Recently, the internet was blessed with a wonderful gift. A few decades ago, Steven Spielberg, George Lucas, and screenwriter Lawrence Kasdan had 5, 9-hour-long chat sessions where they discussed plot ideas for a story about an archaeologist/adventurer who was handy with a bullwhip. The three spoke, sometimes in short, garbled sentences, and sometimes in wild, minute-long monologues that were positively dense with ideas. The conversations were recorded, transcripts were made and, based on those transcripts, Raiders of the Lost Ark was written.
Let me say right off the bat, (stripped of internet-mandated cynicism), that this story conference is one of the most interesting things I’ve ever read. You’ve got hours upon hours of these three guys just relentlessly spit-balling and the sheer amount of ideas that get thrown around in that room is incredible. Over the course of these 125 pages, you really see Raiders taking shape, and you also see bits and pieces of Temple of Doom and The Last Crusade popping up. They’re just sitting around brainstorming, probably with no inclination that they’re about to create a wildly successful and popular film franchise.
It’s interesting to see everyone’s creative process. George Lucas rambles on, he speaks without commas or periods, he repeats himself, he talks in circles but, occasionally, will miraculously stumble onto something so sharp and brilliant that eventually becomes essential and iconic, (”Oh and by the way, let’s have him be really good with a bullwhip”), that you can almost forgive him for all of his crimes against Star Wars. (Almost.) The transcript is available for download here, and I recommend it for both diehard Indiana Jones fans and casual movie enthusiasts who might be curious about the creative processes of two Hollywood giants. (Also, the download is worth it just to check out the three or four straight pages that Lucas and Spielberg dedicate to figuring out how to make the audience hate a monkey spy. “The monkey should be dressed up as a little Arab.” “And there’s this sleeping cat that this monkey knocks in the face.” Spielberg garbles “something about the monkey going ‘Heil Hitler.’” I’m not paraphrasing. All of those things actually happened in this meeting.)
As interesting as the transcript is, there are also some pretty strange moments. I’ll say that there’s more subtle racism than I think I was expecting. There’s nothing really too overt, but enough that it shows that Spielberg and Lucas have a lack of both respect and understanding for other cultures. They start out small, with bits that might not technically be racist. Like, on page 10, Lucas considers a scene with a lot of non-Americans in a foreign country running around, and he’s worried about how expensive the project will be. He quickly puts his fears to rest, however…
From page 10.
Seven thousand dollars? That sounds kind of rough but, hey, maybe I just don’t know how things work in New Dehli, or maybe the dollar is worth a whole lot more over there. Maybe seven thousand dollars, to be spread evenly among eight thousand extras and 15 cars is completely reasonable. Still, let’s take a look a little bit farther down the page where Lucas and Spielberg talk about casting the locals:
I don’t even know what ethnic stereotype Spielberg is referencing when he suggests that certain races routinely jump off cliffs, or if maybe he’s just confusing Mexicans with lemmings, but I do know that someone, maybe even everyone, should be offended.
It’s even more interesting to watch them brainstorm about a villain for Indiana. They know they want a non-white villain, they know the villain needs to be sleazy, and they know they don’t personally care about ideas that are potentially racially insensitive. They season the entire conversation with the word “Orientals” pretty liberally, they talk about how Chinese (”or whatever”) villains are good choices because “you can never tell what they’re thinking,” Lucas refers to a Chinese warlord as “General Fu Man Chu,” and they write off having a Middle Eastern villain because Spielberg “Can’t think of many Arabs who are actors.” Still, this particularly damning bit might be my favorite:
From page 20.
“Italians are too crazy?” What does that even mean? I can’t tell if Lucas thinks Italian characters are too crazy or Italian actors are. Like, is he worried that the audience won’t believe an Italian dude would be interested in something banal, like the Ark of the Covenant? Or is he’s suggesting that Italian actors are, by nature too crazy to be captured on film? Does Lucas think Italian people are so clouded by their own madness that they wouldn’t be able act? Too crazy to travel all over the world looking for the Ark of the Covenant? Too crazy to fight Indiana Jones in the fictional universe you’re creating? What the hell rules are you operating under, Lucas?
Potential racism aside, the transcript is also interesting because we get to see what George Lucas is like when he’s speaking extemporaneously. On page 16, for example, he’s just riffing, but take a look at the dialogue Lucas conjures up for the character who I think would eventually become Marcus Brody:
From page 16.
Sure, Lucas is just sort of going off the top of his head here, but, if you look at some of the clumsy, thoughtless lines that actually make it in to a lot of Lucas’s scripts, you’ll notice that there’s not that much of an improvement. There are lines that are worse than the line above that made it into the final draft of the Star Wars films. We learn, I suppose, that when George Lucas makes dialogue up in the spur of the moment, it’s just as shitty as when he actually sits down to really write it. Which is remarkable.
Actual line from the movie.
From page 31.
Yes. There was almost a scene in Raiders of the Lost Ark where Indiana Jones took a bunch of life preservers, curled up into a ball, and leapt out of plane. Thankfully, Lucas and company had the good sense to really look at that scene and objectively say “Hey, this is pretty retarded.” This happens a few times, in fact. In addition to the sphere of life-preservers, there’s a bumbling child sidekick character and a toboggan ride down a snowy mountain (???), all of which Lucas and Spielberg recognized as shitty. By leaving these cheesy, lame moments out, they saved Raiders. (Though, by Temple of Doom, Lucas will exorcise some of his Bad Ideas Demons by creating Short Round, a character who is both aggressively Asian and a bumbling child sidekick, which for him must have been a total twofer. If Short Round was sassy and CGI, he would be the perfect storm of shitty Lucas ideas.)
