Sonja Foust, Romance Author

Alex Sokoloff did a really wonderful 3-act structure breakdown of You’ve Got Mail on her blog. I did my own of Return to Me, my favorite romance movie, a few weeks ago. Since I’m writing something in the adventure genre now, I thought it would be useful to do a breakdown of my favorite adventure movie too, which is, of course, Raiders of the Lost Ark.

SPOILER ALERT– I’m pretty much going to spoil the whole movie, so if you haven’t seen Raiders of the Lost Ark, do not read this post. Instead, go immediately to your local Blockbuster or your Netflix queue and get it now, put it in your DVD player now, and watch it now. It’s iconic. You must see it.

Raiders of the Lost Ark

1981
Director: Stephen Spielberg
Writers: George Lucas, Philip Kaufman, Lawrence Kasdan

I have loved Raiders of the Lost Ark and, indeed, the entire original Indiana Jones trilogy, from the very first moment I saw it. Indiana Jones is an iconic figure, if a little less than perfect (which I’ll go into more). The adventures are action-packed and the settings are always just right.

Act I

In the first half of Act I, we have the famous idol sequence. This sequence, which is really just an introduction to the character of Indiana Jones, takes up the first 11 minutes of the movie. The first 11 minutes tells us that Indiana Jones is an adventurous archeologist, who, while smart, doesn’t always get the last laugh. He escapes with his life, but little else, including his dignity– the snake in the front of the plane with him scares him half to death.

The second part of Act I is easy to pick out as there is a dramatic scene change to Indiana Jones’ home town, where he is a professor at a university and friends with a museum curator. This second part of Act I also sets up the quest and the history behind the quest. Additionally, it raises the question of history versus religion–an important question throughout the movie– and whether religion is something more than “hocus pocus.”

Here’s where I get a little fuzzy. Indiana Jones gets on a plane bound for Nepal where he meets his old flame Marion (with fiery results– literally, haha). This sequence starts about 23 minutes in and ends with Marion informing Indiana Jones that she is now his “goddamn partner” at the thirty-minute mark. Originally, I had this at the end of the first quarter of Act II, but I’m reconsidering, and thinking it might just be the end of Act I. True, it’s the start of an adventure (there’s another one of those red lines going across a map scenes to get them to Cairo next), but Indiana Jones already started his adventure when he set off to find the Ravenwoods at 22 minutes in. For argument’s sake, I’ll say it’s the climax of Act I, since it’s at the 30-minute mark.

Act II

Act II was where I mistakenly started trying to make Raiders of the Lost Ark into a romance, when it most certainly is not. Indy consistently chooses archeology over Marion, which never really hit me until I watched it through again (probably for the 1,327th time) today.

Act II finds Indy in Cairo where his friend fills him in on the goings-on at Tanis, where they’re looking for the Ark of the Covenant. We find out that Indy’s arch-enemy, Belloq (who already stole the idol from Indy in the very first sequence), is behind the excavation of Tanis, too.

In one of the best comedic action sequences in film, Indiana and Marion are shopping in Cairo when they are attacked by Egyptian Nazi goons. There is much slapstick, and great zany background musical orchestration throughout the whole thing, but suddenly, there is an explosion and Marion is dead.

This is where I wanted to put the Midpoint. The Midpoint is supposed to be a great loss, kind of a “now it’s personal” to the hero. Indiana is indeed shaken by Marion’s death– he gets drunk and then confronts Belloq– but this would be the Midpoint in a romance, and Raiders of the Lost Ark is not a romace. Instead, I’m going to say it’s the end of the first quarter of Act II, at 42 minutes.

The confrontation between Indiana Jones and Belloq is really interesting, and a great demonstration of my favorite hero/villain dichotomy. Belloq tells Indy, “I am a shadowy reflection of you.” Love that.

If you needed further proof that Marion’s (supposed) death is not the Midpoint, Sallah says it in a line of dialog. Indy tells him Marion is dead, and he says, “Yes, I know. But life goes on.” One line is about all the mourning she gets and they’re off again after the Ark.

