Discuss Chapter 4 - Of Interest to the Bureau (DVD chapter by chapter discussion)

Chapter 4 - Of Interest to the Bureau
21:42 - 27:37


"...yes?"

(description pulled from the Indiana Jones Wiki)
Surviving the blast Indy is found and interrogated by the FBI, who accuse him of being a communist because he was an associate of George McHale. As soon as Indy returns to the university, he is sent away on a temporary break, with full pay, because the FBI ransacked his office. His friend Dean Charles Stanforth had to quit his job to get Jones the offer he got. Indiana sadly states that the past few years have been very tough because both his dad, Henry Jones sr. and the museum director Marcus Brody have passed away. Jones decides that there is nothing left for him at the university, so he buys a train ticket to New York...

Chapter Index:
Chapter 1 - Nevada, 1957
Chapter 2 - The Warehouse
Chapter 3 - I Like Ike

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.

Not a whole lot goining on in the chapter. It's probably the "talkiest", but I was thinking when Indy was packing his bag, "how many belts does he have?"

All I have to say really is, I like how they mention Spalko is scooping up items she thinks have paranormal links, and I like the way we get to hear the "illumination" theme from the Last Crusade as we see Indy's dad's pic.

Is Indy teaching is the clothes he marries in? I think Indy looks at his oldest for sure in these scenes with the glasses on. The segment is quite talky, but I don't think it is without reason.

For the token Indy exposition scene, these go by rather smoothly.
I found the Raiders exposition (in the classroom then with governmental officials at the blackboard) to drag on more than I could say this section does. While this chapter is essentially a reversed version of the scenes in Raiders, KOTCS keeps my attention as I enjoy learning tidbits of what Indy has been up to the past 19 years.

WeAreGoingToDie said:

For the token Indy exposition scene, these go by rather smoothly.
I found the Raiders exposition (in the classroom then with governmental officials at the blackboard) to drag on more than I could say this section does. While this chapter is essentially a reversed version of the scenes in Raiders, KOTCS keeps my attention as I enjoy learning tidbits of what Indy has been up to the past 19 years.

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Yeah, I think the Raiders talkie seem to drag more than the KOTCS talking scenes.

Benraianajones said:

Yeah, I think the Raiders talkie seem to drag more than the KOTCS talking scenes.

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Yeah, but at least in Raiders they describe the Ark, how it got in Tanis, what it's power might be and all that. In KOTCS it takes a lot longer to get to the point since there are different points in KOTCS where the film stops to explain the legend, the artificat and how I may hove gotten there, etc. In Raiders you get basically one explanation and then the rest is almost all action & intrigue.

sandiegojones said:

Yeah, but at least in Raiders they describe the Ark, how it got in Tanis, what it's power might be and all that. In KOTCS it takes a lot longer to get to the point since there are different points in KOTCS where the film stops to explain the legend, the artificat and how I may hove gotten there, etc. In Raiders you get basically one explanation and then the rest is almost all action & intrigue.

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Lucas considers the films, in essence, to be supernatural mysteries.

My point was that in Raiders the talkie parts were kept to a minimum and that after one main exposition scene, the rest of the movie was one big chase. In KOTCS there's many expository scenes needed since they didn't explain the skull too "crystal" clear to start with.

Although, to give Skull some credit, they had a lot to explain. Most audiences know Moses and the ten commandments. All they had to say was the tablets were in the ark, it may be dangerous to open it and hint at its possible location. With the skulls they had Roswell (which was the least explained as Western audiences know what this is), Russians, Crystal Skulls AND the lost City of Gold to explain. I think they did a good job splitting it up, keeping the action going and sprinkling in some revelations of the fictional side of the plot.

(My favorite exposition scene is yet to come. I love love LOVE love the close up of the book at Indy's home, post motorcycle chase. )

I stand by what I've said about the FBI interrogation scene: I like the imagery and the Raiders callback in General Ross' description of Irina, but the scene just doesn't work in the context of the overall film, because it causes the FBI subplot to seem more significant than it actually proves to be after Indy leaves New York. It works on its own, but I think it stands out like a sore thumb within the rest of the movie. Cutting from the mushroom cloud to Marshall College would have been a better move, I think.

As a side note, I think more so than the other movies, Indy4's "prologue" sequence is a lot more connected to the rest of the story, whereas in the original trilogy they were much more like standalone teasers that did little more than introduce a major player (Belloq, Willie and Shorty, Henry Sr.). Here we're introduced to key players Spalko, Mac, and Dovchenko, we get the alien corpse, and we're basically given, vaguely, what Spalko's ultimate plans are. A lot of it plays into the rest of the film, storywise. If you make the iconic nuke image the final scene of the prologue and kill off Mac during the warehouse sequence (I've always felt that he should have either been offed after betraying Indy or, if they wanted him to be in the whole movie, not have him be a traitor at all), it would have felt a lot more like an Indiana Jones opener to me.

I've waited for these scene a lot, because I love the academic side of Indy's life. I was expecting some kind of gag or joke at the University, because the previous movies had accostumed us like that (the girl with the words "Love you" printed on her eyes in Raiders, the huge amount of students that wanted to speak with Indy at the end of the lesson in Crusade... light things but delightful).

