Dovchenko said:
Does anyone else believe the scene where Dovchenko is killed by the ants is sooo grotesque that it does not fit with other Indy movies like the pervious poster said.
Seems like a really off-the-mark observation to me.
Melting Nazis
Ripping hearts out and eating live snakes
Come on!!!
I don't know what you may think, but... I've first seen the Indiana Jones trilogy when I was something like a 5 year-old kid. And I was NEVER EVER minimally disturbed by ANYTHING that was shown in those films. ANYTHING. Face melting?? The heart ripping scene in "Temple of Doom"?? The accelerate aging effect on Walter Donovan?? ... bah...
Again, I don't know what's your position about this... but I really think that showing a close-up of hundreds of killer ants entering in the mouth, in the nose, even in the eyes of a person is quite, let's say,
too much for an Indiana Jones movie.
Maybe it could have been cool for a low budget horror flick. NOT for Indiana Jones. I think it's nothing but an awful scene. A friend of mine covered his eyes during the killing of Dovchenko. He could be lame, I don't know and, personally, don't even care. But he is my same age, an adult, and he happened to find that scene MUCH DISTURBING. Much more than anything else that was ever shown in the original trilogy.
As far as I'm concerned, I can only say that the scene with the ants is a big, big failure.
This is only my opinion, I know. But I didn't find it fun to watch, nor I found it scary. It is NOT scary. So it doesn't even reach its goal, which is
clearly that of frighten spectators. It's CLEARLY a scene that was conceived with the intent of frighten people. It's only annoying, not frightening. It simply fails.
The homologous scenes with snakes in "Raiders", bugs in "Temple" and rats in "Crusade", were NOT conceived to be scary. Not at all. They were meant to be funny. There are many funny gags during those scenes. The global feeling you get is that of funny situations, drama mixed with good comedy. Think about it.
Grizzlor said:
The ants were terrific. Much better than the bugs on that Willie dummy in ToD.
Uhm... I'm dubious about that. In any case, since "Temple of Doom" came first, I'm still feeling like bashing the ants for their complete un-originality.