. It's a bit like a romantic comedy from the 1930s- which is a style the Monkey King script attempted to homage.

[cdmeredith]

Bogart's character in To Have And Have Not always reminded me more of Han Solo. Bogie had his own ship and was a great smuggler, then eventually aided a cause and fell in love.

I totally agree. I have always thought that there was a lot of bogart in Indy though. And to have and have not certainly uses the whole expatriate exoticism and romance that the Indy movies also use so well.

[James]

Of course, the best part of that film has absolutely nothing to do with Bogart. Instead, it's that little shimmy that Bacall does as she walks up to him at the end.

[cdmeredith]

absolutely. bacall's character in that movie is hands down the single most sexy female movie character I have ever seen. her one liners are fantastic.

[Crusade>Raiders]

Someone already stole my idea for Lupin the 3rd. Its like Indiana Jones, James Bond, and Loony Toons combined.

Also recommend the PS3 game Uncharted. Rugged adventurer hero, gunfights, fistfights, exotic locales, pretty women, hidden treasure, ancient booby traps/puzzles...the whole nine yards.

[cdmeredith]

I really, really wish they would port Uncharted over to Xbox360. I know they never will, but I would really love to play that game.

[Inbanana]

Does anyone remember a movie that came out in the late 80s called Vibes? It was with Cyndi Lauper and Jeff Goldblum about psychics looking for a lost city of gold in South America that was supposedly a massive source of psychic power (Sounds familiar?). I don't think it ever came out on DVD... so it might have not exactly been as good as I had remembered...

Another one that might be hard to find is Tales of the Gold Monkey, a TV show that came out in '82 that was inspired by Only Angels Have Wings...

Oh and my favorite Carpenter movie, Big Trouble in Little China... it always kind of reminded me of Temple of Doom... but with kung-fu.:D

Edit: ...just noticed on amazon that Vibes was finally released on DVD last month. Hmm... might be worth a rent...

[cdmeredith]

I have always been curious about seeing Tales of the Gold Monkey. There was a rumor a couple of years ago that it was soon to be coming to DVD, but I think that fell through. I keep checking every once in awhile though.

The movie Sphinx (1981) is alright, but the book it was based upon by Robin Cook, (also Sphinx) was much, much better. The movie isn't available on DVD, but you can rent it as a streaming video from Amazon.com. I recommend the book first though. About an egyptologist and an undiscovered tomb filled with pharaonic gold.

I was always disappointed by the Tomb Raider films, but there is a new one in the works, and it is a reboot of the franchise, maybe they will skew towards raiders territory more, and it will be enjoyable?

[Goonie]

Some obvious ones:

The Da Vinci Code - Book and movie
Angels and Demons - Book and upcoming movie
The Goonies
Someone mentioned Romancing the Stone, how about it's sequel:
The Jewel of the Nile - Movie
The Mummy - Movie
The Mummy Returns - Movie
The Mummy: Tomb of the Dragon Emperor - Movie
Ducktales: Treasure of the Lost Lamp - Movie
Pirates of the Caribbean trilogy
National Treasure - Movie
National Treasure: Book of Secrets - Movie
The X-Files: Ruins - Book. I wonder if George read this before he came up with Crystal Skull.

[Morning Bell]

The X-Files: Ruins - Book. I wonder if George read this before he came up with Crystal Skull.

Great book! As a big X-Files fan I enjoyed that book quite a bit and it definitely had an "Indy" feel to it.

[cdmeredith]

I was hoping that when we post new additions, we would also post a short description and WHY we thought it emulated Indy. That way, unfamiliar people can take away some information about the new media. does anyone agree?

[KarmicCurse]

Great idea for a thread.

Though I have not personally read it, there is a new book called "The Lost City of Z" about a very Indy-like explorer and his real-life search for a lost city in the Amazon. It's generating much buzz and sounds intriguing. And it's factual!

[muttjones]

the matthew reilly book trilogy (third book out this year) Seven Ancient Wonders. fantastic indiana jonesy books.

[WilliamBoyd8]

"Plunder of the Sun" was a book written by David Dodge in the early 1950's.
It was about an insurance man who gets involved in antiquities hunting in Peru.

