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     What Kills the Nazis? 
  • What is physically killing the Nazis that look into the Ark? It makes no sense, aside from the writers adoring gratuitous violence and gore. Are the writers bascially saying eyelids trump supernatural powers in any case? Seems a bit... silly.
    • Why can't they just... you know... stop looking.
    • "What is physically killing the Nazis that look into the Ark?" The power of God, wreaking bloody vengeance on those who would defile the Ark. Indy and Marion are spared because they're the only ones paying the proper respect.
    • Also, I just thought once you chose to look at the Ark you simply CAN'T stop looking.
    • 1 Chronicles 15:2 "No one is to carry the ark of God but the Levites; for the LORD chose them to carry the ark of God and to minister to Him forever." So by taking part in the ceremony everyone else was doomed but Indy being the scholarly sort knew better than to look.
    • Seriously that thing is bloody dangerous. The Israelites treat it like it's made of uranium and they are the rightful owners! The Ark was once captured by the Philistines. After wrecking havoc in their temple it is abandoned outside the nearest Israelite settlement. When the inhabitants discover it they establish a protective cordon and send a frantic message for Priests and Levites to take charge of it.
    • "Lightning. Fire. Power of God or something," to quote Indy.
    • I think whatever they saw inside was so amazing they couldn’t bring themselves to look away or close their eyes. As for what literally killed them, it’s the power of God.

     Hitching a Sub Ride 
  • Indy decides to follow a submarine. Does he swim after it? Grab on to it as it sails above the water and somehow is never seen by the lookouts that would be there? Grab on as it goes underwater and he holds his breath for hours?
    • Not only that, but he's without his trademark hat, which he would sacrifice an arm to keep with him, and he gets it back by the end of the movie.
      • It's a different hat. The fedora at the end is dark gray. Maybe the same one he wears on the Pan Am Clipper.
    • This is an early German U-boat, so it cannot run submerged except on batteries. Its normal mode is surface cruising. And it's before the war actually started, so the deck guns wouldn't be manned while cruising on the surface (even though they were manned to threaten the freighter), only the conning tower. Thus, Indy has anywhere on the deck that cannot be seen from the top of the conning tower to hide. Such as, oh, right at the base of the conning tower.
    • Except that the Germans in the very next shot order the U-boat to submerge. Even though they could only run on batteries they would presumably remain submerged for more than two or three minutes, so either Indy managed to open the hatch in time, climb in, and somehow remain unnoticed, or he's the world champion in holding his breath.
      • If it ran underwater on diesel engines, it would keep the Schnorkel up, and Indy could hold onto that.
    • What was originally supposed to happen is that Indy would use his whip to lasso himself to the periscope, which would remain above water through the whole trip. But that bit ended up getting cut. It's still kind of a flimsy plan, though.
      • Indiana Jones is the Trope Namer for flimsy plans
      • In the comic of the movie, which explains that he lashed himself to the periscope, shows the U-boat cruising just below the surface, enough to be submerged yet still use a Schnorkel.
      • The submarine trip has other problems as well: he had no food or water for what was likely a 38+ hour trip. Also: there's no way they could have fit the crate the Ark was in through the hatch of the submarine.
      • Submarines have a larger hatch through which to load torpedoes-the Ark would easily fit through that.
    • We never actually see the U-Boat submerge. Hence, since it avoids a plot-hole, it didn't. Simple.

     Giant Mook Hubris 
  • A Giant Mook punches Indy and he falls to the ground...and then the mook just lets Indy stand up before punching him again. What did he do that for?
    • Because he was winning, and arrogant.
    • Because he was having fun with Indy. You can tell he's that kinda guy right when he comes out of the hut, spots Indy, and instead of grabbing a gun or calling for backup he takes his shirt off and proceeds to take him on one on one. The whole point of the character is that he's an overconfident bully.
    • He didn't let him get up; he grabbed his jacket and helped him up.
    • The (junior) novel mentions that he enjoys boxing. A LOT.
    • It's called "toying with your prey".
    • Another way to look at it, as explained above, the German was actually being a worthy opponent, he just wanted to simply box, Indy on the other hand was fighting dirty, (the nad kicking, biting his arm, then throwing dirt in his face) but with reason, the German was 5 times his size and could crush him into a fine powder! Indy was actually scared shitless, and did anything he could to beat this guy. Not only that but was doing near spinning propellers that could turn him into mince meat in 3 seconds. But as I said the German was fighting fair, he put up his dukes and let indy take the first swing, but after indy kicked his nads and took a swing at him, the German thought, "ok, you wanna play it like that? Game on". After he decked indy in the face and Indy fell down like a sack of doorknobs, the German knew he was gonna have fun. But yes the German didn't shoot him or called for back up, he was just having some fun. Subtle message, not all Germans were monsters.

