Director: Steven Spielberg
I was amazed to learn that I'd never actually seen this movie. Whole sections of it were a complete mystery. I'd seen films 2 and 3 more times than I can count, given the frequency of their running on cable, but somehow this one eluded me. It's an excellent film; I think 3 is stronger, but this one is certainly a very close #2.
The film succeeds because it does not load itself up with exposition and explanations - one of the most basic film rules is that if a director creates a world engrossing enough, the audience will accept it largely without question; we want to believe, that's what we come to the movies to do. So questions like, 'If the Ark has such power, why did it ever fall into Egyptian hands in the first place?' are only asked by nits such as myself.
Having finally seen this, I am even more disposed to mistrust people who hated the 4th installment based on its subject - perhaps we should realize that we all grew up in the meantime. The 4th film fails not because of its subject matter, but because its world is so familiar that we no longer sink into it.
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