5. Indiana Jones - 1984
I've began at the end with the beginning. Picture this: It's Christmas Eve, and a little boy is so excited he's weed the bed. In fact he's so excited, he moved to another bed and weed this one too. Let me just give you some context, I had seen this film on TV a week before, it had a guy in a hat and he punched people with big moustaches and the theme music made my adolescent junk pulse with excitement....it was just wow. I then followed around my parents for that week exclaiming I wanted this film in my life so badly, I promised I'd be good and would stop throwing my sisters toys out of the window at traffic. The gods of film heard my pleas because lo and behold, on Christmas morning there was a gift like none other....my quivering hands excitedly ripped the wrapping off to discover a holy triumvirate of videos. What lay in my hands that morning changed my life irrevocably, it was the Indiana Jones VHS box set. I jumped up and down with such glee that I passed a certain potent gust, it appears not even my backside could contain its excitement. It was one of the most sublime moments of my life and it changed the course of my destiny. It is fair to say Indiana Jones changed everything. Before that on a day to day basis I would work shifts on being an astronaut, a cowboy or a 'very bad boy'. Upon watching, no, experiencing Indiana Jones I knew what I wanted to do. Archaeology. I'd already fallen in love with the past (see Robin Hood for full details) but now I had found a way I could actually 'do' the past. Every single ounce of imagination I had would be spent dressed in my Dads huge leather jacket and one of my mums old hats, climbing trees and destroying the fascist destruction of the past.....with my own destruction of the past. Shouting at people walking their dog past my house with the immortal: 'It belongs in a museum!!' would both and entertain and terrify in equal measure. He's a superhero in a tweed cape. The films are extraordinary in that they focus on the rough and tumble of good old fashioned cinema. You could actually imagine being Indiana Jones for real. Whereas now with The Avengers generation or Bales' Batman, being Thor is a tad out of reach unless you wear an old curtain and bleach your hair, or Batman if you growl at people with a balaclava on. Each one of these will probably get you arrested. This love of archaeology and the spirit of adventure carried me all the way through my adolescence and teenage years. I went on to study archaeology at university, but sadly it doesn't involve punching people and getting chased by naked tribes folk. It is more focalised on paperwork and woolly jumpers. Yet I love every dirt stained moment of it. And it's all thanks to Indiana Jones. But not the fourth one, for the love of all things holy not the fourth one. That made my teeth hurt in rage. His whip is also another story that cannot be repeated here. So there you go. Some of the choices even surprised me, but I beseech you to actually try this too, you may be surprised. Movies are magical, ephemeral and ludicrous but above all, they remind us that we aren't all perfect, but we sure can try to be.