     No Sunday School for Nazis 
  • The entire villainous plot strikes me as more than a little bit daft, even viewed from the very start before anyone knew melting faces would be involved. There are two possibilities: either the God of the Bible is not real and therefore possession of the Ark is meaningless, or the God of the Bible is real and the Ark has immense power. If it's the latter, what remotely sane individual actually thinks the Creator of All Things is going to just sit back and let it be used by the foremost enemies of His chosen people to conquer the world? It's really hard to imagine just what they expected to happen when they opened the Ark. The whole thing is properly buried under Rule of Cool and doesn't diminish the awesomeness, and it's also an satisfying Take That! from Spielberg to the Nazis, but it's one of the bigger Villain Balls around.
    • The churches in Germany were, generally-speaking, not very theologically astute. The Nazis attempted to coerce the Lutherans and other Protestant denominations into a unified National Reich Church which would've been subservient to the Nazi state, although this didn't get much traction. More to the point, not as many of the Nazi top brass were actively practicing Christian as you might think — they nominally held onto the religious affiliation, but didn't bother with practicing it. Combine a lack of time spent really studying a religion that was messed up and watered-down, and you have an army who just didn't think through their Ark defilement.
    • Many Germans were Catholics and many were Lutherans, or had at least been raised as such — Hitler himself being an obvious example (although raised as a Catholic, to the point of having been an altar boy as a child, he never attended Mass as an adult). Think of what the Catholic Church taught about the Jews for almost 2000 years. Yes, they WERE God's chosen people until Jesus came along and they betrayed and killed him. The official Catholic doctrine was that the Catholic Church was now the only way to God and the only true faith therefore any relic of the God of the old testament would be a boon to a Catholic country and its armies - not to Jews. To me, it makes less sense that Belloq would attempt to perform a Jewish ceremony.
      • The Vatican doesn't have to excommunicate him. Hitler committed suicide, so he was automatically condemned to Hell even if he hadn't been a psychotic murderer. And excommunication is supposed to be used to coax a heretic back to the church, not as a punishment or condemnation.
      • Little addendum to that bit about the Jews no longer being the Chosen People. They are still the Chosen People, but the rest of humanity has been added among the Chosen. The big difference is that the Gates of Heaven have been opened and Jesus is the road to get there. A lot of people (including Catholics) don't understand this and religious zealots have a tendency to take whatever they want to be so and run with it off the ragged edge of sanity.
      • Watch 'God on Trial', the Jews at the concentration camps were pretty much convinced God had forsaken them and started a new covenant with the Nazi party.
      • The theological doctrine that says Jews are still the Chosen People alongside Christians is known as Dual-covenant theology and is follow mostly by Evangelical Christians, especially in America, whilst the doctrine that Jews are no longer the Chosen People and only Christians are known as Supersessionism is offical of the Catholic Church, Orthodox Church and most of the European Protestan Churches. As such is not a matter of the 30s or just Catholic, here in Europe is much more common that position.
    • The two American agents who assign Indy say that Hitler is a nutter on the subject of religious artefacts. In real life the Nazis did in fact pursue knowledge about religion and the occult, and they even went so far as to place the swastika at archeological digs (picture cutting and pasting hieroglyphics in Egyptian temples) to make it looks like they were predestined to rule the world.
      • Hitler actually wasn't obsessed with archaeology, which he considered to be a waste of time. Himmler was obsessed with archaeology. That said, Hitler was well aware of the potential propaganda benefits of being in possession of an artefact such as the Ark of the Covenant, as shown by his interest in the Holy Lance.
    • Nazis were religious and believed that they were doing God's work, you know. Just because they were Nazis doesn't make them immune to religious mania.
      • Well ... not really. Or, rather, kind of yes, and kind of no. The connections between the Nazis and Christianity, especially, are pretty complicated. On the one hand, more than a few Nazi supporters did think they were doing God's work and were Christians of the 'Jews are the Christ killers!' variety. The Third Reich even had an 'Aryan' Church which tried to advance the idea that Jesus was not himself a Jew. On the other hand, another large chunk were extremely hostile to Christianity and sought to eliminate it from German life, and as time progressed that was the group which clearly held the most influence. It's largely accepted that had Hitler won the German church's days were numbered; it was to be systematically isolated and destroyed as a competitor ideology to Nazism. Too much Serious Business, I know.
      • It's simpler to consider the Nazi Party as similar to the American mainstream parties. Take the Democrats, they have both religious black preachers and militant left wing atheists. The Republicans? Well, they include fundamental Christians as well as libertarian agnostics.
      • Did you just compare Nazism to Democrats and Republicans?
    • Take a Third Option, captain. The Nazis though the Ark was a powerful artefact that wasn't associated with God in any way. They believed it was simply a weapon anyone could use.
    • Fridge Brilliance: This bothered me too until I realized that it makes perfect sense: The real life Hitler was always convinced that God was on his side (and was said to have searched for things like The Spear of Destiny), and what more fitting and sadistic way of disposing of the Jews would there be than to try to bring the wrath of their own Lord upon them? Remember, it doesn't have to make sense.
      • Heck, he probably decided the Jews had stolen the Ark and lied about it being given to them.
    • Certain anti-Semetic Christians believe that when the Jews refused to follow Jesus they forfeited their place as God's chosen people, with Christians taking their place. Hitler's own religious beliefs were a rather weird mixture of Catholicism and Germanic myth, but it wouldn't surprise me if he believed something like this.
      • This idea is the oficial doctrine of both Catholic and Orthodox churches and several Protestant churches, I don't think they're anti-Semitic for that.
    • Something of an in-universe research flub: Belloq mentions that he thinks the Nazis are looking for the Ark because it makes any army carrying it invincible. In the Bible, every time the army carried the Ark into battle without God's specific direction to do so, they were SOUNDLY trounced and usually lost the Ark as well.
      • Of course, some of the Nazis may believe that they have God's specific direction to do so.
    • It's never been an element of anti-semitism that the God of the Jews is both real and opposed in some way to anti-Semites. So there's no reason for it occur to the Nazis that the ark might be a threat to them. Plus the "inherently powerful/magical artifact that doesn't actually channel the will of God" is another perspective. As stated in the movie itself, the Nazis (at least some of them) really were interested in all sorts of occult/supernatural stuff that might help them out.
    • Basically, as touched upon by certain posters above, the only reason the Nazis going after the Ark of the Covenant doesn't make sense is if you know absolutely nothing about the history of anti-Semitism. It's not something Hitler and the Nazis invented, it's something that Christians invented and propagated for centuries earlier; Hitler merely took advantage of what was taken for granted by "good" German Catholics and Protestants alike, that Jews were heretics and inherently inferior to Christians, having broken the Covenant between God and humans by refusing to accept the coming of Jesus. Hitler in many cases quoted nearly word for word opinions published by Martin Luther, founder of the Protestant Reformation, in a book called "On The Jews And Their Lies", and multiple Nazis are quoted on the similarities between Hitler and Luther's visions. With this in mind, it's only natural to realise that the Nazis (or, indeed, pretty much every mainstream Christian German of the time) would think of the Ark as a Christian relic and not a Judaic one. Hitler's troops marched into battle with "Gott Mitt Uns"note  on their belt buckles; why wouldn't such an order have every reason to think that the Ark would work for them rather than against them? Hell, even their destruction can be attributed more to breaking other Ark-related laws from the Old Testament (mortals must never touch the Ark, bearing the Ark into battle without God's express permission brings only disaster) than to their anti-Semitism.
    • Finally, there's the propaganda value — which, at the end of the day, was all that Hitler was really interested in. If it's the real deal, the Nazis could put a spin on it, just by having their Ark in their possession.

     Literal Shrug of God 
  • There's God. He's looking at the goings-on on Earth and someone approaches, looks where He's looking and says:
    "So, Hitler took over the world, huh?"
    God responds: "He had the Ark, and the Grail, My hands were tied."
    • Either God unleashes lots of stuff like floods and plagues or he allows his creations the free will he gave them to try and fix their own problems first.
      • And those are his only options? At the very minimum, couldn't he have just teleported the Ark into Heaven?
      • Well in that case, why doesn't God just teleport all of Germany's guns, tanks, planes, and battleships into heaven? You can't have it both ways. Either God lets His creations follow their own free will or He doesn't.
      • I think what the above poster was trying to say is that God's actions have no reason to be limited to grand catastrophes like plagues and floods. Why can't he affect his creation with smaller miracles, like teleporting away the Ark?
      • (to the poster before the above) Well, following your brand of logic, is the Ark an instrument of God or not? Then its effects are his responsibility, above and beyond any group of peoples' free will. Teleporting the Ark away is not the same as teleporting Germany's military assets away. False equivalency there. In any case, the Free Will Is Why Evil Exists has always been a terrible argument for God's inactivity.
      • Free Will is Why Evil Exists is a terrible argument? We'll that's certainly debatable.
      • Teleportation doesn't exactly seem like a "small" miracle, seeing as it's a complete violation of the laws of physics and reality as we currently understand it.
    • Alternative theory: Indy's always in the right place at the right time, has a pistol fired at him at point blank range but gets away with a flesh wound, and avoids an attempted poisoning by sheer random chance. God's already acting to stop the Nazis, he's just not being flashy about it.
    • Or: Indy is God.
    • The Ark has a long history of royally screwing over people who aren't supposed to be messing with it. Why would God bother doing anything, when he knows the Nazis won't do anything more than get themselves killed? He probably called the angels over and sat back to watch.
    • Maybe God just likes a bit of irony: 'Well, I could intervene and stop these guys from dying incredibly gruesome deaths... but hey, Free Will. Hands are tied.'
    • We saw what happened when the Nazis tried to actually use the Ark. Clearly, God wasn't about to let them get away with anything.
    • When you do things right, people won't be sure you've done anything at all.

