Discuss Chapter 11 - Big Damn Ants (DVD chapter by chapter discussion)

WeAreGoingToDie

New member
Chapter 11 - Big Damn Ants
1:21:51 - 1:29:11

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(description pulled from the Indiana Jones Wiki)
After regaining control of herself, Irina climbs further onto the hood and takes aim straight at Marion, who thinks fast and manages to throw the Soviet Doctor onto another car. Dr. Spalko takes over the driving by pushing the driver into the back of the car. She then jumps onto Jones' car and after a brief fight with him, she kicks him on the head while he holds her down and she retrieves the skull. She jumps back into her car and begins to ram the car into Indy's so he'll fall off the cliff they were driving next to, prompting the remaining Russian on Dr. Jones' car to jump of the car's back. She is about to drive the famed archaeologist off, even taunting him with a perfectly delivered "Do svidaniya, Dr. Jones". Suddenly Mutt, who got the idea from watching a group of monkeys, swings in on a vine and lands on Spalko's car, along with about a dozen or so monkeys that followed him. Mutt takes back the skull and jumps onto Indy's car, and they drive away from the cliff while Spalko is harassed by several monkeys. After stabilizing the situation and getting rid of all the monkeys by throwing them out of the car (even throwing one off the cliff in her rage), she keeps up her pursuit of the part-time professor.

Indiana, distracted by his recently arrived son who has finally nabbed the skull, crashes through some foliage and into a pile of dirt and some logs. Soon after Spalko and the soviet driver crash through the same foliage and nearly decapitates Indiana, Mutt, Oxley and Mac by driving over them as she crashes into another dirt mound. As the dust clears Indy and his gangs notice that Spalko is pointing her gun at them, however she hesitates when a large red ant bites her hand. Smashing the ant Spalko thinks that?s it, but soon a swarm of them file into the cars from beneath, revealing the dirt pile to be a colony of vicious driver ants. Everyone starts running, and after a truck filled with Russian soldiers drives into the scene, Dovchenko, who survived, leaps out and attacks Indy. Mutt turns around to help his father, but Indy tells him to run, he?ll be fine. Marion appears, driving the badly beat up amphibious vehicle and tells Mutt and Mac to jump in. Both the driver and Irina flee, however the Soviet soldier just wasn't quick enough and he is devoured by the massive amount of ants after he succumbs to their biting. The soviet Doctor climbs onto a log but that just isn?t enough; the ants start climbing up the dried log. Noticing a vine above her, Spalko quickly jumps up and begins to climb up for her life.

While Dovchenko and Indiana duke it out, the ants begin to swarm around Oxley, who is just lying on the ground. When he pulls out the skull, however, the carnivorous insects go around the skull, as if it were creating some kind of barrier. The ants begin to pile up in an attempt to reach Spalko, and one even succeeds in climbing up her leg, however it meets a grisly end when it is crushed between her thighs. Jones and the Colonel fight inside the skull protective range, and, just when Indy is knocked down to the floor and it looks like the Colonel is winning, the archaeologist picks up a small log and beats up the Soviet Colonel until he falls back, right into the swarm of army ants. They all pile up on him and, when he screams, they even crawl into his mouth. Dovchenko is carried into the anthill and he disappears, along with the ant swarm, which almost takes Indy's fedora with them, but he repels them with the skull's power.

Indy picks up Ox and carries him to Marion and the car, meanwhile a small Soviet car comes to Spalko's aid, and she just drops down onto the passenger seat. The soldier loaded truck parks on the cliff's edge and all the soldiers and their leader begin to climb down some ropes that they just secured. Marion drives the car with all the good guys in it of the cliff, but it lands on a huge tree that was growing on the ravine's side. They are gently lowered in to the river below, and the tree recoils and hits the cliff wall, knocking down several Soviet soldiers.

Chapter Index:
Chapter 1 - Nevada, 1957
Chapter 2 - The Warehouse
Chapter 3 - I Like Ike
Chapter 4 - Of Interest to the Bureau
Chapter 5 - Mutt Williams
Chapter 6 - Nazca, Peru
Chapter 7 - Orellana's Resting Place
Chapter 8 - Old Friends and Enemies
Chapter 9 - A Truth Revealed
Chapter 10 - Family Squabble

RC-Ant_Kid_remote-.gif

You know, for kids!