Oh, also of noteworthy importance is how weird Spielberg is. Check out page 32, where he’s talking about a chase scene through a village:
From page 32.
It’s just sort of interesting to me to see what exactly Steven Spielberg thinks is important in a brainstorming session. In five days, they never decide a name for Marion Ravenwood, they don’t quite settle on too many geographic locations and they still don’t know exactly what Indiana’s last name should be, but if there’s one thing Steven Spielberg can concretely say, it’s that Indiana Jones should knock a llama over. “Guys, I don’t give a shit about what else happens in this movie, but if the credits roll and there’s so much as one fucking llama standing I swear to God I am going to lose it.”
Still, despite all this, just about every cool scene that ended up in Raiders starts as a seed and takes root in these spontaneous conversations. The snake pit, the face-melting finale, the giant boulder- they all just suddenly came to the creative forces in unpredictable flashes of genius. That’s cool.
Hey, you know what’s even stranger than the fact that these early spit-balling sessions made it to the intern? The fact that Lucas and Spielberg continued these kinds of spit-balling sessions later on in their careers. In fact, when they decided they were going to bring back Indiana for a fourth installment, they got together with screenwriter David Koepp, though only for, like, a half an hour this time, and it was at an Arby’s, not someone’s house. They bounced ideas around, recorded their conversations and wrote out those conversations, same as before.
Wanna know what’s even MORE remarkable? Well, instead of making these transcripts available for download, they just emailed them directly to me. Weird, right? Pretty unbelievable, I know.
Anyway, here are some excerpts from the Lucas, Spielberg, David Koepp spit-balling session for Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull.
The first thing you’ll notice is that the racism is still very much a part of their creative process.
From page 22.
You should also note that there’s less of a focus on tying up loose ends. In the original transcript, every plot point was analyzed from several different angles until they settled on something they liked. Here, they’re just sort of tossed around.
From page 10.
From page 113.
And, of course, their hearts just aren’t quite in it as much anymore, and it’s a little depressing to look at the evolution here. If you look at the old transcript, it’s clear that they had ideas, (the shittiness of which admirably rivaled the shittiness of Crystal Skull), the difference being that they had the good sense to cut those ideas back in the eighties. If something as awful as fridge-nuking had come up in the spit-ball session for Raiders, it never would’ve made it to the screen, (where “never” can also mean “until Temple of Doom“). The old Lucas and Spielberg could look at a scene where Jones forms a ball of life preservers and wisely cut it, but the new Lucas and Spielberg can see a scene where a greasy teenager swings through the jungle with a bunch of CGI monkeys and all they can say is “More monkeys.” Something was lost along the way, folks. Something profound.
From page 90.
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November 6th, 2009 at 8:36 pm
Well, despite what Steve over here thinks, I thought the article was fucking hilarious! The mental image you painted of George Lucas leaning back, playing with himself and spacing out about monkeys cracked me up. I wonder why people without a sense of humor read the articles on this site? Anyway, nice article.
November 2nd, 2009 at 6:00 am
Let me get this straight…you posted this article to point out all of Lucas’ bad ideas & Spielberg’s supposed racism? You really have nothing much to say, do you?
Reading a transcript of audio recordings doesn’t give you the entire feel of a conversation. Ppl are mistaken all the time on forums because someone takes something they’ve said the wrong way. I didn’t see anything blatantly derogatory with the lines you quoted here. They’re all talking in normal conversational language, not politically correct terms that the media says we all should use.
What a wasted article this is and, as David says, “shame on this article.” Small minds discuss ppl, average minds discuss events & great minds discuss ideas. Lucas, Spielberg & Kasdan recorded 45 hours of brainstorming activity. How long did it take you to write this article?
In your own words: “They’re just sitting around brainstorming, probably with no inclination that they’re about to create a wildly successful and popular film franchise.” Then you criticize Lucas for all of his “bad ideas” & your imagined truth of Spielberg’s racist persona. Brainstorming produces a lot of bad ideas, it’s inevitable. It needs to, so that it can get to better, more matured ideas. They’re not afraid to say something that sounds dumb, in order to reach a solid idea.
September 3rd, 2009 at 2:37 am
Admittedly, I didn’t read the entire article, the first few paragraphs gave me the gist. The first lesson of brainstorming is that no idea is a bad idea. Brainstorming is not the time to go around worrying about steeping on someone’s sensitivities. As for brainstorming, if you can’t stand the heat, get out of the kitchen. Brainstorming is one of the greatest tools mankind has for generating great ideas, as evidenced by this great movie franchise. Uninhibited free-association and tapping into subconscious fears and desires are paramount to the art of brainstorming. Definitely not the place to be choosing your words carefully….garbled short sentences, rambling monologues, indeed.
Shame on this article. If you’re gonna play the racism card, make sure it really counts for something.
July 1st, 2009 at 10:07 pm
Gustaf, I know you’re trying to be funny but I’m pretty sure Steven Spielberg (the guy who made Schindler’s List?) wouldn’t have anything derogatory to say about Jews. Lucas, I’m not so sure.
June 17th, 2009 at 11:02 am
Oh yeah, Thomas. Cause saying Mexicans are “third world sleazes” and absently commenting how New Delhi actors will work for 60 cents a day is just acceptable, mild discrimination.
