A friend and I had a really interesting conversation about Steven Spielberg recently. He pointed out that Spielberg only makes movies about two things: monsters and persecution. At first, it makes perfect sense. What are his big movies? Jaws
– monster.
Jurassic Park, Close Encounters of the Third Kind
– monsters.
Schindler's List, Amistad, Empire of the Sun, The Color Purple, E.T.
- persecution. Of course, my friend forgets to take into account blockbusters such as
Saving Private Ryan
, which is merely about the War and not about the Holocaust aspect. Or
Hook
or
Minority Report
(kind of about persecution, I guess, but not really) or the horrid, horrid
War Horse
. (Ugh. What a piece of crap that was...) Sometimes Spielberg makes movies that can only fall into the genre of Awesome, and no film of his embodies this better than the 1981 film
.
Now is the part where I usually give a brief plot synopsis so my readers know whether they really want to go see the movie or just kind of want to go see it – but I surely don't need to explain the premise of
Raiders
. Everyone has seen it, right? I cannot imagine meeting someone who has not seen this brilliant adventure film... but just in case: Harrison Ford stars as Indiana Jones, an archaeologist who receives an exciting lead: the location of the Ark of the Covenant – the actual artifact from the Bible. The trouble is that the Nazis want it, believing it will imbue their military with the power of God and they will be unstoppable.
Raiders of the Lost Ark
will play tonight as part of the Monday Night Movie Series at the Iroquois Amphitheater [5], located at 1080 Amphitheater Road in Iroquois Park. Admission is free. The film is scheduled to screen at 8:30.
Image: Internet Movie Database