Sunday, November 27, 2011

Raiders of the Lost Ark.....Hey wait... what was that?

I was watching Raiders of the Lost Ark for the umpteenth time the other day. It is a great movie. In my book it is one of the top 5 films in the action adventure genre. The action is great. Harrison Ford is, of course, awesome as Indiana Jones. He has a great supporting cast and a good lineup of villains. It has all the makings of a great film with excellent direction, cinematography, and special effects. This movie has it all including some glaring plot holes and historical errors that we overlook because the film is so damned good.

I am not so much talking about historical inaccuracies although a few do play directly into the plot holes. As the map follows Indy around the world as he travels some of the countries have the wrong names. Thailand should be Siam. Iran should be Persia. Jordan should be Trans-Jordan. This was of course changed for the "great unwashed" and those of use worth a sense for historical geography.

A huge point of discussion is the pistol that Indy uses in the Nepal shoot out. It is a Browning Hi-Power. The movie is set in 1936 and the Hi-Power was introduced for military service in 1935. It is unclear and debatable whether or not Indy could have put his hands on one. And if he could, why did he only use this in this scene when it would of been very helpful in some of the shoot outs to come? Instead he goes back to his old reliable wheel gun. Also in the Nepal shoot out the Nazis are using the Walther P-38 and the MP 38/40. Neither weapon would of been in service in 1936.

Airplane nit picking....The Pan American plane Indiana Jones boards in San Francisco looks similar to (but has noticeable differences from) the Boeing 314 Pan Am used for transpacific flights. This plane did however not fly until 1938 and at the time of the story the company only flew transpacific with Sikorsky S-42s, an plane with a completely different body than the one used in the scene. And don't get me started on that flying wing thingy. Why not use a Ju-52? Now that's a cool looking bird for sure.

Now for the plot holes. First of all that giant stone ball. If you look just as the ball starts to roll, if Indy would run TOWARDS the ball instead of running away from it would of rolled right over him with no damage what so ever. Then he could just follow the path it has made and he is home free. Well until he meet the natives with their fun but deadly stone age weapons.

Now the biggest most obvious plot hole of them all. In 1936 Egypt was an independent country, in name only. Effectively it was part of the British Empire. For the Nazis to be involved in a dig with uniformed and armed soldiers of the Third Reich would be like seeing a Russian dig in the Philippines in 1979 complete with KGB and Soviet troops in uniform and armed with AK-74s etc...

Transporting The Ark... Ok, once Indy has it, he just cannot ship it back to the University of Whatever. This item is stolen and properly belongs to the Kingdom of Egypt. This means he has to get it out of the country by the age old art of smuggling. That means loading it on a less then reputable ship captained by an unsavory individual. After this the only problem should of been to get it to the US or a US territory. Odd to me that the US government would sanctioned this operation and not offer any logistical help getting The Ark out of Egypt once Indy had it in his possession. In the 30's there were lots of US flagged cargo vessels arriving and leaving Egyptian ports all the time not to mention the US Navy. While it might of been rare at the time for a US Navy ship to be in the Mediterranean (I have no sources at this time) the sailing time from Norfolk to the Easter Mediterranean is less than the time Indy spent getting to Egypt by his route and adventures. A heavy cruiser could leave Norfolk and be off the coast of Egypt in 6-12 days depending on its ability to refuel. Also chances are the Navy may already have a ship or 6 in the Med.

This brings us to the German U-Boat. You can see that it is U-26 a Type I-A U-Boat. These were commissioned in 1936 and do have the range to get off the coast of Egypt. However this was not a normal patrol area for the German Navy let alone for a U-Boat. If there was going to be a German ship off the coast to provide logistical support for this sort of operation, a U-Boat would be the last choice. First of all, submarines are slow. Secondly, how do you plan on shipping that big crate on a sub? On the Type I-A boats shown in the movie as well as the type VII-B which is similar, the largest hatch only measures about 22 inches in diameter. A better idea would be one of the many armed merchant cruisers that the Kreigsmarine had at its disposal. Not only would you have cargo space but you would have stealth and the ability to intercept any other ship that might make off with The Ark should a foreign power recover it first. The crews of these ships were trained for this exact type of clandestine warfare.

Raiders of the Lost Ark is a damned good movie. I continue to enjoy it every time I see it. However, I am not sure why movies are made with such factual errors and plot holes. One would think that Lucas and Spielberg would have noticed most of the issues I have described. At the same time they modify the a truck to look like a pre war Mercedes truck. Sometimes there is no rhyme or reason to what they try to insure is period and what is not. It has nothing to do with how obvious it might be or how prominent the prop might be. Take the example of Indy’s satchel is a Mk VII gas mask bag. These were not manufactured until 1942. It should be a Mk V. It seems that they would rather just make the movie with the guns, props, and planes they have on hand and not worry about making sure what they are using are correct.

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