May 27th, 2009 at 4:37 pm
This is one of the most hilarious, yet insightful articles I have read in awhile! Thanks for making myself and several severely stoned friends laugh hysterically into the night, as well as start our own intoxicated brain storming sessions… When your book hits the presses, I will pick it up in a second!!! Keep it up!
May 5th, 2009 at 10:40 am
It’s a crime that people who liberally use the words “racist” and “racism” have absolutely no idea just what the words mean.
April 30th, 2009 at 9:53 pm
Spielberg: And maybe next to the calcalus-doing rice-eating Chinaman in the car, you could have a Jew counting money and drinking baby blood.
April 17th, 2009 at 6:11 am
Holy shit. That was the funniest article that has ever graced my living eyeballs.
April 4th, 2009 at 4:35 am
@gurubrandon, I wondered when someone else would finally remember those things used to be lead-lined. Believe it or not, that’s actually Spielberg’s idea; it was from the original Back to the Future film (Marty would have to be in the fridge to survive a nuclear test withe enough power to send him back. The original script was very, very different).
March 30th, 2009 at 11:07 am
@Daniel O’Brian
I for one am not partial to being a nit-picker when it comes to spelling. However, you still can’t make a half ass attempt to be a cracked columnist, and then spell the name wrong of the person you’re trying to pose as!
March 30th, 2009 at 10:48 am
@The-Retarded-Seraph
Get over yourself
March 28th, 2009 at 1:45 am
Man… I know I’m way into the minority with this, but Temple of Doom was my favorite, annoyances and all. Granted, I was a kid at the time, but I loved Short Round. Arguing with Indy in Chinese over stupid shit, Priceless.
That, with the fucked up food, heart ripping, and the loud blond chick that gave me a funny feeling in my junk, left a more lasting impression that I or III (although they are extremely good, of course)
Still have not seen IV yet, even though I’ve heard a lot about it (mostly negative). Despite some of it’s flaws, I think I’m going to enjoy it.
March 27th, 2009 at 10:00 am
@katkcheshire
Let’s see you get beat up by a llama and get over it.
That ranks as one of the top three ass whuppings I got in my life.
March 27th, 2009 at 12:03 am
G - He has a pistol, and he’s probably
very good at that, but at the same time he happens to be
very good with a bull whip. It’s really more of a hobby
than anything else. Maybe he came from Montana, someplace,
and he… There are freaks who love bull whips. They just
do it all the time. It’s a device that hasn’t been used
in a long time.
S — You can knock somebody’ s belt off and the guys pants
fall down.
(page 4)
March 24th, 2009 at 8:18 pm
DOB this is great. This is so. Great. I love it when you write like this.
More more moremore like this please.
March 24th, 2009 at 3:27 pm
@glendoor
You really have to get over those llamas, man.
@DOB
“Right, like they do” was the best line for me. I don’t know why. You’re amazing. Have my babies.
March 23rd, 2009 at 6:25 pm
Temple of Doom is a beautiful exploration of absurdity with some great action scenes. While not my favorite Indiana Jones movie, I do love it dearly.
March 23rd, 2009 at 1:06 pm
“Guys, I don’t give a shit about what else happens in this movie, but if the credits roll and there’s so much as one fucking llama standing I swear to God I am going to lose it.”
That was the funniest thing ever. I laughed my way through this article and almost didn’t make it… Oh… The NEW transcript that you received from Lucas and Spielberg is amazing and really makes me appreciate the 4th film in the series.
Oh man… Nukin’ the Fridge? That is the greatest thing I’ve heard today.
March 23rd, 2009 at 10:27 am
And then Rock Tree says to Doris Dog, “I’m a very rich film producer and I need a lobotomy.”
“YES MR. LUCAS. YOU ARE INDEED BRILLIANT.”
March 22nd, 2009 at 11:38 pm
Say what you will, I really enjoyed The Phantom Menace. And not in an ironic way or anything. Its got a race, some wise masters and– sorry, what was that? The worst child-actor in the history of cinema? Oh. I just try to ignore him.
March 22nd, 2009 at 9:40 pm
You know, in some cultures “knocking over the llama” is slang for sex. Just throwin’ that out there.
March 22nd, 2009 at 7:29 pm
Andr1231: It did. Check out the Trade Federation in Episode I, and Lao Che in Temple of Doom.
March 22nd, 2009 at 7:22 pm
To be fair about the Italian comment, Have you ever seen Nic Cage act? He’s Italian. Would you want that in Raiders?
March 22nd, 2009 at 6:52 pm
The fridge thing was lifted from Matthew Rileys novel “Temple” written almost a decade ago.
I thought it was a stupid idea then but I suppose he could have hidden in a llama.
March 22nd, 2009 at 6:47 pm
I was reading through the transcript. Lucas really is fixed on Chinese people as idiots or villians. It pops up invariably whenever they start talking about minions or Indy’s evil counterpart. Its kinda crazy, I’m surprised none of it came through in Star Wars, or in Raiders itself. Obviously he tried hard enough.
March 22nd, 2009 at 6:06 pm
[...] instead of choosing any other ep. They guy with the beard. You know who else has a beard? George Lucas. Yes, he did Phantom Menace/Episode I. We’ve come full circle. But without being too [...]
March 22nd, 2009 at 12:38 am
approach an ornery llama and it will spit on you. their spitballs are huge, and will knock you on your ass. worst of all, it actually burns. your eyes will sting like a bitch, and your face will be raw and red. llamas hate wolves with a burning passion, and wolves are terrified of llamas.
