Astoundingly, the fifth Indiana Jones film, Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny (Mangold, 2023) is due to release later this month. To mark the occasion, I’m dedicating every Sunday to revisiting the movies that made him a household icon in addition to some bonus Indy content on Wednesdays.

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Released: 23 May 1984
Director: Steven Spielberg
Distributor: Paramount Pictures
Budget: $28.17 million
Stars: Harrison Ford, Kate Capshaw, Ke Huy Quan, Amrish Puri, and Roshan Seth

The Plot:
Prior to his adventure with the Ark of the Covenant, archeologist and adventure-seeker Doctor Henry Jones Jr. (Ford), better known as “Indiana Jones” (or simply “Indy”), and his enthusiastic young sidekick Short Round (Quan) infiltrated a Thuggee cult practicing child slavery, black magic, and ritual human sacrifice to retrieve a mystical stone and rescue enslaved children.

The Background:
First dreamed up as “Indiana Smith”, George Lucas’s throwback to the heroic pulp serials of his youth gained momentum when he teamed with Steven Spielberg and Lawrence Kasdan and cast Harrison Ford in the now-iconic role. Raiders of the Lost Ark’s (Spielberg, 1981) nearly $390 million gross and widespread critical acclaim meant that Lucas’s dream of a trilogy of films could become a reality and the two set to work on crafting a far darker adventure, one that initially involved fantastical concepts such as a lost world of dinosaurs and a haunted Scottish castle. When Lucas introduced the concepts of a religious cult devoted to child slavery, black magic, and ritual human sacrifice, screenwriter Lawrence Kasdan refused to work on the project, which recycled an excised minecart sequence and other set pieces cut from Raiders. With Spielberg in high demand, there was a sense of urgency to get the script finalised; Lucas jumped at the chance to include a musical sequence and set out to make the infamous dinner scene as gross as possible. Since the Indian government found the script offensive, filming took place in Sri Lanka and made extensive use of matte paintings and scale models; creative lighting also disguised that around eighty percent of the movie was shot at Elstree Studios and incredibly complex miniatures were created by Industrial Light & Magic for the thrilling minecart sequence. Returning star Harrison Ford suffered a spinal disc herniation during filming but soldiered on with the production, and Spielberg even ended up marrying Ford’s new co-star, Kate Capshaw. Although Temple of Doom made slightly less than its predecessor at the box office, it was still one of the year’s highest-grossing movies, however it was met with mixed reviews. Some criticised Capshaw’s performance as annoying, Ke Huy Quan’s character as racist, and were so outraged by the depiction of Indian culture and the film’s darker aspects that it contributed to a change in film ratings. Even Spielberg regretted making the film so dark, but Temple of Doom also received its fair share of praise for its adventurous action sequences, the physical comedy and performances, and it’s been noted as a cult classic. Like its predecessor, Temple of Doom was accompanied by a tie-in videogame and followed by a third instalment five years later, one that was not only much more in-line with the tone of Raiders of the Lost Ark but which also proved the most successful of the original trilogy.

The Review:
Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom immediately separates itself from its predecessor by opening with a very James Bond-like sequence; not only is Indy in an exotic location, he’s even dressed in an outfit that’s a dead ringer for James Bond/007’s (Sean Connery) famous white tuxedo from Goldfinger (Hamilton, 1964) and cabaret dancer/singer/entertainer Willie Scott’s (Capshaw) song and dance routine that plays over the far more elaborate title sequence is reminiscent of the Bond series’ trademark title sequences. While the first fifteen minutes of the movie owe a lot to the Bond movies, they also establish Indy as something of a mercenary; while he still mentions that he’s a professor at a university, it seems like he’s acting less out of the interests of preservation and more for the profit and thrill of his escapades, which expands upon how morally grey the character could be at times in Raiders of the Lost Ark especially when Prime Minister Chattar Lal (Seth) muses that Indy has had his manhood threatened for his “grave robbing” antics in the past.