I think the actual Midpoint of the whole movie is the discovery of the location of the Well of Souls in the map room at Tanis. They realize that Belloq has been digging in the wrong place, and they have a chance to find the Ark of the Covenant and take it right out from under Belloq’s nose. I would possibly have missed that this is the Midpoint, except there is an entire long scene with swelling musical orchestration and a big glowing special effect when the location is revealed. I’m pretty sure it’s the Midpoint. This happens at about 53 minutes in.

Here’s another way we can tell Raiders of the Lost Ark is not a romance. At 55 minutes in, Indiana discovers that Marion is, in fact, alive and being held prisoner at the Tanis dig. Instead of freeing her, though, he leaves her where she is so that he can have a chance at getting to the Ark. He chooses archeology over Marion, big surprise. Marion is left to her own devices, and she manages to figure out an escape of her own.

The next few scenes cut between Indiana Jones discovering the Ark and Marion orchestrating her escape. I love that they get nearly equal time here. We’re allowed to root for Marion just as much as we’re rooting for Indy. This is probably why Raiders is my favorite of the three in the Indiana Jones trilogy– I love having a heroine to root for, too. It’s that romance thing, again.

The Act II climax finds Indiana and Marion both foiled in their plans. Belloq has taken the Ark back, Marion has failed to escape, and they’ve been thrown into the Well of Souls together, and it happens to be crawling with asps (very dangerous, you go first). All is lost, it’s a big dark moment, the torches are going out.

Act III

Of course Indiana Jones saves the day. He’s Indiana Jones. He does that. They escape from the snake pit and the next 20 minutes is one fight scene after another– a fist fight, explosions, a truck chase, whatever we can punch or blow up, it’s done here. I guess all these actions scenes could probably be lumped in with the Act II climax. We could, instead, start Act III when they get to the ship that will bring them (and the Ark) to England, we hope. This is at 1 hour and 30 minutes in to the movie.

Of course, the relative peace (and the most romantic scene in the entire movie squashed into a lull between action sequences– but it’s not a romance!) is soon interrupted when the Nazis board the ship. Marion is captured this time, but Indy escapes and follows them to an island where we learn that Belloq plans to open the Ark.

Indiana Jones follows them into the desert and manages to get hold of some kind of badass rocket launcher. He points it at the Ark and tells Belloq that he’ll blow up the Ark unless Belloq gives him Marion. “All I want is the girl,” he claims. Now here, at the midpoint of Act III, is your undeniable proof that this is not a romance and that Indiana Jones is not a guy you really want to depend on: Belloq calls his bluff and tells him to go ahead and blow up the Ark, but Indiana Jones can’t do it, even for Marion. Archeology wins over love again. Again!

Act III finishes up with the usual battle scene, only it’s between the Nazis and God, which is kind of awesome. Faces melt, heads explode, Nazis die.

Once back in the United States, though, Indiana Jones can’t get his hands back on the Ark. It’s been taken away to be studied by “top men,” and he can’t get at it. He walks down the steps of the Congress building (?) feeling as if he has lost. Faithful Marion, though, is there as his consolation prize. Ugh. I get the distinct feeling that Indiana Jones would sell Marion into slavery if it meant he could get his hands back on that Ark, but he can’t, and it’s wheeled off into storage, lost forever in rows and rows of crates all the same size and shape.

It’s not a romance. Did you get that part? I feel like that’s kind of a revelation for me. I always sort of thought of it as a romance, maybe because that’s the part of it that always caught my attention, more than the explosions and melting faces and stuff. But, if you’re writing a romance, you can’t structure it like this, with the romantic elements taking place in the down time between the actual scene climaxes. The romance has to BE the climax (yeah, hur hur, laugh it up). I’m not trying to bash Raiders of the Lost Ark at all! It’s a great movie for what it is, which is not a romance.

What do you think? Am I being too hard on old Indy? Could he have really loved Marion more than archeology? Tell me in the comments.

Related posts:

1. Act Climaxes Breakdown: Return to Me
2. Top 10 Best Villains