Raiders112390 said:
I'll be honest and say that my favorite sequence in the series takes place in the US: Utah 1912. I know many here want the next film to move away from America (and I don't want anymore South America either) but why is the USA unappealing? I feel if done right, like in the intro to Last Crusade, the setting doesn't matter. I'm not saying set the whole film in the US, but, at this point, America in the 50s or 60s is like another country in and of itself. Even places like Alaska can seem foreign if done right. Can someone explain why an Indy set at least partially in the US would be bad?
I think a lot of good points have been made here, but I wanted to throw in my own two cents about this.
One of the quintessential things about the Indy series is that every location presented provides some sort of impetus to further the journey. For example, the Utah prologue in LC establishes Indiana Jones's quest for the Cross of Coronado, and the scene at the Raven in
Raiders introduces Marion Ravenwood and the Headpiece to the Staff of Ra. For any part of the U.S.A (continental or otherwise) to be included, it would have to help further the story. There's a few problems with that.
1. Let's say the mainland U.S. is the main base of operations for this film. What will be the MacGuffin, then? Will it be something dealing with one of the 576 federally recognized tribes that reside on the North American continent? Because if you choose one, you're going to end up limiting the region to whichever one the tribe ended up in. It also limits the potential amount of travel. You're probably not going to find any Native American artifacts of importance floating around anywhere else in the world during the sixties. As for another option, let's say that the U.S is simply used for a smaller part of the movie (for example, where some enemy is holding an artifact in an urban environment,
a la Temple of Doom's opening). Putting Indy in an urban jungle for 25 minutes plus could become boring.
Extremely boring.
2. And if we ditch the mainland and stick to, let's say, the harsh environs of Alaska, the film runs into the same problems mentioned before. If Indy is stuck in a barren, isolated landscape for a long stretch of the movie, he might not have much to do. And as for a MacGuffin, he'd have even less, even if there are some interesting myths in Alaskan culture, such as the Tlingit belief in malevolent Land-Otter People.
Finally, if they were to focus on the U.S., the safest bet would probably be Hawaii. It has a connection to Polynesian culture, which extends all the way to New Zealand, and would provide more artifacts for Indy to go after while also giving a pretty landscape to look at. The only problem I could see arising with that is not everyone wants to see another jungle-based Indy film, but it could definitely work.