THE BIG BANG: Raiders story conference transcripts!!??

ATMachine

Member
Yeah, these are legit. In the new Complete Making of Indy book, there's a synopsis of the original first draft of the Raiders script, which mentions that Indy successfully retrieves the Chachapoyan Idol, a story beat also mentioned in the excerpts given by the story conference transcripts' owner.
 

Indy fan 235

New member
Man, I would love to read this thing.

No Ticket, I agree, Lucas should publish this sort of thing, for both the Indy films and Star Wars. It's always interesting to see where a film started out and how it got to what we see in the theatre. It always helps me see the film in a new light, especially after seeing the film for so many times you begin to just take it for granted and not think of all that went into the film from concept to screen.
 

Moedred

Administrator
Staff member
It's kind of funny the Complete Making Of book features excerpts from the same page Agent5 uploaded.
From the defunct Spielbergfilms site, I've salvaged Agent5's comments:
I acquired a transcript of some or perhaps all of the conversations between Spielberg, George Lucas and Larry Kasdan that took place in a little office across the street from Paramount studios back in the late 70's when laying down the outline for the Raiders of the Lost Ark script.
I've heard many times over the years that they left a cheap tape recorder on so that Kasdan could go back and use the cassettes for reference but I never have ever seen bootlegs of them in any fashion until a while ago when I saw this on Evilbay. In back is about 8 pages of transcript between Kasdan, Phillip Kaufman (co-story creator) and Deborah Fine who was the person in charge of the research into the MacGuffin items of the occult for the Indy films. These 8 pages are all about the research done on the Ark and a few other things for Raiders.
Now, I can't be 100% certain as the guy who I got it from wouldn't name his source for the tapes, but he said he had copies of them and wrote it all out in transcript form, word for eligible word. I have to think that if it is a fake, it is a damn good one, but I think not. You can just hear Lucan and Spielberg saying these things as you read it. Besides, it would take someone a large ammount of creativity to invent all this conversation, especially 121 pages of it.
There are some interesting things like the backround they had for the Marion character was actually scraped and they ended up using it for Elsa Schneider in Last Crusade. Many of the set pieces were also scraped and used in the next two films so they really had alot of TOD and LC in mind when writing Raiders.
I think this is a great find because it really gets you into the mind of the creators so well. You really don't have this kind of material out there too often and are so indepth in the very earliest stages of the creative process of the entire film.
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I'm not sure about hosting this on the main site for two reasons.
First, I still am not 100% certain that these are authentic and I know Steven, you pride yourself on that aspect of things on this site, which I respect.
Second, I did pay for this and whoever made this took alot of time to get it done. If it were posted on the main site, nothing would stop anyone from copying it and then selling their own copies, even if it is available here for all to see. If there was a way to stop that, I may be game to let everyone in, but in all my time online, that has not been the case. In fact, it's been the opposite alot ofo the time. Trying to find people you completely trust online is hard. People who won't exploit something good when you are simply trying to share.
I hope this makes sense to all of you as this has been a topic of interest on many boards, with those in the 'I'll share everything with everyone' camp, and the 'I'm a little sceptical' camp in another. I've seen guys who have had nothing but good intentions in their hearts to share with others, ripped off by someone who's only intention was to make some quick, easy cash. I know it's bad and those like that are truely in the minority. Still, it happens and being that it does puts me in the sceptical camp, I guess.
Perhaps I can work something out to get some copies into the hands of those who really want it. I'd rather put my trust in a small few with legitimate interest than in the entire internet.
I hope I didn't come off as a jerk and I hope you can all understand.
I'm open to suggestions.
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SS does come up with some weird ideas but I think they all needed to be put out there to get them on the table and flesh them all out to get a roadmap for where they wanted to take this film. Lucas does sort of bring him back to reality on a few occasions with his original intentions of the character. They constantly site old serials and movies as their inspiration. The Dobb's character was the number one inspiration for Indy. They also say how they'd like the villain's to be more like the ones of the Leone spaghetti westers in the fact that even though they are evil, the audience should still like them. All in all there's lots of great stuff in there.
I think SS was just picking his brain for ideas and set pieces and at first he had sort of a different idea of what Raiders could be but over time it was all worked out and everyone was on the same level. It was just a way for them to get all of their ideas out on the table to discuss how relevant they may be or if they would work in the context of the film. It is cool to get into some of their thought processes. It's almost like the Big Bang. We're here, right at the beginning. Stage 1. It's a rare part of Hollywood we rarely get to take part in.
 

cdmeredith

New member
THE HOLY GRAIL! (Raiders of the Lost Ark story conference transcript)

When speaking of Indiana Jones and the Holy Grail, you might think I'm talking about the Last Crusade, but really, isn't the Holy Grail the original story conference transcript for Raiders of the Lost Ark between George Lucas, Steven Spielberg and Lawrence Kasdan? The one where they all sat down and created Indiana Jones? Who wouldn't sell their mother to read that?