March 21st, 2009 at 8:17 pm
The shit I mean.
March 21st, 2009 at 7:23 pm
@CodyCastor ”
There’s some people who live about a mile from my parents who, for some reason, own some llamas. I’m gonna go there tonight and knock those fuckers over.”
I’m telling you be careful because those things will kick and bite the shot out of you. Trust me, I know.
March 21st, 2009 at 6:56 pm
I like reading through the comments and seeing people yell at guy who has my name… I feel famous even if everyone’s pissed.
Good story, by the way because of relatives I will say that Yes Italians are crazy people. My great grandma was just rolling on top of a magazine one day for no reason.
March 21st, 2009 at 4:58 pm
There’s some people who live about a mile from my parents who, for some reason, own some llamas. I’m gonna go there tonight and knock those fuckers over.
March 21st, 2009 at 3:42 pm
it’s not that chinamen are bad drivers, asian people (including indians) in general are terrible drivers. Terrible. They drive Camrys and do 50kph in an 80 zone. But, as usual, i digress: George has lost it.
March 21st, 2009 at 10:47 am
Funny funny stuff, Daniel.
Have you ever WORKED with Italians? Lucas is on the nose, man. Fuckin nuts.
March 21st, 2009 at 10:39 am
You would expect more racial sensitivity from a Jewish American that directed Schindler’s List. Indiana Jones really is a guilty pleasure because you can picture Archie Bunker watching the entire series going “Edith, you goddamn dingbat, get in here! Ya gotta see this shit! It’s so…American.”
March 21st, 2009 at 10:08 am
I don’t see anything wrong with that level of racism.
Saying “Chinamen are bad drivers.” is not nearly the same thing as saying “Chinamen are bad drivers. Lets kill them all.”
Also, they really are bad drivers.
Besides, anyone that is stridently and perfectly non-racist is boring and annoying.
(I know that that part was fake, but the other “racism” was so minor it doesn’t even bear mentioning)
Overall, amusing article.
March 21st, 2009 at 10:00 am
I couldn’t get to the original piece, DOB’s link didn’t take me anywhere. Anyone have the url? Also, this was awesome. Way to make all the random shit in my head seem like good ideas, now back to my screen play “Llama Tipping: The Dan O’Brien Story”
March 21st, 2009 at 9:30 am
@ z0ltan-the-prick
Well, 50 rupees could get you to a place a few kilometers away (in an auto rickshaw)… so I guess it goes farther than you think…
Yeah, I exaggerated, but there’s no reason to be an ass about it…
And while I recognize that internet posturing is about as useless as it gets… I can’t let that stand… so… there is no doubt that I am much smarter than you.
That is all.
March 21st, 2009 at 8:14 am
It’s spelled “kudos” Colin, and no, I will not grow up. Grown-ups don’t know how to have fun so I’m going to Neverland to live with Peter Pan and Micheal Jackson. We’ll have sleep-overs and and play with each other. I’ll never have to be a grumpy old man like a lot of the commentators.
And I’m the coolest because I use not only quotation marks, but also correct punctuation and capitalization. My grammar is exceptional as I avoid run-on sentences and abbreviations.
Oh yeah, I also failed English class. I wonder why, seeing as how proficient my writing is. Not only that, but I can correctly use big words, which explains why I use so few. My teacher must have not liked me. She was mean anyway.
What was I talking about? Oh yeah, I was being a random grammar-Nazi and making references to Guest_Name at the same time. I capitalized “Nazi” not because I like Nazis, but because the word is a proper noun so don’t give me any lip about it.
Also, boobs. Boobs and monkeys knocking over llamas so take that.
March 21st, 2009 at 8:10 am
Personally, I prefer “orientals” to “asians”. Asia is a big place, and “oriental” is a bit more precise.
March 21st, 2009 at 8:01 am
@The-Retarded-Seraph
50 bucks would go far? You got yourself a lobotomy or something? Yeah, it sure would cover a cup of coffee at least!
About the article, that hawk-nosed moronic Jew-trash and that impotent fat Lucas bitch (WTF has a name made up of two first names anyway?) are total wank-jobs. Pay them no attention dear subnormal-IQed Americans.
Peace!
March 21st, 2009 at 7:49 am
Find more fun on ___T a l l l o v i n g . c o m .
March 21st, 2009 at 7:42 am
I’m pretty sure “oriental” wasn’t considered offensive at the time the brainstorming session would’ve taken place.
March 21st, 2009 at 7:16 am
OMG I laughed my butt off until I realized this dialogue sounds more like two pre-adolescents than film-makers. Too bad their mommies couldn’t have been there to whack them up side o’ the head and tell them it SUCKED before it was memorialized on film. And Spielberg had the cojones to blame Lucas for a bad film (see commentaries on the DVD-yes I watched it-with Riff Trax, of course).
March 21st, 2009 at 7:08 am
Mr. O’Brien seemed to be just pointing out the “potential racism”… He didn’t sound particularly incensed… I think he left it mainly up to the reader if they wanted to be offended… I’m glad he wrote about it… Being of Indian descent, I wasn’t particularly bothered by anything in that section but I sure did find it amusing…
And Mr. O’Brien, the current exchange rate puts $1 USD as being equivalent to about 50 Indian rupees… so while Lucas would still not be paying very much for those services, that money would nonetheless go pretty far for the Indians…
@ Fiddlesticks: Get over yourself. The prequels were terrible. Despite having generally interesting plots, the films were trash, which hurts even more since there was so much potential.