Before, we saw that Indy often undertakes what could be described as illegal ventures to the furthest corners of the globe to acquire rare or forgotten relics for the museum and that he was tasked by the United States military to put these same skills to use in service of his country. Here, he’s in a fancy nightclub in the bustling city of Shanghai and doing shady deals with local crime boss Lao Che (Roy Chiao/Ron Taylor) to recover the remains of Emperor Nurhaci. After being insulted when Che sent his sons to forcibly recover Nurachi, Indy takes the clueless Willie hostage in order to get what’s owed to him in a tense showdown between the two that leaves him poisoned and his old friend Wu Han (David Yip) dead from a gunshot and ends with Indy making a hasty and action-packed retreat that lands him in India. Although essentially the adventurous tomb raider we saw in the opening of Raiders of the Lost Ark, Indy still dons his familiar outfit and showcases a respect for local culture and traditions, if only to allow him and his allies safe passage courtesy of a local shaman (D. R. Nanayakkara). Upon arriving at the shaman’s simple village, Indy is clearly unsettled by the misfortunes that have befallen them; in exchange for guiding him to Delhi, the shaman basically demands that Indy detour to Pankot Palace to recover the village’s sacred stone (which they directly attribute to the prosperity of their land) and their kidnapped children from the local Thuggee cult since they believe he has been brought to them by the Hindu God, Shiva, to aid them. While Indy dismisses this as a “ghost story” and recognises that their beloved stone is just one of any supposed sacred rocks, it’s clear to him that the disasters that have befallen the village are directly tied to the missing artifact not because of the wrath of some evil God but from the actions of the destructive cult. However, it should be noted that he’s just as motivated by the promise of “fortune and glory” as he is by the desire to rescue the lost children,

That Indy is so rattled by the kidnapped children might explain why he inexplicably has a child sidekick for this particular adventure; the endlessly enthusiastic Short Round acts as his getaway driver, lookout, and bodyguard, of sorts, with only the briefest explanation offered for how they hooked up (Indy caught the orphaned Shorty, who was living on the streets, trying to pick his pocket). Short Round takes his job very seriously; he insists that Willie refer to Indy as “Doctor Jones”, just like he does, and willingly follows him into every danger while carrying his bags and showcasing a demeanour beyond his years while still being a kid. He tosses out fun puns and exclamations not unlike Dick Grayson/Robin (Burt Ward) from the 1960s Batman show, delights in Willie’s awkwardness and ungainly nature, makes friends with his elephantine steed, and is completely nonplussed by the dangers of the jungle that drive Willie into a screaming frenzy, yet Indy still recognises that he’s a child and makes efforts to shield him from the Thuggee’s brutal ways and even Shorty is disgusted by the food served at Pankot Palace. Indy allows Shorty to follow him into the palace’s hazard-filled tunnels, where he accidentally sets off a series of boobytraps that see them trapped in a death chamber and left to rely on Willie to save them from being crushed by a spiked ceiling. However, Shorty is instrumental in snapping Indy out of the Thuggee spell in the finale; Short Round is forced to dig alongside the other captive children and heartbroken to see his beloved friend a mindless follower of the Thuggee who willingly beats his young sidekick and, Shorty first tries to appeal to Indy’s heart and then drives the poison from his body using a flaming torch in order to bring him to his senses and save Willie from being sacrificed to Kali, the Thuggee’s dark Goddess. When Indy’s busy dealing with the hulking Thugee slave-driver (Pat Roach) in the climactic finale, Shorty again proves instrumental in freeing the enslaved children, and the enthralled Maharajá, Zalim Sing (Raj Singh/Katie Leigh), from their desolate days of endless torture and hardship in the Thuggee mines.

Willie is a natural performer; she’s at home on the stage, in a glittery dress, with all eyes on her and with her every whim catered for. Pampered, spoiled, and basking in the adulation of superstardom, she’s more than a performer; she’s a diva, one who abhors violence and squalor and expects to get everything she asks for even if the conditions don’t allow for it. Curious and bombastic, she forces herself into Indy’s life by interrupting his meeting with Lao Che and ends up being held hostage and treated as an expendable commodity by the conniving crime boss. Positioned as Marion Ravenwood’s (Karen Allen) exact opposite, Willie is literally swept up in his adventure because she happens to snag the antidote he needs and, from there, it’s just one major inconvenience after another for her as she’s taken on a destructive drive through downtown Shanghai, is forced out of a crashing aeroplane, and ends up choking down rancid cuisine far from her make-up chair and room service. When they arrive at Pankot Palace, Willie is initially far more comfortable surrounded by luxury and draped in a dress befitting of a princess but is distraught to find that the Maharajá is a child, thus ruining her chances of seducing him, and that he serves bizarre food that cause her to faint. While she is exasperated by Indy’s lifestyle, she can’t help but be attracted to his rugged handsomeness…and the fruit he brings to her…but their flirtatious banter in the palace ends in a childish game to see who snaps first before they’re interrupted by a Thuggee assassin and Indy’s discovery of secret tunnels in Willie’s bed chamber.

