DOCUMENTING A 35-YEAR-OLD LOVE STORY
Raiders! documentary takes a look at superfans’ tribute movie to Spielberg’s classic 1981 blockbuster
Steven Spielberg was asked at the Cannes Film Festival last month why he keeps making films with happy outcomes, when the world seems ever more torn by acts of violence and terror.
“All of us have to believe in magic,” he answered. “The worst the world gets, the more magic we have to believe in.”
We saw the worst of the world this past weekend, when a homicidal homophobe shot up an Orlando nightclub, killing 49 people and injuring 53. But there’s also still reason to heed Spielberg’s belief in magic.
There’s certainly been a large measure of that in the delightfully zigzagging connection between his 1981 blockbuster adventure Raiders of the
Lost Ark and two other films that salute its can-do spirit.
The first is Raiders of the Lost Ark: The Adaptation, a shot-for-shot remake by Mississippi fans Chris Strompolos and Eric Zala, who spent seven summers of their grade-school youth in the 1980s working on remaking their favourite movie, using pals and actors and tech crew (including junior F/X guru Jayson Lamb) makeshift props and costumes and homevideo cameras. Existing mainly on analogue tape (a digital version is in the works), it’s a rarely screened enterprise viewed mainly at festivals, including Toronto’s TIFF Kids (formerly Sprockets).
The other is Raiders! The Story of the Greatest Fan Film Ever Made, a documentary about the youthful Raiders clone, filmed by Texan Jeremy Coon and Floridian Tim Skousen, who previously teamed for the Slamdance audience winner The Sasquatch Gang.
The Raiders! doc shows the mid-life reunion of Strompolos, who produced and played Indiana Jones in
Raiders: The Adaptation, and Zala, who directed and played evil Indy rival Belloq, as they struggle to finish the one high-explosives scene they couldn’t film as kids. (The Raiders! doc begins a Toronto theatrical run Friday at Cineplex’s Varsity and Yonge-Dundas complexes.)
It’s a strange and meta experience talking about all three films — Raiders, Raiders: The Adaptation and Raiders! — with the Adaptation’s Strompo- los and the doc’s Coon, who I got together on the line from a Los Angeles promo stop.
The only thing that would have made it weirder would be if we’d somehow managed to get Spielberg in on the conversation, which would have been a true feat of magic (he’s apparently OK with both tribute film and the doc, as is George Lucas, his Raiders producer and story writer).
Steven Spielberg says we all have to believe in magic, in a world gone violently wrong. Seems to me you both created your own magic with your respective projects.
Strompolos: All of this represents a lot of positive energy. It represents a DIY mindset, a time where kids were forced to be resourceful, away from their computers. We were outside, in a vacuum and working together.
There are a lot of positive messages in it. I think Jeremy and Tim told a positive story, but they also incorporated darker components into the narrative of their doc that makes it universal and human and exposes complexity and dysfunction. All those things that make it a richer tale.
Coon: I think every movie is a minor miracle if it gets to theatres, no matter how good or bad it is. It’s luck or magic, however you want to look at it. But all said, it’s a driving force behind this for me, a story that makes me happy. It makes me feel positive, inspires you to really go beyond what you think you’re capable of doing. I hope it can inspire a younger generation to do the same and not put limits on what they can accomplish.
Chris, you mention the darker components of the Raiders! doc, which has a lot of detail about how multiple family and professional breakups affected the kids and later adults making Raiders: The Adaptation and how drug abuse hurt you personally. Did you have any qualms about showing the unhappy parts of this story?
S: No. That was a pact that Eric and I made with each other: “Let’s be honest, warts and all, let’s put it all forth. Let’s be true and do it right.” Over the years we’d been approached by different documentary filmmakers, and it really wasn’t the right match. I think when I met Jeremy, it felt instinctually like a proper positive collaboration and that Jeremy would not only live up to up his word and carry it over the finish line, but he also understood the story. When you’re the subject of a documentary, you want to feel comfortable in sharing those darker elements about yourself. It has a lot to do with what you think the intentions of the filmmakers are going to be, and Jeremy and Tim have a lot of integrity, and handled those components very, very well.
Chris, the doc makes note of how you and Eric were estranged from each other for about 10 years, having ended your friendship due to a dispute over a girl. Are you guys really pals again, or just partners in business terms?
S: Absolutely! The way I’ve described it is that Raiders has always sort of been a bit of a way to positively recalibrate myself. I certainly have had my times when I’ve fallen, but Raiders is always something that really holds my feet to the fire and forced me to be positive. And also working on
Raiders and making movies and working with Eric, I feel in contact with myself and that I’m doing what I love and what I’m good at. It forces me to be better than I am.
One of the best moments of the Raiders! doc is finding out Spielberg’s reaction to the kid remake. Has he put any limitations on how all of you guys approach his original film?
S: He didn’t give me any limitations, although he certainly didn’t give us carte blanche to do whatever we want. It was really in meeting with him that we came into a respectful place and validated our story and validated what we did. He engaged with us for a wonderful one-hour period of time. He knows who he is, he knows what he’s done and, for us to be acknowledged by a childhood hero and for him to look us in the eyes and say, “Your film inspired even me,” it doesn’t get much cooler than that.
C: I got to talk to Spielberg a couple of months ago, for two or three minutes. When I told him about this film (the doc), he was like, “How are Chris and Eric doing? How’s Jayson?” He’s just that nice of a guy. He just really wanted to know what we’ve been up to and what they’re doing. He’s a super, super nice guy and he’s got that kind of personal connection.