Kooshmeister
New member
So, let's talk about the novelization of the second Indy flick. Campbell Black's Raiders novelization was an odd hybrid of the original script (particularly where the death of Toht is concerned) and the finished film, and, apparently, Black's own imagination. While the ending was a bit rushed, it was, through and through, an excellent read.
I wish I could say the same for the Temple of Doom novelization written by James Kahn. It wasn't bad, really. Just startlingly mediocre. Reading through it, I just got the impression Kahn wasn't even trying in some places. He uses the film's version of the plane crash, by having the pilots work for Lao Che and ditch the aircraft in mid-flight, rather than the script's over-the-top sequence of Kao Kan attacking in a biplane, but besides that the book is pretty much a straightforward adaptation of the script, word for word in some spots.
It's got the deleted scenes, particularly the infamous one wherein Willie escapes and tries to tell Chattar Lal and Captain Blumburtt about the Thuggee, only to have the possessed Indy appear and contradict her story. It also kills off Lal by having him fall into the lava pit, and has the scene where Short Round gets the idea to burn Indy to make him come to his senses, when a Thuggee guard is burned. It also retains the script's slightly different version of Mola Ram's death, saying that when he burns his hand, he, too, was under the Black Sleep, and comes out of it whilst falling to his death.
Now this isn't to say Kahn doesn't try to use his imagination. The book's high points are the scenes told from Short Round's point of view, especially his prayers to different Chinese deities and spirits, offering up a rather interesting head-on collision between that faith and the Thuggee one. And speaking of which, we actually get to see possessed Indy's thought processes and how he sees the world around him whilst under the Black Sleep. That kid wasn't lying when he said it was like a nightmare; if Kahn's description of Indy's state of mind is to be believed, the Black Sleep is basically like the worst acid trip imaginable.
And then there's Mola Ram. The description of him in the book barely matches Amrish Puri. Bad teeth, sunken eyes, kind of skinny? Quite unlike the rather robust, devilishly handsome (pun intended) guy who clearly saw the Thuggee dentist regularly. I guess this was the original intended look for Mola Ram, but Puri brought a totally new interpretation of the character by his looks and physical presence alone in the final film I think.
I wish I could say the same for the Temple of Doom novelization written by James Kahn. It wasn't bad, really. Just startlingly mediocre. Reading through it, I just got the impression Kahn wasn't even trying in some places. He uses the film's version of the plane crash, by having the pilots work for Lao Che and ditch the aircraft in mid-flight, rather than the script's over-the-top sequence of Kao Kan attacking in a biplane, but besides that the book is pretty much a straightforward adaptation of the script, word for word in some spots.
It's got the deleted scenes, particularly the infamous one wherein Willie escapes and tries to tell Chattar Lal and Captain Blumburtt about the Thuggee, only to have the possessed Indy appear and contradict her story. It also kills off Lal by having him fall into the lava pit, and has the scene where Short Round gets the idea to burn Indy to make him come to his senses, when a Thuggee guard is burned. It also retains the script's slightly different version of Mola Ram's death, saying that when he burns his hand, he, too, was under the Black Sleep, and comes out of it whilst falling to his death.
Now this isn't to say Kahn doesn't try to use his imagination. The book's high points are the scenes told from Short Round's point of view, especially his prayers to different Chinese deities and spirits, offering up a rather interesting head-on collision between that faith and the Thuggee one. And speaking of which, we actually get to see possessed Indy's thought processes and how he sees the world around him whilst under the Black Sleep. That kid wasn't lying when he said it was like a nightmare; if Kahn's description of Indy's state of mind is to be believed, the Black Sleep is basically like the worst acid trip imaginable.
And then there's Mola Ram. The description of him in the book barely matches Amrish Puri. Bad teeth, sunken eyes, kind of skinny? Quite unlike the rather robust, devilishly handsome (pun intended) guy who clearly saw the Thuggee dentist regularly. I guess this was the original intended look for Mola Ram, but Puri brought a totally new interpretation of the character by his looks and physical presence alone in the final film I think.