It was made into a film in 1953 which starred Glenn Ford and changed the setting to Mexico.
In the film, there is a bad guy who says that he was a "disbarred archaelogist",
meaning that he hunts treasures for himself.
Glenn Ford's character starts that way, but is converted to "they belong in a museum"
halfway through the film.
The film is out on DVD now.

:)

[DaFedora]

Like I mentioned in a reply of Indyologist's thread on 'If not an archeologist, then what?', I've always liked the idea of the creative inventiveness and crazy-rgent improvisation in Indy's character (f.i. substituting the Golden Idol with a pouch filled with sand, using his feet to stop the braking wheels of a mine car, using a skeleton's bone to light a torch, dress like a Nazi to infiltrate submarine pens and the Berlin parade, hide in a box on a sidecar-motorcycle with his dad before breaking loose, cast debris to 'backtrack' the Leap of Faith bridge)...

For that reason, I kinda like the Ocean's movies (11 and 12 are best, but 13 is slightly overdone and lacks punch to my taste).


Also, I reccommend anyone also to watch 2 particular directed-for-television episodes of MacGyver.

One was made at the end of season 7 (nr. 139), aired 14 May 1994: 'Lost Treasure of Atlantis'. Starting on an underground site in war-torn Bosnia, the trail sprang onwards to England and then to the isle of Santorini (Thyra). Indy's sidekick, Atticus (played by actor Brian Blessed, known for providing Boss Nass' voice in Episode I The Phantom Menace) is the enthusiastic and bright archtype to Marcus Brody. Lord Cleeve (played by Christian Burgess) was a downtoned version of Walter Donovan (with less complex plotwork).


SPOILER ALERT!!! : Though, this Atticus becomes more of a redeemed Mac in the end .



That TV movie has a pretty good feeling of Indiana Jones adventure to it. A couple great devices, traps and puzzles too. Just slightly corny.

The other MacGyver stuff worth watching: the first two episodes (together 1 storyline) of Season 5 (nrs. 84,85), aired september 1989: 'The Legend of the Holy Rose', with a really Christian and grail/holy water element stolen from TLC.


SPOILER ALERT!!! :
Some Medieval saw trap had to be defused and there was a cool puzzle part of creating a solar-powered ruby laser in it. And an Excalibur-esque sword.

[cdmeredith]

You're right! It was Glenn Ford in Plunder of the Sun. I must have been thinking of Secret of the Incas. However, Colby wasn't in insurance in the book, he was more of smuggler. I can't remember, was he in insurance in the film? Anyway, great book. Okay film.

[indycast]

The Shadow is a fantastic movie that I always haved loved - I always thought that Lamont Cranston and Indy probably bumped into each other at some point in their careers!

http://www.baronboutique.com/movie_replica/the_shadow/the_shadow.jpg

[Goonie]

Also, I reccommend anyone also to watch 2 particular directed-for-television episodes of MacGyver.

There were actually a bunch of episodes of MacGyver that were Indy inspired. Holy Rose wasn't a TV movie but a two part of the TV show. Atlantis was a TV movie after the show ended. Here's a list I posted in the MacGyver thread with all the Indy inspired episodes:

Season 3

Mask of the Wolf – MacGyver and Jack Dalton plan to help a Native American elder locate a sacred wolf mask. But two mercenaries, who think the mask is priceless, get to him first.

Comment: this one had a tomb with a booby trap in it.

Season 4

Gold Rush – A US-Soviet team heads up to the Arctic to retrieve Russian gold from a downed World War II plane. But when the gold is missing, MacGyver suspects an American career soldier is responsible.

Comment: this one had a booby-trapped ice cave in it

Season 5

The Legend of the Holy Rose (Part 1) – MacGyver gets a visit from an archaeologist friend who claims to possess her greatest find yet: a map that will lead them to an ancient artefact known as the Holy Rose.

The Legend of the Holy Rose (Part 2) – The search for the Holy Rose continues in London and France, but turns deadly when MacGyver and his archaeologist friend cross paths with a notorious jewel magnate.
Note: Some scenes were filmed at Hatley castle in Victoria, BC. X-Men fans might recognize Hatley castle as it was the location of Xavier’s School for gifted Children in X-Men: The Last Stand.