March 21st, 2009 at 6:29 am
THAT”S what I was hoping for… Maybe you’re right, they should remake Mola Ram as a white wall street mogul in the Gordon Gecko mold, so those of you with such delicate sensibilities don’t have to feel guilty for hating a minority villain. Last time I checked this was a comedy website, not the fucking Village Voice. Just how high is that horse Jesse? At least you appreciate penis jokes. As previously stated, I thought it was mostly a very good article.
March 21st, 2009 at 6:12 am
disappointed, there werent just a few off color comments…. the scripts were full of them, you are possibly the biggest moron i have ever commented after and flamed in the last 10 minutes.
great job DOB jack the giant smeller should be proud of the work you have done on this one, although…. i miss the penis jokes
March 21st, 2009 at 5:10 am
[...] I saw this article in Cracked. Quick sample: It’s just sort of interesting to me to see what exactly Steven Spielberg thinks [...]
March 21st, 2009 at 4:52 am
Honestly, the last place I thought I’d find politically correct soapbox sermonizing was Cracked. So they made a few “racially insensitive” comments. Big deal. Just because someone makes an off color comment about another ethnic group does does mean he is full of hate. Otherwise, great article.
March 21st, 2009 at 12:44 am
“He idly plays with the zipper of his pants, slightly mesmerized by the sound.”
You are a lovely man, Dan Whatsyourname.
March 20th, 2009 at 11:28 pm
hahahaha brilliant article.
the originial transcipts are really awesome too. thanks!
I had no idea about them
March 20th, 2009 at 11:22 pm
@ru1dt- Damn, thanks man. Well, that shut me up.
March 20th, 2009 at 11:10 pm
[...] the minds of George Lucas and Stephen Spielberg as they brainstorm ideas that eventually became the movie: ‘Raiders of the Lost [...]
March 20th, 2009 at 10:35 pm
Oh awesome.
Still, I really hope the bit in Crystal Skull where Shia looks up at Indy and goes, ‘You’re a teacher?” and the lightning flashes and he hefts his whip and goes ‘Part time’ I really hope that came out of one of these sessions. So cool.
March 20th, 2009 at 10:19 pm
It’s just sort of interesting to me to see what exactly Steven Spielberg thinks is important in a brainstorming session. In five days, they never decide a name for Marion Ravenwood, they don’t quite settle on too many geographic locations and they still don’t know exactly what Indiana’s last name should be, but if there’s one thing Steven Spielberg can concretely say, it’s that Indiana Jones should knock a llama over. “Guys, I don’t give a shit about what else happens in this movie, but if the credits roll and there’s so much as one fucking llama standing I swear to God I am going to lose it.”
Hahahaha!
March 20th, 2009 at 9:58 pm
Someone should knock over a few llamas WILL be the new “I’m Rick James, bitch.” You heard it here first.
March 20th, 2009 at 9:09 pm
Daniel,
It’s Tarzan the Ape Man (1932)
Here’s the trailer, featuring a quick glimpse of cliff falling goodness:
http://www.tcm.com/tcmdb/title.jsp?stid=13192&contentTypeId=130&category=trailer
March 20th, 2009 at 7:14 pm
knock over a few llamas ? WHAT im sorry of all that it made me laugh!
March 20th, 2009 at 7:11 pm
[...] I only found this through the use of Digg, which linked my to this site. The author points of some extremely odd, but histerical bits from the transcript; kind of easy [...]
March 20th, 2009 at 6:43 pm
Hey, if DOB puts it in his blog, it has to be true. You don’t question him, it could get messy if you do.
March 20th, 2009 at 6:41 pm
“Fiddlesticks,” shut the fuck up.
March 20th, 2009 at 6:26 pm
Do people seriously think the second part is real?
March 20th, 2009 at 6:23 pm
@Harley, Yes I know Bugsy Malone( with a post TaxiDriver Jodie Foster no less) I saw it several times in the theater, it’s probably my second favorite movie musical after Popeye.
Hey Colin “fuck off”
March 20th, 2009 at 6:20 pm
how could you fail to mention that they also wanted to imply that Indy had sex with Marion when she was 15?
March 20th, 2009 at 6:08 pm
@Colin
So by your logic it isn’t racist to be racist towards a racist…
March 20th, 2009 at 6:07 pm
I giggled at Guest_Name
Good Work.
P.S I use Quotes too. im cool like Colin
March 20th, 2009 at 6:04 pm
@Joe:
Clearly you are lying, no Indians are named Joe.
March 20th, 2009 at 5:48 pm
guest_name - cruel… but necessary. very very necessary.
March 20th, 2009 at 5:38 pm
Hey, look everyone! It’s Colin! He’s so insightful and intelligent. He uses quotation marks and everything. You really got straight to the heart of the matter, didn’t you Colin? On behalf of all the Cracked readers: thanks for contributing to the comments section. Really, Colin. I mean that, with all my heart. Oh, and that last part? “Grow up.” Oh my god, that was the best line I’ve ever seen anyone type on the internet. Is that from something, or did you just come up with that all by yourself, Colin? I have a new goal in life, and it is to be as awesome as Colin.
March 20th, 2009 at 5:38 pm
Hey Colin, how about you grow up and gain a sense of humor?