Rather than butting heads with the bungling might of the Third Reich, Indy is faced with a malevolent cult who worship Kali, the Hindu Goddess of power and destruction, with their ways and practices being akin to Satanic rituals and Devil worship. Led by the priest Mola Ram (Puri), the threat of the Thuggees is slowly built up: we see the devastating consequences of their victimisation in the village, the brutal nature of their ways as the protagonists head to Pankot Palace, and clearly see that they’ll stoop to any means (including torture, killing, and kidnapping children) to spread their vitriol across the land. Their influence has infected Pankot Palace through and through; both the Prime Minister and the adolescent Maharajá have been enchanted by the power and allure of Mola Ram, which promises to shake them free of the condescending shackles of the British Empire, represented by Captain Philip Blumburtt (Philip Stone). A malevolent and sacrilegious figure, Mola Ram relies as much on grandeur as he does fear; he appears capable of tearing out human hearts and leaving the victims alive so they can be sacrificed to his dark goddess using a lava pit and keeps his followers entranced through his violent ways as much as the three sacred stones. Although Indy is unfazed by the mysticism surrounding the Thuggee, it turns out that Mola Ram is capable of putting others under his spell using a strange potion and demonstrates that voodoo magic is wielded by the Thuggee when the enraptured Zalim Sing causes him agonising pain by stabbing a voodoo doll made in his image. Furthermore, similar to Raiders of the Lost Ark, the threat of Kali’s destruction is real enough for Mola Ram to set himself the lofty goal of not only slaughtering his enemies but destroying all other deities to allow his dark Goddess to rule unopposed, with him as Her primary enforcer in a world overrun by chaos and bloodshed.

The Nitty-Gritty:
Considering how dark the film becomes later on, it’s a little strange how wacky Temple of Doom can be at times; the melee at Club Obi Wan in the opening is the first example of this strange dichotomy as Indy desperately trips and fights his way to the antidote, punching out a cigarette girl and taking out a goon with a cymbal as balloons fall and screaming patrons run everywhere, and shielding himself from an onslaught of gunfire using a giant gong like it’s a Three Stooges skit! His dramatic escape from Shanghai is hampered by his getaway plane containing a cargo of live poultry and ends with them plummeting from the plane using an inflatable lifeboat, which inexplicably doesn’t result in them being splattered all over the Himalayas, and even surviving a further plunge over a cliff and a raging river in a set piece so over the top that it would make Roger Moore’s Bond blush! Rather than attributing the film’s wackier aspects to Indy’s cheeky sidekick Short Round, it’s actually Willie who is responsible for them; there’s hardly a scene where she isn’t complaining, shrieking like a banshee, or making an idiot of herself with the local wildlife and culture. It’s extremely grating, though at the same time amusing to see Indy and Shorty ignore her screams and discomfort and to see her unknowingly toss away a large snake in a fit of rage while Indy freaks out at the sudden appearance of his worst fear.

The map sequences return, albeit only briefly, as does the score, which is largely unchanged from the first film and Indy remains as adaptable as ever; even while struggling from the effects of Lao Che’s poison, he’s able to impale one of his sons with a flaming skewer and make a hasty exit from Club Obi Wan and he’s not only shown to speak multiple languages but is always well aware of local customs and folklore. Because of this, he knows better than to offend his hosts (even when they’re offering food they cannot spare or serving up eyeball soup and chilled monkey brains) and to apologise when his accusations of Thuggee worship insult Zalim Sing. Actual fisticuffs, gunplay, and whip action are few and far between here; Indy brawls with an assassin in Pankot Palace, leaving him hanging from an overhead fan, the fight with the hulking Thuggee is a brutal affair that ends with the brute being ground into a bloody paste, and the film even subverts the classic ad-lib from the first movie but Temple of Doom definitely emphasises elaborate set pieces more than grounded action. One of the more harrowing is the bug-infested tunnel within Pankot Palace that seeks to outdo the trap-filled chamber from the last movie, but both are surpassed by the Thuggee temple with its massive stone idol to Kali, an actual lava pit, and its elaborate mine. Here, the local children are worked and beaten within an inch of their lives trying to find the last two stones and left begging for death rather than fall under Mola Ram’s dark spell. More importantly, however, this setting allows for easily the most extravagant and exciting sequence of the film, if not the entire series; the minecart chase that takes up a massive chunk of the finale. And what a sequence it is! Although the mines are impossibly huge and there’s absolutely no way they could have built those tracks, especially as the mines are so dangerous and adjacent to an active volcano, a combination of composite effects, highly detailed miniatures, and to-scale practical effects make this one of the most exhilarating set pieces in all of cinema! Sure, some of the effects and composite shots are a little dodgy and the sequence is maybe a little too ambitious, especially given how long it goes on for, and it’s a bit ridiculous that Indy is able to stop their out of control cart with just his feet but this thrilling minecart chase is reason alone to watch this movie and give it some extra props as an under-rated entry in the franchise.