The Treasure of Manco – MacGyver travels to Peru where a friend’s father was killed, searching for a mythical lost treasure.
Note: this episode featured a prominent mountain peak near Vancouver known as the Lions. Vancouver’s Lions Gate Bridge is named after the peak, as well as Lions Gate Studios.

Season 6

Eye of Osiris – In Turkey MacGyver helps an archaeologist and his daughter search for the lost tomb of Alexander the Great, with another ruthless archaeologist hit on their trail.

TV Movie

Lost Treasure of Atlantis – MacGyver teams up with his archaeology professor, and an old friend to search for the legendary treasure of Atlantis, but an enterprising Englishman and his partner want the treasure for other reasons.

There was also an episode in Season 7 that may be Indy related. I've got the whole series on DVD but I haven't gotten to this particular episode yet (I'm in the middle of season 7 right now). The DVD description says:

The Mountain of Youth - Jack Dalton ropes MacGyver into yet another scheme, this time in Kabulstan, where locals claim that water from an ancient spring is a virtual "fountain of youth."

[Lance Quazar]

I'm surprised no one has mentioned HELLBOY - both the films and the comics.

The spin-off BPRD series of comics is also very enjoyable.

If ever another character deserved to be a colleague of Dr. Jones, it's Professor Bruttenholm.

[KarmicCurse]

The Shadow is indeed very underrated. It's a beautiful looking movie too, Art Deco is my favorite style and it's ideal here. Too bad there has never been a proper DVD release - no features and only FULLscreen?

[indycast]

The Shadow is indeed very underrated. It's a beautiful looking movie too, Art Deco is my favorite style and it's ideal here. Too bad there has never been a proper DVD release - no features and only FULLscreen?

The Aussie release was in widescreen but not one special feature - heck not even a trailer!

here's hoping for a blu-ray special edition!

[joebloggs]

Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's The Lost World is also a good read. The miniseries with Jon R. Davies wasn't bad either. The tv show wasn' t that good though. The book was still the best.

[Morning Bell]

The Phantom comic series and film have a lot of Indy qualities. I've never read the comics and I've only seen the film a couple of times but it definitely has an old-time serial feel to it.

[cdmeredith]

I have read the LOST CITY OF Z. it is a very interesting book, but it's non-fiction and doesn't really have a ton in common with indy, (other than you could argue that Indy was modelled partially on percy fawcett), but it is a very interesting bit of historical research though, and great if you love jungle exploration tales. (also good in this category is DRUMS ALONG THE CONGO - ON THE TRAIL OF MOKELE-MBEMBE, THE LAST LIVING DINOSAUR by RORY NUGENT, NO MERCY - A JOURNEY INTO THE HEART OF THE CONGO & INTO THE HEART OF BORNEO, 2 books by REDMOND O'HANLON, MAN-EATER OF KUMAON by JIM CORBETT, & DRAGON HUNTER - ROY CHAPMAN ANDREWS AND THE CENTRAL ASIATIC EXPEDITIONS by CHARLES GALLENKAMP)

here is a screenplay for the film TOMB RAIDER, but it is an early version, VERY different from what ended up in theaters.

http://www.sendspace.com/file/6mioq7

I have always liked the TOMB RAIDER games, (the films were pretty awful), but I think in trying to ape the indy franchise, they really didn't grasp a lot of what makes indy fun and exciting.

another really good book is GRAVE DESCEND by JOHN LANGE (a.k.a michael crichton) it is is the pulp vein, and touches on some of the same type of stuff the indy movies do. (ZERO COOL is good as well)

THE EYE OF THE TIGER & ELEPHANT SONG are a couple of books by WILBUR SMITH. not a TON of stuff in common with Indy, but fits into the exotic adventure/treasure category.

INCA GOLD by CLIVE CUSSLER isn't bad. not great by any means, but not bad.

TALES OF SECRET EGYPT by SAX ROHMER - some really good exotic adventure stories from the pulp era. (especially VALLEY OF THE SORCERESS). more horror elements in these as well. most of these stories can found online for free.