And what the hell does how apparently racist ‘chinamen’ may or may not be have to do with anything? The Chinese didn’t write this article did they?
March 20th, 2009 at 5:36 pm
Haha awesome.
The CGI monkey part was insane.
*mumbles* the fridge was quite cool though..It takes the piss out of itself.
March 20th, 2009 at 5:13 pm
This story is terrible. “Potential racism”… is that what you’ve succumbed too? Does this guarantee you readership and “cuedos”? This is a normal conversation between individuals and you belittle it by blindly moaning about “potential racism”?
Chinamen, yes that’s what I said and mean, are the most racist people out there, towards white, brown, Japanese, south-east asian etc. etc. You, everyone, has to stop being so PC and analyse the points of the matter, without faking annoyance or insults that were never meant by the subjects.
Grow up.
March 20th, 2009 at 4:25 pm
Of course, nobody can write about anything Lucas has done without pissing all over the prequels, which I am further convinced hardly anybody actually understands.
Poor form.
March 20th, 2009 at 4:06 pm
The Indiana Jones Brainstorms: The Insane True Story…
A few decades ago, Steven Spielberg and George Lucas 45 hours of conversations where they discussed plot ideas for a story about an archaeologist/adventurer who was handy with a bullwhip. The conversations were recorded, transcripts were made. Today, w…
March 20th, 2009 at 4:05 pm
Lucas sounds so smashed in the last session.
March 20th, 2009 at 4:00 pm
I’ve only recently discovered your writings, Mr. O’Brien… but already you have replaced Mr. Swaim as my favorite columnist…
Keep up the spectacular work, good sir!
March 20th, 2009 at 3:36 pm
But.. But… The fridge was lead lined…
March 20th, 2009 at 3:27 pm
You almost got me there… until the last quote…
I mean, American audience likes only _that_ much of a stereotype, but — oh man — playing with his zipper? Who would believe that? I mean, everybody who can read this article _does_ have a neocortex.
March 20th, 2009 at 3:26 pm
I can just see Indiana Jones running through a village, hesitating, going slightly out of his way, and effortlessly pushing over a llama with a slight grunt. Then he’d keep running like nothing happened. This looks hilarious in my head.
March 20th, 2009 at 3:18 pm
Spielberg and Lucas are most definitely racist. I’m Indian, and I watched Temple of Doom when I was ten, and it really offended me. It also gave me nightmares. Even now whenever someone mentions that movie to me I get the urge to find and strangle Lucas and Spielberg.
March 20th, 2009 at 3:14 pm
I know about that movie because it’s awesome haha. I wouldn’t be a movie fanatic if I couldn’t catch quips like that :P. Plus, I love gangster movies and comedy movies. Put them together and you get a masterpiece. The trifecta? Gangster movies, comedy movies, and musicals, what do you get? Bugsy Malone. Look it up if you don’t know it. Scott Baio, always good for a laugh.
March 20th, 2009 at 3:12 pm
@ru1dt- For real? That’s totally interesting. I don’t doubt the possibility, because the entire conference is littered with references to other movies. It’s definitely likely that Spielberg and Lucas are so close that Spielberg can make a reference like that without mentioning Tarzan by name and Lucas would know what he’s talking about. I wasn’t familiar with the movie, and you can understand how bizarre that comment looks without having the Tarzan scene as context.
Thanks for the tip! I’d change it, but I still think it’s funnier to pretend that Steven Spielberg thinks Mexicans are lemmings.
March 20th, 2009 at 3:08 pm
You’re judging a conversation held almost 30 years ago up to the PC standards of today? I found some newspapers from the late 1970’s in my house while I was renovating, and they are FULL of racist editorials, comments, and articles. People are just as racist today, but you don’t hear the racist comments as much because everyone feels they have to be politically correct.
Besides, when Lucas and Spielberg make certain comments that are racist and/or stereotypical (Arab with the pencil thin mustache), they are often referring to the classic racist villans from the 1930 serials that they grew up on; they wanted the movie to follow all the formulas used in those shows.
March 20th, 2009 at 3:01 pm
DOB, how does one follow the shit out of you? Some kind of tracer laxative or a shrunken starship a la fantastic voyage and/or Magic School Bus? I am all about one, but not the other… My choice may surprise you.
March 20th, 2009 at 3:01 pm
where = were
March 20th, 2009 at 3:00 pm
“they carry boxes over their heads. They fall off cliffs.”
That’s a reference to the old Tarzan movie in which the African natives where helping the English carry their luggage (boxes) up the side of a mountain. When the gorillas starting throwing rocks down, they fell off the cliff.
March 20th, 2009 at 2:51 pm
@Gracie- I really appreciate that you hold me to such a high grammatical standard. Off to fix it now.
March 20th, 2009 at 2:23 pm
I didn’t expect to see such a glaring grammatical error in a DOB article…how has nobody corrected it by now?
March 20th, 2009 at 2:09 pm
Awesome. It’s been awhile since I’ve laughed out loud that much.
March 20th, 2009 at 2:09 pm
dude that llama thing would be hilarious. i mean a llama, falling over, jesus christ.
March 20th, 2009 at 2:06 pm
Johnny Dangerously it was and how does a 22 year old know about that movie? But I was really kicked by a llama once and bitten too for that matter.
I was drunk and picked a fight. I lost.
March 20th, 2009 at 1:57 pm
Spielberg is clearly mistaken about the comic value of llamas.
I just don’t think he was familiar with the term, “alpaca”.