Well, now you can finally have it.

Here it is:

[link removed upon request]

126 pages
File size: 6MB
NOTE: Missing pages 101 & 116.

Also: Transcript of a conversation between Debbie Fine, Kasdan and Phil Kaufman mostly re: background of the myth of the Lost Ark of the Covenant.

Special thanks to [name removed].

ENJOY!
 
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cdmeredith

New member
Thanks to theRaider.net

As far as I know, it's the real deal.

I have really enjoyed this site for many years. All the various screenplays that have been posted, and all the entertaining articles. So, here's my thank you to everyone here. I know that many of us have been looking for this for a long time. For years, all we've had were some images from some ebay sale. Hopefully, I will be able to find the missing pages from someone in the near future, and if I do, I will repost this. Thanks again.

Also, check out the screenplay I posted for the unmade Terry and the Pirates film. If you like Indiana Jones, you'll get a kick out of this. There is also some nice Drew Struzan artwork to go with it.
 

Moedred

Administrator
Staff member
cdmeredith said:
here's my thank you to everyone here. I know that many of us have been looking for this for a long time.
All my life (online).
Merged with the history of our quest.
Thank you, cdmeredith!

(The crooked pages might take a while, but I think I can html this sucker tomorrow if someone doesn't beat me to it...)
 

cdmeredith

New member
You're very welcome.

A big thanks goes to [name removed], who is the fellow who gave this to me, so that I could give it to you.

I also have a draft of Raiders of the Lost Ark that is dated August 1979. It contains the Shanghai stuff, has this been posted before? I haven't had the chance to read the whole thing yet, so I am not sure what else it has.

if not, here: [link removed upon request]

The story conference transcript is very interesting. A couple of things worth noting are that George Lucas had a lot of the story fleshed out before sitting down with the other two, most of the major beats were almost fully formed, although he knew absolutely nothing about the ark, and didn't seem to care. Also, Larry Kasdan seems to have basically created Marion Ravenwood from scratch. So much depth was added during this conversation though. It's really neat to read the gestation that eventually birthed the greatest movie ever. For so many years I have wanted insight into THIS step of the process. The writing. This is by far the most interesting part to me. DVD extras glossed over it, and interviews only teased it.

Reading this was like scratching an itch that had been bugging me for years.
 
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Wilhelm

Member
Big Thanks cdmeredith!!!

This is a great document. I just begin to read and it's so interesting.

For example: the polemic concept of flying saucers / extraterrestials of Indy 4 was present in the genesis of Raiders from 1978.

LUCAS: "The Ark is like a radio transmiter. That's the real legend. That's what they used to do. The Israelis used to set up these tents and they would talk to God and God would tell them what to do. And then they would march with it in front of their army. The other Armies would be destroyed. Our idea was that there must actually be some kind of super high-powered radio from one of Erick Von Daniken's FLYING SAUCERS. The fact that it's electrical charges makes it vaguely believable."
(Page 28)
 
What hits me is how swiftly all the beats are laid out, the snake pit for example begins as a water trap, but when the snakes are suggested George grabs the idea and instantly makes it what we see in the film. Lucas is on fire here, riffing creative, Most impressive.
 

torao

Moderator Emeritus
Amazing. I just started reading it and I don't think I expected it to be so damn funny.

Lucas: "I think also you've been describing this to people as a science-fiction film, which is good."

Spielberg: "I have not."

Lucas: "It's in Rolling Stone. Anyway."

Or one of Spielberg's first reactions to the whip:

Spielberg:"You can knock somebody's belt off and the guys pants fall down."
Oh dear, I love how Spielberg's sense of humor is so prominent even on page four.


I'm also impressed by Lucas' dominance and inspiration. This transcript is quite illuminating in so many ways. Certain turns and decisions in the most recent chapter of creating Indy don't seem too surprising anymore.

