Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #3495 in DVD
• Released on: 2008-05-12
• Rating: Parental Guidance
• Format: PAL
• Number of discs: 1
• Running time: 113 minutes

DVD Description

The second of the George Lucas/Steven Spielberg Indiana Jones epics is set a year or so before the events in Raiders of the Lost Ark (1984). After a brief brouhaha involving a precious vial and a wild ride down a raging Himalyan river, Indy (Harrison Ford) gets down to the problem at hand: retrieving a precious gem and several kidnapped young boys on behalf of a remote East Indian village. His companions this time around include a dim-bulbed, easily frightened nightclub chanteuse (Kate Capshaw), and a feisty 12-year-old kid named Short Round (Quan Ke Huy). Throughout, the plot takes second place to the thrills, which include a harrowing rollercoaster ride in an abandoned mineshaft and Indy's rescue of the heroine from a ritual sacrifice. There are also a couple of cute references to Raiders of the Lost Ark, notably a funny variation of Indy's shooting of the Sherpa warrior.

Customer Reviews

Paramount Pictures...
...must be having a laugh! The runtime on the actual case of this release lists this film at 114 minutes, the 2003 case lists it at 112 minutes. Closer inspection of the films themselves by placing the discs in the player show they run for EXACTLY the same amount of time. If you are looking for the uncut version of this film, DO NOT be fooled by the listed run time of this DVD. It does NOT clock in at 118 mins.
This film was originally attacked by the BBFC waaaaaay back in 1984 and trimmed by 66 secs for excessive violence.
As it is now 24 years down the line one would assume this film would get a 12 certificate. After all, that's why the Motion Picture Association of America created the PG-13 rating in the wake of Temple, as barely got it's PG cert over there. In the US, the film is uncut and STILL rated PG. Whatever has happened we consumers have been left high and dry again!
It appears either Paramount have made a mistake, or are trying to pull a fast one and get completists like myself to purchase this film in GOOD faith based on the extended run time. I for one am very disappointed and intend to take this as far as I can to get some answers from Paramount Home Entertainment UK Ltd.

That said, despite the missing bits, it's still a massively enjoyable romp. Not the best of the three, but still quality entertainment and perfect for watching while having a few beers with the lads.

The lesser Indy film, but still exciting and entertaining
Indiana Jones takes on an evil god-worshipping cult who are enslaving children in their determination to find some long-lost sacred jewels. It has to be said that this is a rollercoaster ride, has all the action and suspence Indiana Jones films are famous for. There are some genuinely memorable and quite terrifying moments, and everything looks very authentic. That said, the storyline is nowhere near as interesting as Raiders or Last Crusade, and the female love interest in this film comes across as stuck-up and irritating. Still, this is a great film anyway.

Short on the humanistic inspiration
In this film, as compared to the previous one, we progress backward from 1936 to 1935. We move across the universe from Egypt to China and India. The team is reinforced with a nice little but strong Chinese boy. The film is absolutely packed with suspense and action, and yet the film is also packed with all kinds of interesting questions though it does not provide us with all the answers, far from it. At the beginning we have the Chinese mafia of this time but the film forgets to explain that this Chinese mafia is the result of the Opium war or wars, of the control of China by the English and other western countries, and that this mafia will be quite happy with the Japanese some years later. This quite one-sided vision seems to support the idea that in China the mafia controls everything, the police, the bars, drugs and opium, the government, you name it you have it. Then in India that poor Indiana discovers and dismantles a terroristic and fascist small potentate that imposes an extreme vision of Hinduism based on human sacrifice (God knows Spielberg makes us shiver in front of this horror), the legend of five miraculous stones that would give the Indians their power back against the English, the colonizing power, and these believers have to exploit children in mines in the worst possible way and with the most unimaginable violence (God knows Spielberg insists on the inhumanity of this crime against civilization). But this seems to imply that this Hinduism is producing that kind of sectarian and dictatorial vision and action. These people must be barbarians and that is purely racist somewhere (it is true Bush will come later with his war on terror that is implying the same thing about another religion), whereas the enlightened Americans are bringing freedom (God it is so true in Iraq and Afghanistan). These people eat insects, spiders and the fresh brain of monkeys, snakes and all kinds of nice juicy animals of that type. But the worst part is the role and function of the English in all that. Their representative is sharing these beautiful banquets with the local maharaja who is a child. Then they come nearly at the end to save the day that is mostly saved anyway, and they don't even use their guns because they use Indian soldiers to do the shooting. What's more these English-loving Indian soldiers have blue turbans, whereas the barbaric slave owners and exploiters have mainly red uniforms and turbans. These red and blue are not gratuitous. But no answer again and we cannot say that the worst violence and the worst massacres in India were done by turbaned Hindu extremists but rather by the very British colonizers. This film purports for the people who don't know history, which means the majority of the audience, that the evil of this world is not the colonizing western powers but extremist Hindus and Chinese Mafiosi. That is at least an extreme lie and an unacceptable disguise, not for truth that does not exist on such subjects, but for the slightest possible objectivity. Entertaining cannot mean conveying racist and western-centered prejudices. I am sure that Spielberg can do better and has done better than that.

Dr Jacques COULARDEAU, University Paris 1 Pantheon Sorbonne, University Paris 12 Créteil, CEGID