March 20th, 2009 at 1:50 pm
Short Round was a God DOB! A God, you blasphemer!
March 20th, 2009 at 1:44 pm
@glendoor42: Nice Johnny Dangerously reference…or was that just something you put out there?
March 20th, 2009 at 1:21 pm
that was suprisingly good. Entertaining and funny although hardly topical
March 20th, 2009 at 12:57 pm
Rofl. I love you, DOB.
March 20th, 2009 at 12:43 pm
Funny shit. I still think Twitter is gay but hey whatever gets you through the (lonely) night.
March 20th, 2009 at 12:38 pm
Fantastic article. Also liked the shopping of your good self into the Indianna picture.
Llamas falling over… creative minds at work, eh?
March 20th, 2009 at 12:26 pm
Ugh, why can’t you write your own material instead of relying on some email you got. How do you know the email is even real, it’s probably spam. hAahahaha
March 20th, 2009 at 12:24 pm
I never understood why “Chinaman” has ever been considered offensive. I mean…..Englishman? Dutchman? Frenchman? I’ve never heard of anyone going up in arms over those terms, so why Chinaman? It makes no sense to me. But on another note, I’m going to have to find the movie with that “I with I could just wish away my feelings…” That’s gotta be a goldmine of meaningful dialogue. Great article, sir.
March 20th, 2009 at 12:14 pm
The zipper part is great.
March 20th, 2009 at 12:14 pm
Or in it, for that matter.
March 20th, 2009 at 12:12 pm
There, there hearts. You can’t always be in the right place.
March 20th, 2009 at 12:01 pm
I was almost crying with laughter by the end. The part about the zipper almost made me fall out of my chair, lol.
March 20th, 2009 at 11:54 am
Hahahaha. Beautifully done. Excellent closing line.
March 20th, 2009 at 11:52 am
WOW!
March 20th, 2009 at 11:48 am
Llamas are fucking evil,I got kicked by a llama once, ONCE!!!!
March 20th, 2009 at 11:19 am
im going on a llama tipping mission.
March 20th, 2009 at 11:16 am
I’m Arab so I probably should be offended by what those fuckers said, but it’s just too damn hilarious actually imagining them saying those words.
March 20th, 2009 at 11:05 am
No, is this real?
March 20th, 2009 at 10:56 am
@Ganondorf
hey!
March 20th, 2009 at 10:55 am
I can’t wait for the next Indy Jones movie when Shia LeBoeuf (sp?) fights the alligator men.
March 20th, 2009 at 10:51 am
this article made me laugh more than any other cracked article ever, genuinely, i’m not exaggerating, and i’d always been kind of a Swaim guy, but now i see i was wrong
do it Dan, fucking endzone
March 20th, 2009 at 10:51 am
This isn’t a real DOB article. With all the genuis that Dan puts into his writing, I don’t believe he would EVER use “there” when he should’ve used “their”. I bet Brockway wrote this article and just posted it as DOB…
March 20th, 2009 at 10:48 am
In The Temple of Doom, Indy actually jumped out of a plane with his bumbling child sidekick (and love interest) and an inflatable raft and tobogganed down a mountain, eventually skipping into a river.
March 20th, 2009 at 10:39 am
I don’t know about anyone else, but I thought the llama thing was funny.
March 20th, 2009 at 10:06 am
@ Cletus: that is fucking creepy.
March 20th, 2009 at 9:46 am
I love you, DOB.
March 20th, 2009 at 9:46 am
Thanks for the link to the transcript!
March 20th, 2009 at 9:43 am
THIS IS FUCKING AWSOME!! did some one copyright “Me love you long time”…lol thats great, those bastards are going to hell not cause they’re racist…. its because they ruined star wars.
March 20th, 2009 at 9:28 am
Yuk, I just stepped in twit…
Ooh and it’s Dan’s twit.
And yes, as you can tell from the humor, I liked Crystal Skull. Fridge and all.
March 20th, 2009 at 9:21 am
The creepiest part of the transcript…
G — We have to get them cemented into a very strong relationship.
A bond.
L — I like it if they already had a relationship at one
point. Because then you don’t have to build it.
G — I was thinking that this old guy could have been his
mentor. He could have known this little girl when she
was just a kid. Had an affair with her when she was eleven.
L — And he was forty-two. .
G — He hasn’t seen her in twelve years. Now she’s twentytwo.
It’s a real strange relationship.
S — She had better be older than twenty-two.
G — He’s thirty-five, and he knew her ten years ago when
he was twenty-five and she was only twelve.
G — It would be amusing to make her slightly young at the
time.
S — And promiscuous. She came onto him.
G — Fifteen is right-on the edge. I know it’s an outrageous
idea, but it is interesting. Once she’s sixteen or seventeen
it’s not interesting anymore. But if she was fifteen and
I he was twenty-five and they actually had an affair the last
time they met. And she was madly in love with him and
he…
S — She has pictures of him. .
G — There would be a picture on the mantle of her, her
father, and him. She was madly in love with him at the time
and he left her because obviously it wouldn’t work out.
Now she’s twenty-five and’she’s been living in Nepal’ since
she was eighteen. It’s not only that they like each other,
it’s a very bizarre thing, it puts a whole new perspective
on this whole thing. It gives you lots of stuff to play
off of between them. Maybe she still likes him. It’s
something he’d rather forget about and not have come up again.
This gives her a lot of ammunition to fight with.
S — In a way, she could.say, “You’ve made me this hard.”