     How did they build it? 
  • One of the first traps Indy comes across is this big wall of spikes that activates when anyone steps into the beam of light streaming in from a skylight. "Forrestal..." But how could the temple builders have possibly built a light-sensitive trap using ancient technology?
    • Now we know: the aliens did it!
    • Worse yet, if Forrestal's skeleton is on the spikes that pop out, who wound it up again after it killed him?
      • Probably the Hovitos.
    • How do we know it was light sensitive? I always assumed the traps all used mechanical levers in the floor that activate the wall of spikes and the arrows and were one shot deals. Something like that is well within ancient technologies.
      • The spike trap only activated when a solid object moved into (and partially blocked) the light beam.
      • Alternatively, Indy could have been acting like the trap was light-sensitive. In reality, he was stepping on a pressure-sensitive tile and moving his hand into the light at the same time to give the illusion the latter is what triggered the trap. As to why he did this, an explanation is that he did so just in case Satipo were to betray him later on, which he does, and the trick ultimately works.
      • And Indy is actually crouched under the beam when he activates it. If there were triggers in the floor, he would have triggered the trap getting into position to do that.

  • Related question: the spike wall is clearly made from a large piece of metal(steel or iron). No ancient cultures in South America used metal like that. Or was the gate not hundreds of years old?

     Nazi Secrecy 
  • What is a large Nazi military encampment doing in the suburbs of Cairo? Granted, it was before the war, but the appeasement strategy didn't go that far.
    • Archaeology. Why do you ask?
    • It wasn't anywhere near Cairo. When Marion goes to flee from his tent, Belloq tells him that the desert is "three weeks in every direction". True, he may have been bluffing, but then Indy has that long, protracted fight scene with the Nazi convoy on its way to the Cairo airfield so it was clearly a significant drive.
      • Belloq was almost certainly bluffing, since Indy reaches a village on horseback barely 10 minutes after leaving the Nazi camp (couldn't have been much more than that, given how energetic his horse still was after chasing after the Nazis' cars at full gallop). We see dense growths of palm trees and grasses, houses, a primitive irrigation system, and one Nazi motorcyclist actually ends up in a small pond.

     Isn't Fire Supposed to be Hot, Herr Toht? 
  • What sort of person sees a metal object in a fire and not only grabs it unprotected, but grabs it with their entire palm? Everything except the first two acts of the movie should have been Indy marching to the Ark unmolested and maybe catching a nap!
    • An idiot. What, you asked.
    • Or, someone who's desperate to get it, doesn't have time to think of other options, and knows that if he doesn't grab it he's not going to get the main thing he's set out to find in the first place?
      • He burnt his hand so badly, he didn't get it anyway. Some quick thinking there. Obviously, a master of the Indy Ploy.
      • No one said he thought it was guaranteed to work, just that he was desperate enough under the circumstances to think that it was worth trying. Had he managed to come away with the medallion, he doubtless would have thought his burnt hand was a price worth paying.
    • Someone who was gambling that the medallion hadn't had time to get very hot yet, and clamped down in a hurry in case he was wrong because he couldn't afford to lose the thing.
    • Watch the scene again. Flames surround the medallion getting it hot. He doesn't see it. By the time he does see the medallion, the flames have died down enough that the medallion looks unscatched. It's only when he picks it up that he burns his hand.

     Not Such a Combat Pragmatist After All 
  • The fight with the Giant Mook, as classic as it was, due to Indy's uncharacteristic refusal to just shoot said behemoth. He uses all sorts of dirty tricks (groin kicking, biting, throwing sand in the guy's eye), but doesn't think to just shoot him until his gun falls out of his holster during the brawl, whereupon he suddenly remembers he has it with him, and spends the rest of the fight trying to pick it up again. It's just such an odd lapse in logic, and a sharp contrast to the swordsman scene from earlier (oh, the potentially awesome missed running gag).
    • It did become a running gag - just look at Indy's reaction towards the end of "Temple of Doom", when faced with a bunch of Hindjas.
    • Yes, but my main point that it was out of character for the Combat Pragmatist Indy to engage in a fist-fight with a clearly bigger and stronger enemy rather than just quickly shooting him still stands. And yes, I am aware of the Rule of Cool reasons, but I'm looking for a Watsonian explanation here.
      • The big guy was unarmed and begging for a fist fight. Indy figures "Okay, he doesn't have a sword, I can probably save a bullet, beat him up and look totally badass in doing so by dodging his attacks and hitting him when he gets tired". It's only when the fight starts going badly for him that he considers just shooting him.
      • Also, the huge Nazi isn't actually coming after Indy with a lethal weapon. The swordsman was. Now, the situation Indy's in is dangerous. But if Indy is at all reluctant to kill people who aren't actively trying to kill him, that reluctance is likely to crop up here.
      • Alternatively, Indy is familiar with what usually happens to characters who bring a gun to a fistfight. He already tried his luck once by bringing a gun to a swordfight; twice would be too many.
      • Did Indy even have his gun at this point?
      • Yes he did. Alternatively, maybe he was worried about the sound of the gunshot attracting more guards or something.
      • Ze Germans don't hear gunfire; only fuel tanker explosions.
      • Look again, He loses it fairly early on in the fight, which he consented to because otherwise the guy would just raise the alarm or shoot him anyway, a good portion of Indy's strategy is getting it BACK.
    • At first he is trying to remain unnoticed, sneaking up on the pilot having knocked the other guy out without killing him, he probably still figured he could keep it quiet if he won quickly by using the dirty tricks. The German pilot fires first which is probably what convinces him he might as well draw his gun, but after that he first doesn't have much chance to draw the pistol, and then loses it and spends the rest of the fight trying to get it back. If we take that he was going to be quiet, which given the number of Nazi soldiers he knew where in the camp makes sense, it makes a lot more sense that he doesn't draw his gun until later.
    • Indy loses his gun and tries to get it back most of the fight to shoot him.
    • Indy's also a bit overconfident. He doesn't realise just how tough the Giant Mechanic is until he's deep into the fight.

     The German Pilot's Selective Hearing 
  • The flying wing pilot doesn't hear the first mechanic shouting at Indy. He doesn't hear the mechanic hit the plane. He doesn't hear the mechanic's wrench hitting the plane. He doesn't hear the wrench getting sheared in half by the prop. But when the Bald Mechanic talks to Indy in a conversational tone, suddenly the pilot is all ears.

     Kadams Not To Scale 
  • A major plot point is that René Belloq and the Nazis are digging in the wrong place because the incomplete instructions, from only one side of the head-piece, have them using a staff which is too long. The translator says "six kadam", which Indy says is "about 72 inches" (6ft/183cm) less "one kadam" (1ft/30.5cm). The correct length of the staff should therefore be "five kadam" (5ft/152cm). Yet when Indy enters the map room, the staff he uses is clearly taller than he is (Harrison Ford stands 6ft/185cm tall), and longer than the staff Belloq used.