Once again Please no trolling or bashing of the film. The word "sucks" isn't a valid form of explaining why you hate something. I'd like a friendly discussion for those who enjoy the film and watching it on the small screen.
 

Dewy9

New member
What does Indy (at least I think it's him) say when they first realize that it's a giant ant bed? Right after that, he says "big damn ants", but I can never understand what he says that first time. I've always thought it would have been cool if he says "marabunta" (a reference to Heston's "The Naked Jungle").

The ants are extremely creepy and the first since Raiders which are actually deadly. I also love how in a few shots, including one where Marion's driving the duck, ant goo gets on the camera.
 

Cagefighterkip

New member
i thought his line was, "Siafu!" and mutt asks "what?" and indy says "SIAFU! BIG DAMN ANTS!" and they run and the fight happens
 

StoneTriple

New member
I'm fine with this chapter too. It's the conclusion of the jungle chase, which borders on too long - or perhaps it's just me wishing they'd get the better of Spalko...run her off the cliff already. :eek:

I dig the ants, man. Certainly my favorite of all the bug\creepy crawler things in any of the films. More than the snakes, bugs, or rats of the first three - the ants feel much more like an immediate threat. I thought they were done very well and I thought the skull's power was a very clever escape.

I thought the ants carrying his hat and him getting it back was very Indiana Jones, particularly the way the shot was framed and the camera angle.
 

Dewy9

New member
Cagefighterkip said:
i thought his line was, "Siafu!" and mutt asks "what?" and indy says "SIAFU! BIG DAMN ANTS!" and they run and the fight happens

Oh, okay. It looks like siafu is a fancy term for red ants.
 

Udvarnoky

Well-known member
The ant attack is probably one of my favorite scenes in the movie. I think there are a lot of missed opportunities, but overall it's too much fun for me to gripe all that much. I think the main thing that the would have improved it is setting up the ants better than just having them show up (but that's effective in its own way too, and I love the "Big damn ants!" line). For instance, in the ant scene in Saucermen from Mars, there's a line by the bad guy when he leaves Indy to die where it's explained that the ants can pick an elephant clean in no time. It lets you know what these things are capable of. I think the scene would have been tremendously helped by a gruesome, "gross-out" moment, such as a single shot of seeing a half-eaten Russian with the ants crawling around the bones of his corpse. As it stands, not a single drop of visible blood is drawn by any of the ants, but oh well I guess.

I think there are a lot of nice little moments in here too. I like Winstone's "Mum, slow down!" I like that part after Indy climbs back into the car with Oxley where Mutt is slapping his neck (did he get some stray ants on him?), I like the "Woah, woah, WOAH!" and I like the part where Winstone goes, "This is very dangerous" while the car is on the edge of the cliff. (I don't like the fact that Spalko never seems to acknowledge the fact that Mac switches sides. If it was always part of the plan, why try to run him off the cliff? And if Mac knows he's expendable, why be truly loyal to the Russians by leaving the tracers later on?)

I think the CGI is some of the better examples in the movie, and it was really the only way to do it if the film was going to do its "ocean of ants" thing and have them crawl into Dovchenko's mouth. What I don't get though, seeing some of the movie's concept art as well as that toy advert that WeAreGoingToDie posted, depicting the ants as these freaking scary, termite like bastards with ginormous jaws, is why the hell they didn't go that route in the final film. In the actual movie they just look like big fire ants. Why the hell would they choose to go in that direction with the design when they looked so much cooler conceptually? (Not that it's the only example.) I know that's not authentic to how the ants really look, but neither is putting Siafu in Peru, saying that they build hives, and depicting them as being able to carry a grown man into one. You're already in fantasy territory, so why not go all the way? And as cool as the "ant arena" that Indy and Dovchenko duke it out in, having the crystal skull conveniently repel ants just like it did the natives later on is really weak and uncreative. Indy should have had to come up with some patently ridiculous and clever way of getting out of that jam, like in the other movies. (Though, obviously the hat retrieval was awesome.)
 

