Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom (1984)

Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom is an American action-adventure horror film that grossed $333.1 million over a budget of $28.2 million, becoming the highest-grossing film of 1984.  It is a prequel to Indiana Jones and the Raiders of the Lost Ark (1981) and is the 2nd (chronologically 1st) film in the Indiana Jones franchise.  In Australia, it was originally rated PG, but in 2000 it was upgraded to M for medium level violence, and in 2008 again changed to M for moderate violence, which remains its current rating.  The following are the 10 most recent reviews for the film on IMDb.

 

6/10

Interesting, but horrific

jmmustchin14 January 2019

Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom is the second (chronologically first) Indiana Jones movie, following Raiders of the Lost Ark (which I loved). It’s set a year before Raiders, in 1935.

But first, some historical background for the movie. The Thuggee – often called the Thugs (where we get our word Thug) were a religious criminal cult that operated in India between the mid-1300s to the mid-1800s. They were quite vicious. Many – probably most – Thugs were Hindus, who targeted caravans (pretending to be travelers to gain the other travelers’ trust), killing travelers as a human sacrifice to their goddess Kali. They strangled the person, and afterwards mildly mutilated part of the body. They usually robbed the persons they killed. They often recruited the children of their victims, with the presence of children dampening other travelers’ suspicions. A very large minority of Thugs were Muslims who killed – in pretty much the same way – purely for the riches. All were superstitious, however, and believed themselves the offspring of Kali. The British began to learn of the problem in the early 1800s, and began to take action against them. They largely suppressed the Thugs in the 1830s, and they disappeared completely (as far as anyone knows, anyway) in the 1870s.

OK, now that that’s out of the way, what about the movie?

Temple of Doom focuses on the evil Thugs, in particular on the area of uncertainty when any cult dies out: do they secretly exist underground?

In the movie, Indiana Jones, Willie Scott and Short Round just escape from Hong Kong after falling afoul of a crime lord. However, the plane they hopped in is owned by the crook! The pilots sabotage the plane and bail out. After failing to stabilise the plane, Indy, Willie and Shortie are forced to bail out over India – just before the plane crashes and explodes.

After an unrealistic (but funny) ride down a mountain on an inflatable rubber dinghy (yes, they bailed out of the plane in that), they come across a village where all the children are missing, and the people are practically starving. They are informed that an evil cult operating unsuccessfully tried to convert them, before burning their crops, stealing their sacred Sankara Stone (which allegedly has supernatural properties), and kidnapping their children. One of the missing children – severely malnourished – returns that night, and reveals he escaped from Pankot Palace. The next day, Indy, Willie and Shortie set off for Pankot.

Indy learns that Pankot Palace was once, a hundred years beforehand, the base for a Thuggee cult. A British army officer is there, investigating reports of a revived Thuggee cult operating out of the palace. Pankot’s Maharajah and Prime Minister, Chattar Lal, give them hospitality but, partly to scare them off, serve them with disgusting food that Indians don’t normally eat. Lal in particular acts slightly suspiciously – especially when Indy confronts him at dinner about the palace’s history, and the evidence for the Thugs operating out of there.

That night, after Willie and Indy (who had been developing romantic feelings for each other) have an argument, a Thuggee assassin attempts to kill Indy, but Indy and Shortie kill him. Indy then goes to Willie’s room searching for an assassin there, but doesn’t find one. Instead, he finds a secret booby-trapped passageway (crawling thickly with insects – really upsetting Willie) leading to an underground Thuggee temple.

Now, up to this point the movie was really fun to watch. It was quite good. To this day, I would give the first half of the movie a 9 or 10. But from the moment they entered the temple, things changed. It became much darker and more horrific. This is when they introduce the historical Thuggee cult in action.

Indy and Willie stumble across the temple just in time for a human sacrifice. Not the strangling one that the real Thugs did (which would have been uncomfortable to watch), but ripping the heart out (a nod to the mild mutilating the Thugs did) and lowering the poor victim into a lava pit – somehow still alive. It’s a very horrible scene to watch. It’s shown in as much detail as possible – even reaching into the chest.