     Defying Odds to Plunder the Wrong Treasure 
  • Okay, so, the first ten minutes. What kind of archaeologist would care about a stupid little gold statue when he's in a temple with loads of fully-functional death traps? Seriously, consider the ingenuity required for that whole "displaced weight equals rolling boulder" trap!
    • Why is the assumption always that the traps themselves are ancient? There are living people a short walk from the temple who revere the idol enough to worship whoever holds it. Doesn't it make more sense that the traps are of a modern vintage, being lovingly maintained and reset; while the idol itself is the only truly ancient thing in the temple?
    • Um. Pretty much every archaeologist ever has cared more about the artefacts themselves than the mechanisms to protect them. When you read about the Pyramids, you read about two things: Graverobbers having gotten to them first, and the marvel that King Tut's tomb was still intact. Also, because he can, you know, actually take the gold idol. How do you propose he was going to bring a temple full of traps to a museum?
      • What they're saying is Indy's focus on the gold idol is totally misplaced. Any podunk civilization can smelt gold into a small religious statue, but the ones that built that temple were using light-sensitive traps, pressure plates, and then the rolling boulder thing centuries before other peoples could have pulled them off. Studying those would be * much, much* more valuable to understanding that culture than simply taking the idol and sticking it in a glass museum case. In a way, its an unintentional critique of the way we learn history, just grabbing the pretty stuff and showing it off.
      • Do we really know the traps were light sensitive? I always assumed they were mechanical levers in the floor section that set off the traps, and the arrows were fired from some kind of mini crossbows or simple spring mechanisms.
      • The spike trap only activated when a solid object moved into (and partially blocked) the light beam.
      • I agree, I thought the same thing in many scenes where the hero and villain are fighting over the Macguffin in an ancient temple with fantastic architecture, and many still active traps (bonus points for video games where the traps contain traps have continiously moving parts). Let the other guy get the Macguffin, and just come back with a team of engineers to find out how all the stuff works. It's got to be worth something too.
      • Yes, but no museum is going to pay for an intact ancient temple with working death traps and its own colony of gigantic spiders. It'll never fit through the door.
      • Dunno, look at the temple friezes and columns in the British Museum, and the intact Temple of Dendur in the NYC Met. If someone offered them something like this, I think a lot of museums would find a way to make it work
    • Maybe Indy's plan was to use the idol as leverage to convince the museum to mount a more thorough expedition. Without the idol, all they have is Indy's word that there's a huge hidden temple deep in the Peruvian jungle. Pretty easy for them to put the REJECTED stamp on Indy's funding proposal. But with the idol, they at least know something's there and they have reason to believe it's highly valuable.
    • You also have to remember, this was the 1930's; the bad old days of archaeology.
    • Maybe a background element of the Indyverse is that ancient temples are usually filled with complicated deathtraps, so they're not seen as interesting, just annoying obstacles to the good stuff.
    • Leaving aside the fact, wow, you guys who apparently would rather watch Indiana Jones painstakingly document the ins and outs of the inner workings of an ancient temple instead of be chased by a giant boulder when he tries to steal a gold icon clearly have different tastes in adventure films than I do, it is hardly impossible that he might be interested in both. But the thing is, he can come back to the temple. He now knows where it is, he now knows how to get there, and while it might not necessarily be the easiest journey ever it's not like the ancient stone temple is going to disappear any time soon. But the gold icon might, because it is small and (comparatively) easily stolen, and it is also valuable, and is much easier to transport back home as an example of the ancient culture he is visiting than a fuck-off huge ancient stone temple filled with death traps. So he grabs the gold icon now, and leaves the rest of the temple as something he can come back and document another time.
    • Also, documenting a temple that size is almost certainly not something that one archaeologist with a whip, a cool hat and a snake phobia can do all by himself. It's something that requires a full team (and not just two sketchy locals who might be planning on betraying you either). At that point, Indy is probably just scouting ahead to see what's there and if the temple actually exists; as mentioned above, now he knows where it is, he can get together a proper archaeological dig, some real funding, and come back with more people to document it. In fact, swiping the totem acts both as proof that it exists and a tempting little bit of bait for potential donors (you think this is good? If we go back, we might find even more...).

     Belloq's Cred With the Nazis 
  • By far the most hilarious part is when Belloq dons that ridiculous quasi-Jewish getup (that the Nazis somehow let him bring along. They forgot to check his luggage, I guess?)
    • This Just Bugged the filmmakers too. That's why they added the scene where Dietrich says he's "uncomfortable with the thought of this ... Jewish ritual" and Belloq talks him into it (apparently, this was the last scene to be added to the script before filming). And the dialogue in that scene seems to imply Belloq had already talked the Nazis into this and that Dietrich was getting cold feet at the last minute, so they must have known ahead of time that he was bringing the outfit and what it was for. Of course, considering how much the Nazis hated Jews, this is still a pretty big Hand Wave, but at least they tried.
      • Prusumably, Belloq was more or less sincere (or at least genuinely thought it was a just a "say the secret word and the duck will come down" situation where all he had to do was wear the right hat and say the right lines to make the magic box work) while the Nazis justified it to themselves as taking the ritual to use the Ark "back" as its rightful owners, as THEY are obviously the rightful rulers of the world and Jews are just underhanded Christ-killing subhumans who aren't entitled to ritual pomp and circumstance. That or they viewed it as just another way to mock Judaism (Toht obviously finds the entire situation hysterically funny, although that may be because he's sceptical about the whole thing). In that light, Dietrich's discomfort looks more like he's starting to suspect they're making a horrible, horrible mistake.
    • According to the Novelization, Belloq called ahead and spoke to a German officer named Captain Mohler (a character identified in the credits as "Tall Captain"). In return for speaking favorably of him to Hitler later on, Belloq tasks Mohler with setting everything up and acquiring the Jewish ceremonial robes and such. This is where they came from. It may not be canon, but it's an explanation.
    • If worth something, I thing one of the (crazy) Nazi theories is that modern Jews are descendants of converted Khazars and that the ancient Israelites were Aryans or something like that, therefore, an "Israelite Rite" wouldn't be entirely contradictory to Nazis, at least not for those that held that belief.
    • Belloq was always planning to "test" the ark before it was taken back to Berlin; firstly, he wants to be the one to open it and see what's inside first (he tells Indy that Hitler can have it "after I'm finished with it"), and secondly, as he points out to Dietrich, it's probably a good idea from their perspective to make sure that the Ark actually is an all-powerful magical superweapon and not just a gaudy stone box with a lot of dust inside before they try to show it off to their bosses. Hence, Dietrich was likely always aware that this was going to be a thing and Belloq was going to need some authentic Jewish ceremonial garb in order to perform it, but that doesn't mean he had to like it. He was just taking an opportunity to express his discomfort with the situation once the time came.

     1930's Politics 
  • Why does the US want to stop the war when they are supposed to be isolationist? And why don't they work with the British government (Egypt was under British rule then)?
    • This movie is set in 1936 — ie. before WWII. Britain and France declared war on Germany in 1939 after the latter invaded Poland, and the US didn't get involved until after the attack on Pearl Harbour two years later note . Even so, why would the Americans be so interested in what the Germans are getting up to in Egypt?
      • That's the problem right there — the American officials who recruit Indy talk like the war's already started and Hitler's proven himself to be the most dastardly villain of all time, when in the real 1936 Hitler had only reoccupied a portion of German territory that had been demilitarized after the First World War.
      • In 1936, American Isolationism was only just ramping up, and the Neutrality Acts (easily among the biggest effects of Isolationism, and not a pretty part of US history) weren't passed until 1937, primarily to prevent more American citizens from fighting in the Spanish Civil War.
    • Just because they're hesitant to engage in open warfare doesn't mean they're at all averse to covert operations. The US was pretty hesitant to go to war with Soviet Russia too. Didn't stop us from spying on them and trying to muck up their operations whenever we could.
    • I always assumed it was because they expected a war sooner or later, and didn't want the Nazis to have such a powerful weapon at their disposal when it did. This is more of a justification in LC, when the war was a lot closer.
    • Isolationism was influential in the United States pre-1941, but it was hardly universally accepted. The agents meeting with Indy work for a president who, although faced with significant isolationist opposition in Congress, was personally convinced that war with Germany was a matter of when not if, a view shared by many in his administration. And heck, if you were trying to stop a rival power from gaining a military advantage but wanted to do so without incurring public opposition from your political opponents, covertly farming the job out would be a pretty good way of doing so. Hence, the US government is trying to stop the Nazis on the quiet — by having two of its agents give Indy (a private citizen, albeit one who knows more about ancient artefacts than most) a fistful of cash and telling him to go and find Ravenwood and take it from there.