Thank you so much, cdmeredith!!
 

TheMutt92

New member
Jeremiah Jones said:
What hits me is how swiftly all the beats are laid out, the snake pit for example begins as a water trap, but when the snakes are suggested George grabs the idea and instantly makes it what we see in the film. Lucas is on fire here, riffing creative, Most impressive.

This is Lucas at his height. Despite what many people say, he was and still is a brilliant storyteller and filmmaker. Can't wait to see his future endeavors (outside of SW and Indy that is...)

Wilhelm said:
For example: the polemic concept of flying saucers / extraterrestials of Indy 4 was present in the genesis of Raiders from 1978.

LUCAS: "The Ark is like a radio transmiter. That's the real legend. That's what they used to do. The Israelis used to set up these tents and they would talk to God and God would tell them what to do. And then they would march with it in front of their army. The other Armies would be destroyed. Our idea was that there must actually be some kind of super high-powered radio from one of Erick Von Daniken's FLYING SAUCERS. The fact that it's electrical charges makes it vaguely believable."
(Page 28)

I've been confortable w/ the inclusion of aliens ever since seeing KOTCS on the big screen, but to officially see hints of it back in the early days of Raiders... makes me think things havn't gone so far (maybe Lucas was lying when he said he really had no idea what to do for the proposed four sequels at the time?)
 

cdmeredith

New member
E Unum Pluribus

I think another really interesting aspect to these transcripts is how much of Temple of Doom and Last Crusade were born here too. A lot of the MAJOR characters and scenes from these movies are included here in Raiders, but had to be cut or dropped.

Maybe that's why Crystal Skull feels so disjointed from them, it wasn't birthed in this meeting like all the other ones.
 

James

Well-known member
It's also interesting how much thought Lucas devotes to the "expert on the occult" part of Indy's backstory- even as he admits it won't play a large role in the film. But he's already toying with the haunted house idea, even at this early stage.
 

Darth Vile

New member
What an excellent read this is...

As already noted, it is interesting to see how Lucas is dominating the show. This is clearly a man on a roll after Star Wars, with Spielberg deferring at nearly every point (some things never change).

The most interesting thing for me is looking at the line between what was conceptualized, at this early stage, and what we actually got in the movies. It?s quite evident that Lucas envisaged, from the outset, that the character of Indiana Jones should be able to cross genres into the paranormal, sci-fi realms. :D
 

Wilhelm

Member
I'm amazed of how much imagination Lucas had in this transcript. I always thought that Spielberg / Kasdan were the principal creative minds, but they're listening and Lucas is the driving force. He's responsible of the best ideas and the whole concept-tone-style of the saga.

This is like a pre-audiocommentary of Raiders.
 

Moedred

Administrator
Staff member
Lucas, page 34:
There is actually a Rick's Place in Nepal. Bill and Gloria know about it. They stayed there. It's some expatriot American who lives there at the foot of the Himalayas. It's got this hotel/bar.
Holy cow, the Raven is real!

Also, Lucas calls Marion "jail bait!"
G — I was thinking that this old guy could have been his mentor. He could have known this little girl when she was just a kid. Had an affair with her when she was eleven.
L — And he was forty-two.
G — He hasn't seen her in twelve years. Now she's twenty-two. It's a real strange relationship.
S — She had better be older than twenty-two.
.....
G — Fifteen is right on the edge. I know it's an outrageous idea, but it is interesting. Once she's sixteen or seventeen it's not interesting anymore.
 
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James

Well-known member
Lawrence: Let me ask you one thing about this fight, how gory do you guys see this movie?
Steven: Not very.
George: Not very. It should be Saturday matinee violence.
Lawrence: How about death by fire?
George: That's okay.

The most interesting thing about this transcript is that it provides a clear insight into how Lucas and Spielberg have always viewed this series. This is something that was endlessly debated in the wake of KOTCS, as everyone has their own opinion of what an Indy film is supposed to be. But people that grew up with the films obviously have a much different view of how serious the original trilogy was meant to be taken.

Here we see that all of the sequels' most hated elements were present right from the beginning. Lucas refers to Indy as being a role model for children. The supporting characters are considered comic relief. The Nazis are treated as little more than caricatures. Spielberg has a LOT of goofy ideas, and is constantly thinking of new things that will be "funny". (He's even responsible for the over-the-top life raft gag in TOD!)
 
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