From then, it just deteriorates into horror. After the ceremony, Indy tries to take one of the three Sankara stones place in front of the giant (and horribly ugly) idol of Kali. He then discovers that the Thugs are using the kidnapped children as slaves in a mine in horrible conditions (a nod to the historical recruiting of their victims). The trio are captured. After being whipped (along with Shortie), the Thuggee high priest forces Indy to drink blood or something from from a ROTTING SKULL. This again is really uncomfortable to watch. Especially as the drink puts Indy into a trance and makes him an evil slave.

Shortie is made a slave in the mine, while Willie is selected as the next sacrifice. It was at this point that we turned the TV off.

This movie has a really interesting premise – probably more historically based than the other movies in the series. There is certainly a greater threat to the world. As the high priest explained, they are mining for the two remaining Sankara Stones (in addition to mining diamonds and jewels to fund their operation). Once they have all 5, their full power will be unleashed, and they will take over the world for Kali. In his words, “The British in India will be slaughtered. Then we will overrun the Muslims and force their “Allah” to bow to Kali. And then the Hebrew God will fall and finally the Christian God will be cast down and forgotten.” I always found that part interesting.

But in the end, the movie (the middle part, anyway) is just too horrific to watch (unless you’ve got a very strong stomach). I don’t know that I’d recommend it (unless you’ve got a good constitution).

8/10

Why was this one dark?

cashvaz14 January 2019

Spielberg made this movie darker than all the other Indy films due to splitting with his wife at the time. Spielberg was unhappy and wanted to take out his anger on this film and do a “rub-my-pain-in-your-face” kind of thing. He sort of put his character in Indy in this film to show his wife that he was hurt, tortured and even turned evil temporarily because of her. But fortunately, he found his new wife during the making of the movie, who turned out to be the actress who portrayed Willie Scott!

HOPE THIS BACKGROUND MADE IT EASIER TO UNDERSTAND THIS FILM AND WHAT SPEILBERG WAS GOING THROUGH. It’s like music artists that express their feelings at times in their music or their lyrics.

9/10

A fun start

SlyGuy216 January 2019

Warning: Spoilers

While the story is simple, the movie does a great job of combining comedy with action. In fact, the action overshadows most of the problems the movie has. I’m not going to compare this to the other films, because this is supposed to be the first one, and I think it’s a good start. I like the characters, although the villain is just kind of there. If anything, the biggest problem I had was the story surrounding the stones, but that’s because I’m not familiar with Hindu mythology or religion. Aside from that, the action scenes are great, and I thought it was funny for the most part. If this is where the series starts, I’m interested to see where it goes next.

10/10

Underrated

joeylikeswolves31 December 2018

I was shocked to see this film doesn’t even crack the 8/10 range on the site, as since I was a kid this has been my favorite of the series. The darker tone is handled well as some scenes have silly humor, while others have hearts being ripped out, but neither ever feel out of place. Short Round is a delight, but Willey is really my only complain in the whole film. I understand why some people may be turn off by this one, my mom has never made it past the infamous heart ripping out scene, but personally I love all of it. (Besides Willey, she can be a little to silly at times)

8/10

A darker adventure for Indy but still a thrill ride.

davidandrewvantonder28 December 2018

An indication of the personal termoil that Spielberg and Lucas were experiencing at the time, this is a darker, more ominous installment in the franchise although still a rip roaring adventure despite some of the political incorrectness that often dates older films. Not as charming as the original but a solid action adventure movie which stands on its own.

7/10

A Wilda review: (Certified good) Not as great as ‘Raiders of the Lost Ark’, but still a good movie.

junshiwilda15 December 2018

I thoroughly enjoyed the Temple of Doom. It has everything a good Indiana Jones movie have; the signature fast tempo storytelling, thrilling chases, fun characters with great chemistry. It has some of the most memorable moments from the franchise, especially the human sacrifice scenes where the leader of the Satanist cult rip off people’s heart. It was oddly hilarious with the so called believers dancing aggressively in the background. I badly contemplated if this movie deserves a 7 or a 8 out of 10, but the reason why it lost 1 star was simply because it lacked the archeology and adventure fun the first and third movie. I felt like this movie was just focusing on being dark, which is why to me this movie didn’t feel like a adventure movie these films are supposed to be like. But overall, this is way better compared to Kingdom of the Crystal Skull. I definitely recommend it unless you can never tolerate human sacrifices.