G ‘— This is a resource that you can either mine or not.
It’s not as blatant as we’re talking about. You don’t think
about it that much. You don’t immediately realize how
old she was at the time. It would be subtle. She could
talk about it. “I was jail bait the last time we were
together.” She can flaunt it at him, but at the same
time she never says, “I was fifteen years-old.”‘ Even If
we don’t mention it, when we go to cast the part we’re going
to end up with a woman who’s about twenty-three and a hero
who’s about thirty-five.
March 20th, 2009 at 9:10 am
Great article, as always. Hilarious insights… Scanning through pieces of the sessions you posted, sounds to me like SOMEBODY, not naming names, must have been pretty damn wired on some fine stimulants!
March 20th, 2009 at 8:52 am
Fuckin Llamas.
March 20th, 2009 at 8:50 am
I was saddened/enraged by Kingdom of the Crystal Skull. I had pined over it until the release day when I saw it. Oh, and your Twitter is awesome DOB. It’s a safer way to stalk you. I got scared the second night I followed you around….so much blood and topless women O.o
March 20th, 2009 at 8:41 am
I’ve always thought the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull could use more llama knockings. And I’m following the shit out of you on twitter.
March 20th, 2009 at 8:37 am
For people who, unlike Teaphit, appreciate subtlety:
http://www.facebook.com/pages/Daniel-OBrien/45034426016?ref=ts
March 20th, 2009 at 8:15 am
You know what? Screw it. I’ll just go ahead and say what everyone’s thinking right now.
Friday is the best day of the week.
March 20th, 2009 at 8:06 am
Another brilliant, alcohol fuelled piece. Rock on, DOB!
March 20th, 2009 at 7:55 am
Bastard. I had finally gotten that horrific pile of retarded shit out of my head, and now you’ve crammed it right back in there.
Now I’m going to go hide in my refrigerator in case of a nuclear attack. I hope there’s beer left in it.
March 20th, 2009 at 7:44 am
If I could have one traumatizing memory removed from my brain… it would be that of watching Kingdom of the Crystal Skull…
March 20th, 2009 at 7:20 am
Nice article Dan Dan. Nice Twitter page too.
March 20th, 2009 at 7:00 am
Ok…
Well, I guess not everything DOB does is pure gold. Had to write a stinker eventually.
March 20th, 2009 at 6:42 am
Confession : I laughed the hardest at the twitter image at the bottom.
March 20th, 2009 at 6:41 am
funny shit. nice one
March 20th, 2009 at 6:31 am
This was an excellent article. Good work.
March 20th, 2009 at 6:25 am
How could you miss the part where they talk about how Indiana Jones’ relationship with Marion should’ve happened when she was 11? Because the pedophilia would’ve made a great character trait for your hero. It’s a wonder George Lucas hasn’t been arrested for his batshit crazy yet.
March 20th, 2009 at 6:22 am
too good to be true
March 20th, 2009 at 6:22 am
I read this article at a library computer. I laughed out loud when I read about the llamas.
March 20th, 2009 at 6:07 am
I can’t believe how hilarious this was. And reading their actual transcript was awesome.
March 20th, 2009 at 5:51 am
Very well written article….the last movie was a total rape of indy…especially love the faked ones about it
March 20th, 2009 at 5:45 am
Pure**
March 20th, 2009 at 5:45 am
Fucking hilarious mate.
Per brilliance
March 20th, 2009 at 5:39 am
That’s probably not even far from the truth…love it!!
March 20th, 2009 at 5:20 am
That’s funny. Lol.
March 20th, 2009 at 5:14 am
Although I think Spielberg and Lucas should both drown in a pool of dicks, I also think that it would have been hard for them to come up with the good ideas for the original Raiders if they’d felt like they needed to sensor themselves.
Nice ending, DOB. You saved it.
March 20th, 2009 at 5:07 am
The perils of cocaine use are exemplified by these sessions.
March 20th, 2009 at 5:02 am
Also, Cate Blanchett’s jumpsuit.
March 20th, 2009 at 5:00 am
Is this even real?
March 20th, 2009 at 4:59 am
This was excellent. Lucas and Spielberg sound satisfyingly brilliant and disappointingly wankerish. I’m seeing Princess Leia in John Cheese’s Star Wars and thinking that maybe that’s how the script originally went.
I loved the Crystal Skull, though. There were moments I could have done without (the fridge; the monkeys) but it’s one of the most FUN films I’ve seen.
March 20th, 2009 at 4:56 am
If you don’t knock over a llama I will be angry…
Ah…
An amazing article, one of my favorites… ever.
March 20th, 2009 at 4:28 am
Wow, you’ve got their writing style down.
March 20th, 2009 at 4:25 am
Llamas should be knocked over in every movie, ever.
March 20th, 2009 at 4:23 am
Like a barnacle sitting in a tight place
Laughing like a monkey arm
Pulling like a china boy
March 20th, 2009 at 4:18 am
Poor David Koepp.
March 20th, 2009 at 4:15 am
Honestly, it’s quite hard to see where the real transcript ends and the fake one begins. Such is the idiosyncrasy that permeates the Indiana Jones series you could throw /any/ random idea that looks swoopish and awesome in the mind and it’d probably somehow find its way into a movie of similar vein; congratulations, you’re a director. Great humour though, simply observational yet musingly entertaining.
March 20th, 2009 at 4:02 am
Calm a llama down, calm a llama down, deep down in the ocean blue