Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom - uncut in UK for 1st time

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AnImaginaryBoy

Active member
ResidentAlien said:
Wow. Special, aren'tcha?



http://raven.theraider.net/showthread.php?t=12237&



Search and you shall be rewarded.





And Raiders features more acts of violence than Temple. It's an absurd and unfounded argument to suggest that Temple is more violent. Just a bunch of PC hogwash that sunk the film in 1984.
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Oooh, you're a real charmer! Sorry I didn't search for a thread about this already. I'm still new and rubbish. I'll get better, I promise. And I was being tongue in cheek about the violence, although I suspect that doesn't really come across on the internet.
 
Ignatius Stone

Ignatius Stone

New member
Many of the BBFC's ratings decisions from the 80's were questionable, to say the least.
The cuts forced to Temple of Doom were totally devoid of any real rationale, IMHO.

Just some of the genre movies old and new to unjustly suffer the scissors of the BBFC have included Batman Returns, Batman Forever, Willow, Dragonslayer, Conan the Barbarian, Conan the Destroyer, Star Wars Episode II: Attack of the Clones, Mulan, The Matrix, The Mummy Returns, Lara Croft: Tomb Raider, Spider-Man II, Judge Dredd and many, many more.
 
MolaRam2

MolaRam2

New member
Ignatius Stone said:
Many of the BBFC's ratings decisions from the 80's were questionable, to say the least.
The cuts forced to Temple of Doom were totally devoid of any real rationale, IMHO.

Just some of the genre movies old and new to unjustly suffer the scissors of the BBFC have included Batman Returns, Batman Forever, Willow, Dragonslayer, Conan the Barbarian, Conan the Destroyer, Star Wars Episode II: Attack of the Clones, Mulan, The Matrix, The Mummy Returns, Lara Croft: Tomb Raider, Spider-Man II, Judge Dredd and many, many more.
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I am American, but I have read about some of the goofy rules the BBFC has. Lilo and Stitch had to be edited to avoid a 12A rating.
 
F

Fish1941

New member
AnImaginaryBoy said:
...it was at a friend's house, who had setup his projector, and we watched the region 1 version of Temple of Doom, and my god! I can finally see why so many people complained about it being too violent. The whole stuff in the Thuggee sacrifice scene was just unbelievable - I'm so glad I didn't see it as a kid, as it would have probably scarred me for life! One little cut I don't understand is during the fight with Pat Roach, as in the region 2 version, Short Round goes up to help, Willie holds him back, Shorty says, "I gotta safe Indy!" then we see Pat Roach put Indy into the mine car, and Willie says, "Okay, save him!" where as in the region 1 version, that scene goes on for longer before Willie finally lets Shorty rescue Indy. Anybody know why that was cut? I mean, I suppose it's a tiny bit more violent, as we see Pat punch Indy right in the heart, but it's no worse than the edited version of the Thuggee sacrifice, so what was the problem with it? Anyhow, I am very glad I got see the uncut version of Temple of Doom! I feel like I'm finally grown up, or something.
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I don't agree that TOD is more violent than RotLA. I think that both movies are equally dark and violent . . . but in different ways.
 
Agent Spalko

Agent Spalko

Guest
What's surprising is that nobody made as much fuss about the violence in Raiders... A guy getting diced by an aircraft propeller, melting faces, exploding heads... but only took issue with it after Doom... flaming shishkabob spear, incinerating bodies, ripping and flaming hearts. Should there have been as much backlash surrounding Raiders we would have seen the PG-13 rating imposed sooner.
 
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Dust McAlan

New member
The violence in Temple of Doom is more intense, I think. We see a man literally reach into another man's chest before we see the sacrifice slowly lowered into a pit of lava, whereupon he catches fire, screaming all the way. There's also the drinking of the blood of Kali, which made me ill as a child. The flaming shish kabob, eh, that's not so bad. Indiana getting whipped, Short Round getting whipped, that's hard to watch. That's torture, really.

In Raiders, a lot of the really horrible violence happens off camera. Satipo getting impaled happens off camera, we just see the aftermath. The German mechanic getting chopped up, off camera. The melting faces and exploding heads, the only real shocking violence that happens on camera, and it's fast, real fast, just over and done with. The violence in Temple is very slow and arduous, so it feels more intense, and that's why I think it's gotten the rap of being darker and more violent over the years.
 
Agent Spalko

Agent Spalko

Guest
I really don't see much difference in the violence between the two. I think Temple is perceptively more violent than it is but Raiders is just as graphic. Crusade on the other hand is so much more toned down you have to wonder why it received a PG-13 rating at all. It feels very much like a PG movie. Even the Donovan zombie looks pretty cartoonish.
 
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Dust McAlan

New member
Agent Spalko said:
I really don't see much difference in the violence between the two. I think Temple is perceptively more violent than it is but Raiders is just as graphic. Crusade on the other hand is so much more toned down you have to wonder why it received a PG-13 rating at all. It feels very much like a PG movie. Even the Donovan zombie looks pretty cartoonish.
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I think it got a PG-13 solely for Donovan. It still frightened me when I was a kid. Not so much now in comparison, but back then? Shudders.
 
MolaRam2

MolaRam2

New member
Agent Spalko said:
I really don't see much difference in the violence between the two. I think Temple is perceptively more violent than it is but Raiders is just as graphic. Crusade on the other hand is so much more toned down you have to wonder why it received a PG-13 rating at all. It feels very much like a PG movie. Even the Donovan zombie looks pretty cartoonish.
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The PG-13 rating has proven to be pretty pointless. Nobody cared that Raiders was only PG, yet Last Crusade which is far tamer than Raiders is PG-13. If Raiders didn't cause controversy with a PG, shouldn't a much tamer film be given a PG also?