     A Staff of Ra for All Seasons? 
  • Basically everything having to do with the staff and the headpiece. Firstly, wouldn't the light shine at a different angle on different days of the year (perhaps you only use the staff during certain seasons, but I don't remember it being addressed). Also, how can the Nazi's reconstruct one that would even work? Where do they find out how to angle the gem just right? If it's all based on the imprint left on the guy's hand, they still would not have enough info. Lastly, Sallah says that the new headpiece has markings on one side. If the Nazis only need it for the light beam, why would they bother to put on the markings that give the size of the staff?
    • In regards to the angle of the sun, I always assumed the reason Indy chose that specific spot on the ground to stick the staff was because the markings on the ground said which slot to place it in depending on the time of year and whatnot.
    • As for the gem, the point is that they got it wrong, so if their gem is not cut right that would still give them an incorrect location.
    • As for the markings, the whole expedition is based on and shrouded in mysticism. They probably replicated the headpiece in order to be as authentic as possible, in the off chance it would make a difference. Maybe the light would reflect off the model city and illuminate part of the headpiece for an extra clue, who knows?
      • The markings on the floor do indicate where to place the staff based on the time of year. The markings on the headpiece tell how tall the Staff of Ra has to be. Since Belloq only got a copy with one side, his staff was too long and the beam lit up the wrong building on the model city. Therefore, he was digging in the wrong place. Indy's staff was the right length. We can assume that the Germans did not get the same mystical light show that Indy got when they took their staff down to the Map Room, since only Indy was projecting a beam onto the correct model building. That one was probably covered in special magic reflecting paint or some such, just to let you know you had done your homework correctly.
    • Further point on the markings — when the Nazis created their copy of the medallion, they did so from the imprint on Toht's hand. Meaning they had no choice about including the markings, because they would appear automatically when whatever they used to make a mold for the copy (plaster of Paris, presumably) was poured over his hand.

     Why Were There Any Snakes at all? 
  • Where did all the snakes in the temple come from? What were they eating during all those dry, dusty centuries waiting for Indy to come swinging down from above? Or are there just that many rats running around in there?
    • I always assumed that the tomb was like an underground lair for the snakes to hang out in when they weren't out hunting in the desert. They enter and exit through cracks in the walls or holes in the paintings. Indy saw them crawling out of the 'eyes' of a painting and that's what gave him the idea of crashing through the wall to find a way out, after all.
      • Its called a "Hibernaculum", basically a gigantic snake nest.
      • Yet when they open the hatch to the tomb, there's a sharp intake of air as if it had been sealed airtight all that time
      • Snake poop produces gasses, gasses gather at the top of the chamber. Indy and company open the lid, the gas mixes with the outside air, thus producing an odd wooshing sound. The noise was essentially a gigantic fart.
      • Then never mind what they ate, what did the snakes breathe?
      • That air sound effect was presumably just a cinematic embellishment — again, in keeping with how the snakes slip out through holes in the mural.
      • It was probably just sand dislodged by the removal of the hatch door.
    • For all we know, the snakes have been eating each other in all that time.
    • They're coming from outside. Remember, when they've been sealed in, Indy sees the wall they're coming through and deduces that there's a way out that way. The snakes have likely found that place when they've been trying to escape from the excessive desert heat, and have just congregated together over time. Which also answers where the air is coming from; there are vents leading outside that the snakes are getting through.

     Indy Burning the Snake Pit 
  • Does anyone else find it a little disturbing that Indy, the crack archaeologist and professor, has no qualms about lighting a tankful of gas in an ancient chamber crammed with artifacts? I know, I know, the snakes are all over the place... but wouldn't he at least hesitate before engulfing those perishable wooden statues in a fireball?
    • Indy's not exactly the best at thinking ahead, and this isn't the first time he's screwed up at archaeology; those complex traps in the Native American temple earlier were of far, far greater interest than that idol they were guarding.
    • Along with being utterly terrified of the snakes and probably wanting to get rid of them ASAP, they were working a dig site practically right on top of the Germans who were digging in the wrong place and had a very limited amount of time to locate the Ark and haul it up and away before anyone noticed. Burning a path would have been the fastest way for him to get it over with.
    • Indy has survived as long as he has by making quick decisions under pressure. That was the plan his instincts came up with and he went with it.
    • It's not exactly "crammed" with artifacts, and besides, he only sets the snakes on fire.
    • Even if he appreciates the value of the antiquities in the chamber, Jones, like 99% of sane people, values his life much more

     The River Pilot 
  • Why does Indy have a two-person plane waiting for him just over a hill from the temple? If he knew the location so well, why did he walk there through the dangerous jungle? And what were his companions supposed to do once he took off? It's almost like he was planning to sacrifice them in traps all along.
    • The guys with him are natives of the country he is in, and he is paying them to guide him and help carry his stuff. Jock is his ride home. The reason why it's just a two person plane is because his guides simply aren't leaving the country. They live there.
    • The guides probably have a boat hauled up nearby to carry them safely out of the hostile tribe's territory.

     The Teacher's Pet Wannabe 
  • How the hell did that young lady write "LOVE YOU" on her eyelids? Eyeliner smears and smudges very easily!
    • People do crazy things for love, and crazier things for childish (or in this case, studentish) infatuation.
    • Ink, not eyeliner. Mind you, it'd be the devil to wash out afterwards.
    • The question is more how did she manage to physically write it on there. She could've used a mirror, but that would've still been quite difficult, so she must've got one of her friends to do it.
      • This question occurred to me when I was re-watching the movie the other day. I decided she just had another student help her, much like the real-life actress would have had to.

     How Would the British Allow All This? 
  • Egypt, while it was theoretically independent, was under control of the English, so it is doubtful that the Germans would have been able to actually start an excavation in the middle of Egypt.
    • Which is why they were there under the guise of a legitimate excavation with a renowned archaeologist supposedly in charge.
      • A renowned FRENCH archaeologist, so from a friendly country.
    • We don't know which part of Egypt Tanis was in. It's possible that it was outside of the 1936 Egyptian borders, like say in what was technically Libyan soil - they'd have had no problem operating there (supported by Belloq's claim that "the desert is three weeks in every direction"). Notice that when they're in Cairo, they're a lot more discreet: they wear civilian clothing and leave the killing and bruising to local thugs.
      • Except Libya wasn't anywhere near the centre of the Ancient Egyptian empire, which had all its major cities along the Nile because that's where the water was.
      • Who said the Ark had to be in the centre of they Egyptian empire? If I were the Egyptians, I'd think back to what happened to the Philistines when they captured the Ark and do my level best to keep it a safe distance from any population centres.
      • Except we know exactly where Tanis is. It is a big archaeological spot that's had excavations going back to the 19th century.
      • It must be a different Tanis in the film then, since Indy was told by the government agents that the Nazis had just discovered Tanis.
    • By that same logic, why would an independent Egypt put up with this? Why assume that a British controlled Egypt would be any more or less opposed to a Nazi incursion than an independent Egypt?
      • Because to all practical intents and purposes Egypt was not independent at the time; rightly or wrongly, it was a British-controlled protectorate. Considering whether or not an independent Egypt would have also opposed the Nazi incursion is thus pretty much irrelevant to the question about this movie, since the British were the ones calling the shots at the time and so are the ones who are in a position to officially respond to the Nazi incursion.
      • Britain was giving Egypt progressive independence at the time and also following a policy of appeasement towards to the Germans, so may have allowed the dig as part of this.