2/10

Truly awful.

burrahobbit5 December 2018

When I was a kid I used to watch Raiders of the Lost Ark and The Last Crusade all the time but somehow I never managed to watch Temple of Doom. I figured out pretty quickly why it was never on TV.

8/10

Became My Very First Video Tape Purchase at $19.95 !!!! A bargain back then !!!!

Crazy_Bruce21 November 2018

I rented a lot of Video Tapes from a local Mom and Pop Video Rental Store back in 1986 !!! So when they offered the opportunity to purchase a brand new ,unopened Video Tape of Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom for $19.95 , I bought it !! Back then a new release movie would cost over $100.00 !!!

I loved this movie and it was the first film that me and some friends watched two times in a row !!! We liked it so much the first time that we stuck around for the next showing an hour later !!! Back then they didn’t clear the theater after each screening like they do today !!!

10/10

Short Round: Hey, Dr. Jones, no time for love. We’ve got company.

bombersflyup15 November 2018

Warning: Spoilers

Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom is a treasure of a film and the best of the trilogy.

A terrific cast and some of the greatest moments in cinematic history. How anyone could prefer Raiders over this and not love Kate Capshaw, is hard to fathom. Not a perfect film though, as the ending drags on and the child actors besides Short Round are bad. The rest of the film is a complete hoot though. The moments I initially speak of are; the trade with Lao Che and then getting aboard one of his planes and of course Indy and Willie’s late night rendezvous.

7/10

Is it that Good?

christophershobris10 November 2018

Of all the Steven Spielberg films this is to me by far the weirdest one he’s ever done. But does weird equal good? Well, let’s get this out of the way…their is no logic in this film, so you can just throw that out the window. People thought Crystal Skull was unrealistic (?)…think again. Spielberg lets us know pretty much right out of the gate what kind of movie we’re dealing with here. George Lucas (the storywriter) went in such a humorous direction with the story it almost came across as a comedy. With the more comedic approach this made the film very unique in the feeling of it compared to Raiders of the Lost Ark which was darker and more serious, and The Last Crusade which borrows a lot of the elements from Raiders to give it a similar tone and feel to it. Indiana Jones himself is written in a more comedic way, almost to the point where you can’t take him seriously, but not quite, Harrison Ford makes the characters balanced and doesn’t make Indy come across as cartoony. As for the supporting characters…oh my god. These supporting characters make me want to pull my hair out. Willie played by Kate Capshaw is such a major step down from Marion. Yes, she was a damsel in distress, but she was a badass while she was. Here, she is over-the-top just for the sake of it. I don’t blame Capshaw because she’s just acting the way the director tells her to so, Spielberg, what the heck? You given us such beautiful characters like E.T. and Elliott. Then you give us this. Why? Then there is Short Round. Look, I understand there is a lot of people who like this character but…I just can’t. His voice is like nails on a chalkboard, the actor who portrays him just isn’t a good actor. He’s definitely more important than Willie and isn’t excruciatingly annoying but he does get under my skin. I know it seems I’m bashing the film more than I intended to. What do I like about this film? The villain. Unlike Willie, he is over-the-top in all the right ways. Roshan Seth does a great job with his character he makes this film enjoyable. The other thing, Harrison Ford’s performance, like I said before, he gives a rather complex performance as Indy compared to Raiders. And lastly, the mine cart chase scene, beautifully choreographed, masterfully suspenseful, and downright entertaining. These three things gives this film a solid 7/10. Nowhere near as bad as Crystal, but comfortably falls in third place behind Raiders and Crusade for me. So is this film really that good? It’s good, but not great.

[What do you think of this film?  Be sure to let me know in the comments!  Also, send me your review for any film, and I’ll post it on this site.]