Yet the "teaching scene" is rather greve and serious this time, and that makes very mournful the subsequent scene set in Indy's house. That's a pity, because I was expecting to discover something (really new) about Indy's life in the scene set at home, for whom (even with the featurette of the original site) they've created quite anticipation. But we learn not so much from that scene: yes, we learn that Brody's dead and so is Henry Jones Sr., but that does not add nothing really new and fulfil the moment with even more sadness and meaning, that makes the setting (Indy's house) pass in second role, when it could have been better (and more) developed as ulterior epiphany of Indy's personality.

I found very poor the choice of using photos from the set of Last Crusade as portraits of Brody and H. Jones Sr. That's a cheap idea that show quite bad taste. First of all, a great part of the audience (the fans), knows that photos too well not to recognize them (and I wouldn't call it a "quoting" or a reference, because it's way too evident to be that: a reference should be subtle and smart). In second place, even for those who does not know these photos, they look way too clean to seem autentic. They should have at least made the paper a little more yellow, in order to make them resemble real '30s photos.

I've had so appreciated the creation of the false "old photo" portraiting a young Indy with a young Sean Connery as his father in Last Crusade that I guess they could have used the same fantasy for made an effort more in order to give us some more original Indy family photos.

Returning to the opening point, I must say, though, that the serious feeling that affects this whole scene is widely balanced with the motorbike chase scene, where the Authors give to the Campus-setting the lightness and the joyfulness it have had in the other movies. That's one of the most brilliant scene of the movie. But I will discuss that under another Chapter thread!

Professor Jones said:

They should have at least made the paper a little more yellow, in order to make them resemble real '30s photos.

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Though wouldn't a photo from the late 30's be relatively new in the late 50's? I have B&W photos from the 70's that are still a brilliant black and white, no yellowing. As my graphic design instructor once told me during a project of creating historical recreations of items from the 1920's, "Not everything encountered a flood."

WeAreGoingToDie said:

Though wouldn't a photo from the late 30's be relatively new in the late 50's? I have B&W photos from the 70's that are still a brilliant black and white, no yellowing. As my graphic design instructor once told me during a project of creating historical recreations of items from the 1920's, "Not everything encountered a flood."

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I was meaning not yellow because of the aging of the photo itself, but because of the type of film that it was used at that time... That kind of clear black and white it's more for artistic photos, and it doesn't remind me the photos of the 30s. I think that a movie should not necessarily mirror what it is reality, but simply suggesting it, so I simply say that a more yellow photo would have suggested me more the photos of the 30s, like those that I've so many time seen in my granparents' houses.

I'd have loved to see Roger Moore's autograph on Henry Sr.'s photo.

WeAreGoingToDie said:

I'd have loved to see Roger Moore's autograph on Henry Sr.'s photo.

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ehehehe... that we'd have all loved to see!!

i love these scenes. the "seems we've reached a point our lives where live stops giving us things and starts taking them away" is classic

WeAreGoingToDie said:

Jones decides that there is nothing left for him

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This is a great chapter, because it establishes what is at stake for Indy in the adventure that follows. Sure, it may be underdeveloped for a 2008 movie- but not for an Indiana Jones movie.

I love Indy's reactions to the "But did he deserve them?" and "Life...starts taking things away." lines. No dialogue in either, but Ford perfectly conveys the sadness and melancholy involved.

Upon watching this sequence today I discovered something new. Before, the dean's introduction seemed forced in that they presented him both as and not as Marcus Brody. In my opinion they almost could've swapped actors/names around and there'd be no difference. Until I noticed something...

For one, the manner in which Charlie enters the room is not at all like Marcus: given the circumstances he's quite upset. Second, Indy dosn't wait on him and ackowledge his presense in a overtly friendly manner. The way Indy quickly responds to the dean seems to suggest some kind of urgency as well ("What the hell is the dean of the college doing in the middle of my class?").

I don't know, something little I saw that made me appreciate the differences made between Marcus and the dean a little more.

Steven pointed out the same yet different approach to the character of Dean Stanforth. The scene is almost shot for shot with the previous films, but rather than wait like Brody would have done, Stanforth abruptly enters and interrupts class.

sandiegojones said:

Yeah, but at least in Raiders they describe the Ark, how it got in Tanis, what it's power might be and all that. In KOTCS it takes a lot longer to get to the point since there are different points in KOTCS where the film stops to explain the legend, the artificat and how I may hove gotten there, etc. In Raiders you get basically one explanation and then the rest is almost all action & intrigue.

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It is all true -you know, I also wish the skull/dimensional being aspect was explained more, but it doesn't alter the fact in Raiders nes the takie scene seems to kind of drag on longer.

As for Marcus and and Henry's photos, it doesn't bother me really they are obviously well known photos. They tend do do things like that in most movies. It is just a "in your face" movie thing. Shame we didn't get slight close up of Willie's pic, and I do like how they have imposed Sallah ove Marion, where Indy's stood next to her.