     Why the U.S. Government's Final Indifference? 
  • Why did the US government put the Ark in storage instead of studying it? Were they disbelieving of its power or simply knew not to fool with powers beyond them?
    • The latter. If nothing else, Indy would've told them when he was debriefed.
      • Indy can testify 'Yeah, despite the part where Belloq flawlessly followed the ritual as laid out in Leviticus, everybody who opened the box with intent to use it still died.' At this point, the US research staff would feel an understandable reluctance to open the box.
    • The impression I got was that bureaucracy saved the day: the vaunted 'military applications' of the Ark were misfiled, the Ark forgotten, and the Ark had no further effect on history.
    • A variety of reasons. When real archaeologists saw the warehouse scene, many admitted that is very much Truth in Television. A lot of museums plus colleges and universities have whole warehouses full of archaeological finds that the public will never see. Sometimes it's because the relics are so vast that these institutions may not have the time and people to analyze them all. Sometimes it's because some can't be positively identified and are never publicly exhibited, especially if the field notes were lost for the same. Other times, some relics may not be exhibited due to a combination of social, religious and geopolitical reasons. It was probably a mix of these that the US government locked away the Ark.

     Durable, Wear-and-Tear Clothing 
  • Who makes Indy's clothing? At one point he's dragged behind a truck on a dirt road and they receive pretty much no damage. In fact, they have enough padding that Indy isn't reeling in pain from friction burns.
    • The movie would be much less exciting if our brave hero cried of carpet burns every five minutes.
    • Indy's jacket is unquestionably made of leather. Motorcyclists prefer leather clothing because you can take a fall at speed and get dragged/rolled across asphalt without getting torn up. His pants are harder to figure out, but they are probably either heavy canvas or wool (which is not actually as bad an idea in the desert as one might think — most of the natives would have been wearing linen or wool). The next time we see him, his pants do have rips all over them, and a scene follows shortly after (on the ship) where he complains that everything hurts (except for one of his elbows) and falls asleep mid-kiss.
    • Also, some of this is simply Anthropic Principle and Willing Suspension of Disbelief. It is an action-adventure film, some level of impossible-in-reality resilience is to be expected.
    • For what it's worth, Indy's hat, jacket, and boots are all commercially available. His fedora is made by Herbert Johnson, his jacket by Wested Leather in Great Britain, and his boots by Alden Shoes in Massachusetts. His shirt and pants were supposed to be surplus Army clothes.

     Getting Off the Secret Submarine Base 
  • How did Indy and Marion get off the island at the end? Was there a plane on the island? Did he call in the United States government?
    • The Nazis were dead, but the area they died in was far away from the U-boat docks. So he just simply trekked to the docks and stole a free U-boat.
      • Even if you just sailed them on the surface, U-boats weren't one person-craft. Most likely he found a radio, sent out an S.O.S. and the two were picked up by a merchant or fishing vessel.
    • That raises the question, did the Ark really kill all of the Nazis on the island? So Fritz the 17-year-old drafted submariner is sitting on his bunk back at base and suddenly lightning comes down and kills him, even though he was asleep when the ark was opened and couldn't possibly have seen what was going on?
      • Young Fritz von Hypothetical was still a Nazi, so yeah he deserved it. He could have deserted, refused to serve, fled to a non-Nazi country, even been part of Germany's own anti-Nazi resistance movement. Young Fritz von Hypothetical decided he was okay with being a soldier in a military which inflicted horrendous abuses on Jews, the Disabled, LGBT people, Roma peoples, etc.
      • Except the Ark only killed the people who looked at it. Young Fritz wasn't looking at it, nor did he have any intent to use it as a weapon, he probably knew nothing about it. Maybe it killed all sinners in a certain radius, but that would have most definitely included Indy (who was accused of sleeping with Marion when she was underage).
      • Leaving aside the allegation about Indy and Marion's relationship, The Ark is a Magical Superweapon that kills opposing armies. The Nazis are a disrespectful genocidal army who make war against the Jewish people (the very people the Ark is supposed to protect), so yeah, Fritz von Hypothetical is toast. Shouldn't have been a Nazi. You can see that set up where, even contained, the Ark scours the Swastika off its cargo crate.
      • That's a pretty shallow view of the Wehrmacht. General conscription was introduced in Germany in 1935. Many of the soldiers in the Wehrmacht were not Nazis, and many had nothing against the Jews (it was the SS who ran the extermination camps, who were all Nazis). If you were drafted, the alternative to serving in the military was prison (later it was legally death to refuse a draft notice). So poor Fritz von Hypothetical gets drafted, joins the navy rather than go to prison, becomes a cook, never has an unkind word for anyone, certainly never shoots at anyone, and never even operates the equipment on the submarine outside of his cooking duties, and then lightning comes down and kills him.
      • If the Ark interpreted 'opposing army' as 'everyone who is a member of and subscribes to the ideology of this particular armed force, no matter where they are', then the entire Third Reich, up to and including Hitler, would have melted overnight. Since that almost certainly didn't happen given the events of The Last Crusade, we can safely assume that the Ark only attacks those who are in its direct vicinity and directly interacting with or attacking it. So whether he's a die-hard Nazi or just some hapless kid who got drafted, if Fritz von Hypothetical is just at back at base lying in his bunk reading a book and nowhere near the Ark then he's probably fine.
      • Also, while it might not be explicitly stated, the pretty clear implication is that the soldiers involved in this mission are SS, not Wehrmacht; they were the ones who were obsessed with all the paranormal stuff, after all. So if it helps, most of the people melted were almost certainly die-hard Nazis.
      • The novelization is pretty specific that Dietrich is Wehrmacht. When he gives the order to his aide Gobler to arrange for the Ark to be transported by truck to Cairo, Gobler responds, "Jawohl, Herr Oberst" before an explosion cuts them off. Oberst is a rank in the Wehrmacht, not the SS. Of course, they've mixed up ranks in the films, as in Last Crusade, Elsa erroneously refers to Colonel Vogel as "Herr Oberst" as well, despite him actually being SS.
    • The Ark was empowered by the Old Testament God. Back in the day, He was a little indiscriminate, remember. So the Ark probably wouldn't have spared Fritz on the technicality that he was only drafted; but probably wouldn't have gone out of the way to kill him if he wasn't at ground zero.
      • Biblical stories of the Ark tend to follow a pattern of: a) God tells people not to use the Ark in battle, b) people use the Ark in battle, c) God smites them. It would suggest that only the people who dared to use the Ark in such a blasphemous (Old Testament definition of blasphemy) way would receive the punishment.
    • Why is everyone assuming that only U-boats were present on the island? There were probably ordinary boats there too, because you can't easily construct and staff an entire military base - even a covert one - by smuggling every last one of your personnel and every bit of equipment or supplies in with clunky diesel-powered submarines.
      • Indeed, while the Indy-travelmap is very rough, it looks like they are on one of the islands that are within spitting distance of Santorini/Thera. If so, they could just about row there in a dinghy.
      • The novelization mentions that there was some radio equipment that Indy and Marion used to call for help.

     Belloq Sure Gives Away Crummy Rags 
  • Was there a scene cut after Indy and Marion flee the exploding Nazi plane? Marion's dress is mostly intact (save for the tear in her skirt from when they were in the cave with the snakes), but then later when we see Indy and Marion hiding behind a sand dune, her dress is completely ripped to shreds. What happened?
    • Didn't they use some of the cloth to keep the snake-repelling torches going?