Even with its wackier aspects, Temple of Doom is, without a doubt, the darkest entry in the franchise. Not only is the wholesale kidnapping and torture of children darker than anything else seen in the series (which is saying a lot considering its reliance on Nazis….), the voodoo practises and aesthetic of Mola Ram and the Thuggee cult are a disturbingly violent and gruesome affair. Mola Ram appears to rip out human hearts, immolates victims with his lava pit, has left a trail of bodies in his boobytrapped tunnels, and there’s even a bask of crocodiles waiting to chomp down on human flesh in the finale. If Mola Ram’s heretical attire and ominous demeanour weren’t bad enough, we also have a sadistic little child in the form of Zalim Sing, a disturbing scene where Indy is beaten and whipped into submission, and Willie is left facing her own horrific end when she’s lowered to Mola Ram’s lava pit. After being rescued thanks to Shorty snapping Indy out of his trance, she joins her friends as they fight off the Thuggee and race through the mines, stones in hand, as the children flee to safety. However, Indy, Willie, and Shorty’s escape is cut off when the Thuggee ambush them on a precarious rope bridge with a fatal fall and a grisly end at the jaws of the crocodiles below awaiting them. As crazy and adept as ever, Indy chooses the sever the rope bridge, dooming all of those not secured to certain death and he and Mola Ram fight over the sacred stones while dangling from the bridge. Indy’s knowledge of their religion is what ultimately allows him to outlast Mola Ram; by evoking the name of Shiva, the stones burst to fiery life and the mad priest plummets to his death trying to recover them. Thanks to Captain Blumburtt’s cover fire, the Thuggee are fended off and Indy returns to the village with their children and is hailed as a hero. Having learned a newfound respect for the power and significance of the sacred stone, Indy respectfully returns it to the shaman rather than see it gather dust in a museum and finally shares a passionate kiss with Willie.

The Summary:
I can understand why Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom is the black sheep of the franchise; it gets very dark and edges away from the high-spirited action and adventure of the first film and seems uncharacteristically mean-spirited at times. Delving into Hindu mysticism and the sprinkling in of a bit of voodoo and human sacrifice alone makes this a more exotic entry in the franchise, one that’s more reliant on elaborate sets and outdoing the boobytraps of the first film rather than globe-trotting. Juxtaposing these darker moments are some of the wackiest action set pieces in a series known for being a little over the top at times; by drawing on the more extravagant aspects of the James Bond films and relying a little too heavily on Willie’s…shall we say “unique”…brand of humour, Temple of Doom feels decidedly at odds with itself at times. The inclusion of a kid sidekick is a strange choice; while Short Round isn’t too annoying, especially compared to Willie, he’s little more than a stereotype and appears to be there primarily to snap Indy out of his trance in the finale and to showcase that the adventurer has a heart of gold, something almost necessary considering his more mercenary nature in this film. However, Temple of Doom contains just as much of the appeal, action, and adventure as its predecessor if not more; as mentioned, the minecart sequence alone justifies a watch and I personally enjoyed the darker aspects, especially surrounding Mola Ram and his gruesome dedication to Kali and the disgusting feast laid before our heroes. For me, Temple of Doom isn’t any better or worse than Raiders of the Lost Ark, even with Willie’s grating and incessant squealing; it’s definitely a different film but I can’t in good conscience rate it any higher or lower than Raiders since I have just as much fun with it as the first movie and personally consider it to be an under-rated entry that’s worthy of re-evaluation.

My Rating:

Great Stuff

Are you a fan of Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom? How do you think it compares to Raiders of the Lost Ark and were you put off by the film’s darker aspects? What did you think to Indy’s more mercenary presentation and his enthusiastic little sidekick? Who did you find more annoying, Willie or Short Round, and what did you think to the wackier set pieces on offer here? What did you think to Mola Ram and the Thuggee threat and were you blown away by the minecart sequence? Which of the Indiana Jones movies is your favourite? Whatever you think about Temple of Doom, feel free to share your memories of Indiana Jones in the comments or on my social media.