All PG-13 has done is make G-rated movies such as Happy Feet and The Incredibles PG, and PG rated movies such as Spider-man and Harry Potter 4 and 5 PG-13.

PG-13 has become the PG of the 70s, and PG has become the G of the 70s. Ocassionally a film will be rated G, but I have no clue why Ratatouille is G and Over the Hedge is PG, they are pretty much equal in terms of content.
 
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marky_77

New member
i feel doom had the most graphic violence, although raiders did have quite a bit. doom's tone made it more intense, but not necessarily for the better. it's a shame lucas wasn't just married when he thought of the film, rather then going through a divorce.

i have the 2003 uk version of doom, so i don't know if that's the full film. it has the heart being taken out. and these films where meant for kids lol. i have seen the scene where indy is in the cage after he has drunk the blood, and thats been shortened before.

i was watching crusade back in 2002 i think, and it was the first time i saw the soldiers head roll down at the end. i was like :confused: bbc had cut it as they showed it in the afternoons before. i saw it in new york in 2000 and it was cut too in an evening showing. crusade is tame overall.
 
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ResidentAlien

Guest
marky_77 said:
and these films where meant for kids
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Satipo getting impaled through the face was meant for kids? Really?


Temple gets an unfair rap. And the series always gets saddled with the "well they're for kids" nonsense. It's always been a mature series for a more mature audience. Sure they appeal to kids but it's hard to argue that they were the intended audience considering all the extreme acts of violence in the first film.

And Indy was infinitely darker and more embattled in the first film than the second. Alcoholism, anyone?
 
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marky_77

New member
ResidentAlien said:
Satipo getting impaled through the face was meant for kids? Really?QUOTE]

exactly!!

i think the highest arrow should have been a bit lower so it went through his face, not graze the top of his head. :dead:
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oki9Sedo

New member
Raiders is more violent than Temple of Doom overall, but Temple of Doom's heart ripping scene is still the most violent moment in the trilogy, I think.
 
nezobiwan

nezobiwan

New member
When I was five years old I fainted in my living room during the heart-ripping scene... which was weird because I had seen the film a dozen times before. :p

And come to think of it-- I used to close my eyes during the Nazi face-melting in Raiders and Donovan's demise in LC and I never closed my eyes during any ToD scene.

That is pretty weird.
 
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oki9Sedo

New member
Donovan's death in Last Crusade is the scariest part of the trilogy, I think. That said, I grew up with the cut version of the hear-ripping.
 
Vance

Vance

New member
Agent Spalko said:
What's surprising is that nobody made as much fuss about the violence in Raiders... A guy getting diced by an aircraft propeller, melting faces, exploding heads... but only took issue with it after Doom... flaming shishkabob spear, incinerating bodies, ripping and flaming hearts. Should there have been as much backlash surrounding Raiders we would have seen the PG-13 rating imposed sooner.
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A lot of the more grotesque violence happens just off camera and is implied. We KNOW what happened, but we don't SEE it. Also, the violent scenes are interspersed throughout the movie.

Temple of Doom, however, makes a point of showing a lot of violence, graphically, and with nearly all of the violence within a 15 minute sequence at the end of the second act. From the moment we see the shrine to the moment Short Round BURNS Indiana, it's a very long and gratuitous fest of violence and sadism, and it's all presented - even the torture of children - in its full glory.

PC has nothing to do with it. Even now I have to look at Lucas and Speilberg and wonder just what the hell they were thinking.
 
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WeAreGoingToDie

New member
If Spielberg himself didn't make the edit, then there is no dispute. The Original version is the only version. The other is a hack job done for the sake of censorship.

oki9Sedo said:
That said, I hate films like Saw. They're violence for the sake of it, there's no artistic merit there to justify it.
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Actually, if one actually sits and watches the Saw films they'll find a gory film series with amazingly intelligent nd thought out plotting running through the films. Every action is either influenced or influences another action. It isn't simply violence for the sake of it. :dead:
 
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Dust McAlan

New member
As a parent, it's difficult for me to sit back and watch the Indy flicks with my five year old around. Last Crusade is the one I watch with him, but he gets bored quickly because the action is sparse. Raiders has worked really well, and when I informed him that the opening might be scary, he quickly shut up and sat on the edge of his seat. Fortunately, he survived seeing both the dead body and Satipo impaled on the wall spikes, so I'm confident in his current level of what he can handle in movie violence. However, the face melting and the heart ripping are not happening for a while.

Here's my honest take on Temple of Doom: it ought to be rated R. It's bloody and graphic, much like Raiders, but the difference with Temple is that it's intense. We get a close up of Mola Ram's hand reaching into another man's chest. That's pretty f*cked up right there. And it's not like there's room for interpretation, he's reaching inside his chest. Very seldom do we see scenes like that even in modern PG-13 films, but moreso in R rated films. And it's even more intense in that we see the heart beating afterward, the hole in the chest close up, and then the man is SLOWLY lowered into the lava, where we see a prolonged shot of his body catching on fire while he writhes and screams and see Mola Ram laughing as the still-beating heart catches on fire. It's so intense, so graphic, that I'm serious surprised that this film still escapes with a PG, when even modern PG-13 standards couldn't fit this film.

Should it be censored? Of course not. The level of intensity fits the movie in context of the story and of what's at stake here. I appreciate the level of intensity and violence in the film; it's one of the reasons I prefer it to the other Indiana Jones movies, in that the whole of the violence feels organic and necessary to the movie. But should it be given a harder rating? Yes, I believe it does. Partially for graphic violence, but mostly for the intensity of the graphic violence. Raiders never lingered on the violence the way this film does, mostly because it didn't need to, where Temple does need to.

My $0.02.
 
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