     So Much For Flat Earth Atheism 
  • How did Indy know not to look at the Ark? And why does it work? Are the spirits coming out of it just an illusion that can still kill you somehow if you look at them?
    • Mentioned elsewhere on this page. The same passages that state that "the army that carries the Ark before it is invincible" go on to state that using it without God's express permission, touching it, or looking inside it results in a good-Old-Testament-fashioned smiting. Indy didn't physically touch the Ark, he did not open it, and certainly had no intention of carrying it into battle (with or without God's permission). Indy's smart enough to read and follow the warning that comes after the spell, so he closes his eyes (and tells Marion to do the same) because then, not having done any of the things you're not supposed to do when interacting with the Ark, they will be spared the Wrath of God.
      • Except that earlier in the movie we see some Nazis carrying it around without being struck dead. Does it only work if you touch it with your bare hands?
      • And those same Nazis who carried it around are killed later at the opening ceremony. God is prescient in addition to being wrathful. God will punish those who have defiled His Ark on His own terms, and His own schedule.
      • The film seems to imply that what sets the Ark off is opening it and looking.

     Why Would the Ark Even Work? 
  • Why does the Ark even work in the modern era? It's the Ark of the Covenant, very specifically the sign and seal of the Mosaic covenant between God and the Jewish nation. And that covenant is gone, Christ's death and resurrection ended the Old Covenant and established the New. Wouldn't that make the Ark just a box now?
    • The idea of the old Covenant being broken is simply an idea and viewpoint of the Catholic, Protestant and Orthodox church is simply due to centuries of antisemitism. There is no "official" statement about the Jews no longer being the Chosen People. Hell, according to Islamic views, Christianity and Judiasm is corruption of God's teaching and the Quaran is the true word of the God.
    • The "official statements" do exist, is part of the Catholic Church's official doctrine for example, and from several Orthodox and Protestant churches (although not all Protestant churches as some, especially of the Evangelical variety, do consider that Jews are still the chosen people), is not about antisemitism as even Christian Jews of those faiths believed that, and basically what they say is that Christians are the chosen people now and not Jews (as in practitioners of Judaism, technically if an ethnic Jew converts to Christianity would be as chosen as any other Christian), is more about (well, sometime very common among all religions) that your religion is the only one that is valid or at least the best of the bunch, thus it makes no sense for most churches to think that other religious community is the real deal. That said, obviously Jews don't think so and believe to still be the chosen people, thus what you can take from the movie is that in-universe Judaism (and not Christianity) is the one true religion (may have something to do that Steven Spielberg is Jewish).
    • For all we know, the Ark normally is just a box now. It only blew up in the Nazis' faces or burnt their mark off the crate because the divine force it represents — regardless of what faith, if any, is valid in the Indyverse — was pissed that a formerly-empowered artefact was being abused by genocidal dicks.
    • Because it's an action-adventure / fantasy movie, not a religious studies seminar. The movie isn't about the complexities of Christian / Jewish theology and its spiritual implications for the Ark, it's about a heroic archaeologist trying to stop Nazi stormtroopers from acquiring a magic box that can melt people. At some point, you just have to go with "because it's a more thrilling and entertaining climax if the Ark melts the Nazis at the end rather than just being an empty box because it turns out that the magic doesn't work any more".
    • They went after the Ark obviously believing it still had some value. The religious ones of the bunch probably already had some crackpot mutation of Supersessionism already thought up to explain why taking the Ark would be both worth it and a good idea. Their logic was probably that the new Covenant superseding the old one would render the Ark connected to the new one automatically, giving them the right to claim it as a now-Christian artifact. The others meanwhile probably figured it was worth looking into for propaganda value at best.

     Why not Give The Ark Back To The Jews? 
  • Why didn't the Americans try to give the Ark to proper Hebrew religious authorities, that would arguably have much better odds at harnessing and directing the divine powers against the Axis powers?
    • Sort of answered in-text. Indy laments at the end that the Americans were bureaucrats and idiots who didn't know what they had. At the very least, Indy (and audience sympathy) don't think the American government knew what it was doing.
    • Plus, trying to decide who the "proper religious authorities" legitimately are, in the modern era - modern Jews, modern Christians, modern Muslims...? If so, which tradition/sect/denomination of above...? Which particular individuals within that denomination...? - could potentially kick-start an entirely different World War II than the one already looming on the horizon.
    • Even if you believe the Jews to be the rightful owners, consider that in Antiquity, the Jews were organized into a state with rather monolithic secular and religious authorities... but in the nineteen-thirties... not so much. Who would be the uncontested Jewish authority back in Indy's time?
    • Also also, for better or worse the United States government is generally not in the habit of handing off massively powerful objects to religious sects from other countries that it has no direct control or influence over. As far as the Americans are concerned, finders keepers; they gots the magic box that melts people, they's keeping the magic box that melts people.
    • Another reason could be that the Americans in charge of that decision weren't too fond of giving the ark to the Jews for safety reasons. WW2 is almost around, and Nazis were known to have problems with Jews in 1936. Better to keep the ark in safe America than risking a hunt for it as soon as it's given back to the Jews.

     What Measure a Non Westerner? 
  • Did Indy have as much qualm about killing the Arab henchman in the market fight scene? With Nazis, they were enemy combatants of an evil army. The Arabs were probably just hired mercenaries who were paid a small wage to capture Indy (probably not even kill him).
    • No, and why should he? They're trying to kill him, so he kills them.
    • He didn't seem to much worry about killing the hired Nepali thugs who were trying to kill him at Marion's place earlier in the film either. Indy's a pragmatist. He doesn't hesitate to kill when people are actively trying to kill him.