Goonie

New member
Oops, I did get it mixed up with Chapter 10. So it was Chapter 11 that contained the scene that spawned fine garments like this one:
http://t-shirts.cafepress.com/item/wtf-tarzan-dark-tshirt/268854517

In all it wasn't a bad sequence, but it does seem as though the CGI was rushed on the vehicles, namely the one Spalko is in when it comes off the edge into the ants' nest area. They could have worked on the physics of that a little bit, or better yet, since there wasn't really any big effect going on like a nuclear blast, they could have just rigged it up with a real car. If Nolan could flip a semi in The Dark Knight, they could have easily sent a real car over a little ledge.

As for the Tarzan Boy scene, I just look away for a few seconds and try and forget its there...:hat:
 

oki9Sedo

New member
The people who complained that the action in this film was too light and comic should have liked this scene.
 

The Man

Well-known member
oki9Sedo said:
The people who complained that the action in this film was too light and comic should have liked this scene.

I do quite like the ant sequence. Necessary CG, multiple sidekicks kept offstage, icky demises and - crucially - the last slice of action and psychicality for Harrison. Alas, when the film does engender a sliver of goodwill, we're then 'treated' to stuntcar genius Marion and her deliberate drop to the rubber tree. Balls...
 

Udvarnoky

Well-known member
To be fair, I think the rubber tree gag is pretty in-line with the Indiana Jones vibe, but I think it was just one goofy cartoon moment too many for people who felt the movie had no real tension.
 

The Man

Well-known member
Udvarnoky said:
To be fair, I think the rubber tree gag is pretty in-line with the Indiana Jones vibe, but I think it was just one goofy cartoon moment too many for people who felt the movie had no real tension.

In TOD, that mine-cart left one stretch of track and landed on another by sheer chance, unknowable luck - elements which add to Indy's in-over-his-head appeal. But Marion purposely landing a duck in a rubber tree so precisely..? Nah. If Indy were driving and the brakes had failed - fine. This whole chapter and the one preceding are intent on painting his new family as superheroes...
 

Udvarnoky

Well-known member
But I mean still, Short Round is depicted as being able to successfully karate kick countless grown men in Temple of Doom. But for every Three Stooges moment in Temple of Doom, people were getting sacrificed/crushed/eaten by crocodiles. It's not that stupid stuff shouldn't be in the movie, it's that Indy4 never offered any weight for the other side of the scale.

I do agree though, that it still could have been staged in a more Indiana Jones type manner. When he or the others have to do something insane, it's out of desperation that they do it and it's out of crazy luck that they succeed. Marion's confidence in driving off the cliff does feel a little bit off. I think you're right that if the accelerator got stuck or something, it would have been better.
 

The Man

Well-known member
Udvarnoky said:
I think you're right that if the accelerator got stuck or something, it would have been better.

Watch this TV Spot and imagine the scene as the editing at 00:24 suggests...

<object width="425" height="344"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/jT2EeiFqD-8&hl=en&fs=1"></param><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"></param><param name="allowscriptaccess" value="always"></param><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/jT2EeiFqD-8&hl=en&fs=1" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowscriptaccess="always" allowfullscreen="true" width="425" height="344"></embed></object>​

Ford could have aced a moment like that.
 

nitzsche

New member
I love those TV spots. I smell springtime just watching them.

Yeah that little edit is a nice one and I expected that was going to be his reaction.

I like the tree gag. I especially like the look on Spalko's face as the shadow of the tree looms. It's priceless. It's the same expression you'd expect from Belloq - like a "this can't be happening, I am too dignified for this" expression.

(TV spot side note: I wish that overhead shot of Indy swinging up into the warehouse rafters made it into the final cut)
 

Udvarnoky

Well-known member
You sure that wasn't in the movie?

There's definitely a shot from that TV spot that wasn't in the movie though, and that's the one with the Russians departing from the warehouse. There was originally a scene showing them doing so (I think at the part where Mac and Spalko get in the jeep). In the making of doc you can also see Spielberg filming a shot of the Russian car leaving Area 51 at sundown to go pick up Dovchenko on the New Mexico location.
 

Wilhelm

Member
I like the concept of the skull as the key or leit motif that resolves the different set-pieces. It's like a talisman that guides the group to the chamber of gods. The Jungle chase - Ants - Ugha Warriors - Big Door in the temple.

I also like that they combined 2 classic Indy scenes in one: fight with a Pat Roach type of villain and the phobia-scene.
 
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