     Indy Solving Problems For the Nazis 
  • As this article pointed out, the Nazis' plot was already sending them off a cliff without outside intervention. They were digging in the wrong place until Indy's intervention and would had blown millions digging in the wrong place. Not only that, only Indy knows about the Ark's face-melting secret, meaning that even if the Nazis found the thing and shipped it to Berlin as planned, they would have effectively opened the Ark right in front of the entire Nazi high command along with many of their powerful supporters.
    • There are many ifs in that scenario. Nazis may easily drop the expedition once the diggings became too costly, especially during the war, and also it's impossible to know if the ark would be really opened in front of the Nazi high command (it could have been opened in the middle of a parade or any other crowded activity killing thousands of innocent civilians), or some other Genre Savvy German scholar may have figure out the same thing Indy figured and prevent the melting from happening, leaving Hitler with an incredibly powerful mystical weapon. Not to mention Belloq and his SS pals would've been pretty stupid not to confirm they'd actually found what Hitler wanted before they'd risk embarrassing the Fuhrer in a big public unveiling of nothing more than an empty stone coffer.
    • Belloq even specifically says to Dietrich that they should confirm it first to get him to go along with the ritual. Plus Belloq also made it clear to Indy that he wanted to open the Ark first.
    • The Nazis could have spend the money and time necessary to find the Ark... they already found Tanis; so they could just keep digging every last building uncovered from the ground.
    • The Cracked article is a perfect example of hindsight being 20/20 and the audience having a different perspective to the characters; its criticisms are based from the (somewhat over-confident and know-it-all) perspective of people declaring that the problems Indy faces are easily solved because they know what the ending is and have seen these problems being solved. To wit:
      • Most importantly, Indy doesn't know about the Ark's face-melting secret for most of the movie. He literally only realises that the contents of the Ark should not be looked at when he and Marion are tied to a stake right in front of it and it's been opened up — as in, five minutes from the ending. As far as he knows for most of the film, the Ark is a potentially unfathomably powerful weapon that must be kept out of the Nazis' hands at all costs. Claiming that Indy should have just let the Nazis take the Ark is, essentially, criticising him for not being omnipotent or precognitive or aware that he's a fictional character in a story, which are hardly fair criticisms to make.
      • But also, while the Nazis are digging in the wrong place, the wrong place is still, essentially, just over the road from where they're currently digging. They might not have the exact correct location, but they are still too close to locating it for comfort. There is no guarantee that Belloq or the Nazis will give up upon not finding anything at the current location, and they may in fact still locate the true location of the Ark independently. If Indy's purpose is to keep the Ark out of the hands of the Nazis, then it is better to at least try to steal it out from under them and slip away before they realise rather than just leave it where it is and hope they don't find it.
      • And, of course, all of this essentially requires Indy to take the passive route of inaction throughout the movie rather than the active route of doing things to further the plot. A protagonist who doesn't do anything and reacts passively to every development because he's already figured out what the ending is going to be is what's called a boring protagonist in a boring story, nevermind a supposed action blockbuster.
      • Essentially, the Cracked article is a rather long-winded and pedantic way of asking "Why doesn't Indy act like he knows he's in Raiders of the Lost Ark?" To which the only real or fair answer is, of course: because he doesn't.
    • Indy says outright why he's going after the Ark: He wants to find it not because he thinks that if the Nazis find it they will take over the world, but because it's a find of incredible historic significance and he wants to be the guy who found it. He doesn't believe in magic or superstition (at least, he says he doesn't to Marcus). George Lucas has even said that Indy was intended as an Antihero verging on being a Villain Protagonist, with his actions in the opening meant to be outright theft of cultural artifacts, with the quest for the Ark meant to be a redemption story where Indiana rediscovers things to believe in, and indeed, Indy is portrayed as far more cynical, greedy, and morally ambiguous in this film compared to the sequels, before becoming a better person over the course of the film. Plus it apparently pays well and is a chance to reconnect with Abner Ravenwood and Marion. And it's a good thing for Marion that Indy did get involved, as otherwise she would have been tortured to death by Toht.

     Indy's facial expression before the Giant Mechanic 
  • Probably a dumb question but I never quite got what Indy's expression and body language are meant to convey when he first encounters the big mechanic mook. I'm thinking something along the lines of "You've gotta be fucking kidding me". Is this right?
    • Yep, Indy's simply done with this shit before it even starts. His strained smile and "Alright, man, I'm coming" gesture are supposed to be humorously facetious.

     How Does Sallah escape the Nazis? 
  • How did Sallah get away from the Nazis? He was caught helping Indy try to acquire the ark, and we see him on his knees surrounded by armed guards. Next, we encounter him running through the chaos when Indy's blown up the airfield. Why didn't the Nazis kill him straight away?
    • It's shown in a deleted scene that a young inexperienced soldier was tasked with executing Sallah, but couldn't bring himself to do it so secretly released him instead. Alternatively, in the comic book adaptation Sallah says he managed to escape by convincing Dietrich that Indy had tricked him into thinking he was one of the German soldiers.

     The Sherpa's Weird Loyalties 
  • When Toht orders his Gestapo henchman with the MP 40 to shoot Indy and the big Sherpa henchman while they're fighting over Indy's gun, the two stop struggling and shoot the henchman. And then the two continue struggling in a fight to the death despite Toht having betrayed the Sherpa and him now no longer having a reason to continue fighting Indy.
    • How about because Indy is still fighting him? He no longer has a reason to kill Indy but he does need to defend himself.

     The Propeller's Presence Behind The Mook 
  • Just before the big mechanic guy gets chopped up by the propellers, we see the propeller right behind him. Why can't he feel the wind from it if it's that close (and, presumably, realize whats happening and run). Is this just a case of Rule of Perception (the audience can't feel the wind, so he can't either), or what?
    • It's a pusher propeller, the airflow is going away from the huge mechanic. It's not a jet turbine sucking air in, so the air disturbance in front would be less noticeable as well. Also, he's busy being in a fistfight at the time, so, a little distracted.

     Why are the whereabouts of the Ravenwoods such a mystery? 
  • Doctor Ravenwood died in a dig in Nepal with no one knowing any better, hence, his daughter Marion is stuck there for what seems years, since she has been running quite a popular tavern. No one knows exactly where they are to the point that the Nazis have to tag on to Indy the moment he boards a plane in America to get to where renowned archeologist Doctor Ravenwood might be, i.e., they don't even know what freaking continent to look for him. Is this even possible? As an archaeologist, Ravenwood probably had sponsors and/or correspondents who would more or less know where he is, so why would the German espionage service need to follow Dr. Jones to get to Ravenwood? Furthermore, couldn't Marion arrange to get back to the States or get in touch with a U.S. consulate?
    • You've kind of answered your own question here; "Doctor Ravenwood died in a dig in Nepal with no one knowing any better". Nepal is notoriously remote and inaccessible even today, never mind in the 1930s — a huge amount of the country is mountainous and difficult to reach either in person or via communications. It's landlocked and you couldn't even travel there directly in 1936 (the country didn't build an international airport until 1949), you would have to land at a port in India or China and travel through them — both massive, heavily populated and comparatively dangerous places to travel through themselves at the time (in addition to both generally possessing substandard infrastructure outside of the cities, there were numerous violent resistance movements trying to engage in violence rebellion in India, and China was undergoing a civil war) — and cross the border into it. It's not like anyone's got a GPS tracker on him; the only information anyone would have on Ravenwood's actual whereabouts would be Ravenwood's own correspondence with the outside world, and if the last time he managed to post a letter to inform anyone where he was was in, say, (what was then) Calcutta, as far as anyone else knows he and Marion could be literally anywhere. So yeah, the Germans might as well put a guy on Indy's tail since, in addition to the fact that he's an American agent after the same thing they're after, he's got just as much chance of finding Ravenwood as anyone else.
    • As for Marion, she's running a tavern that's popular mainly because it seems to be the only place to get a drink in what is clearly a small, remote and out-of-the-way mountain village, it's not like she's running Studio 54. She's pretty off the grid. Furthermore, she's pretty much got no money and thus no way of getting to anywhere which might a decent boat, air or train service to somewhere else, much less have a US consulate (the nearest one is probably hundreds of miles away). Given how eagerly she latches onto Indy's quest despite their history and almost getting killed, the answer to the question of "couldn't she arrange to get back to the States?" is pretty clearly "she would have if she could have."

     Why the fake-out for Marion's death? 
  • Don't get me wrong, I get why in the script, but I mean in-universe. The Nazis have the burned impression of the medallion on Toht's hand which they're using to dig for the Ark in Tanis, but maybe they want the real thing for themselves, in which case the kidnap Marion. Okay, sure, but then why bother with the fake-out with the baskets? If she had the medallion they could've just killed her and taken it, but we see later Indy gave it to Sallah already, so then they could maybe offer a trade: the girl for the medallion. But they don't try that, so evidently they were happy to keep working with Toht's burned hand and nothing else... so why keep Marion at all? Why do the basket switch? Sure, Belloq probably asked for her as compensation for his participation, but the Nazis are already digging in Tanis by the time Indy and Marion arrive, Belloq's part is basically over and the Nazis have very little interest in keeping Marion around, as shown when they dump her in the tomb with Indy... so, again, why do the basket switch? What was the point of it?


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