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Raiders - starring Harrison Ford, produced by George Lucas - became an instant classic.
October 19, 2005
CHRIS Strompolos was 11 when he first fell in awe of Indiana Jones. It was 1981 and Raiders of the Lost Ark had just been released in cinemas. From the minute he saw the ruggedly handsome, whip and wise-cracking archeologist on the big screen, he wanted to don a fedora and leather jacket and embark on the same adventures: to battle Nazis, travel to Nepal and Cairo, run away from rolling boulders, even be afraid of snakes, just like Indy.
Raiders - starring Harrison Ford, directed by Steven Spielberg and produced by George Lucas - became an instant classic.
Set in 1936, it tells the story of an archeologist turned adventurer who is hired by the US government to search for the Ark of the Covenant, believed to hold the Ten Commandments, which is also being sought by the Nazis.
The film cemented Ford's stardom after his Star Wars role, made more than $US384million worldwide at the box office, and spawned two sequels (The Temple of Doom in 1984 and The Last Crusade in 1989) and a television series, The Young Indiana Jones Chronicles, which ran from 1992 to 1996.
"When I saw the film it just blew me away, I was so overtaken with the character of Indiana Jones," says Strompolos, 35, by phone from his Los Angeles home. "He was a real guy to me, he was accessible, he was an academic ... And he seemed such a well-crafted hero that I wanted nothing more than to inhabit that world, to get into the same sort of trouble - and get out of the same sort of trouble - that he did. And by golly I set out to do that."
Always the show-off in class, the slightly pudgy, dark-haired charmer decided he would re-create Raiders, shot by shot, scene by scene. It was an extraordinary and painstaking process that took Strompolos and his schoolfriends Eric Zala and Jayson Lamb seven years to complete. The project saw them through high school, the angst of puberty, the growth of chest hair and first girlfriends.
It all began on the school bus in small-town Mississippi, when Strompolos showed his Raiders of the Lost Ark comic book to Zala, an older boy, who was also a fan.
During their hour-long bus trips, Strompolos and Zala would discuss the idea of remaking their favourite movie and one day they decided to do something about it. They convened in the basement of Zala's house - a rambling old home built in 1918 - and hatched Raiders of the Lost Ark: The Adaptation. Playing sound effects albums to get into the mood, the pair began adapting the script and drawing up storyboards.
They soon realised there was a lot more to making a film: props, special effects, make-up, and, oh yes, a camera.
They enlisted Lamb, another local kid, who had a penchant for magic tricks, art and hanging around haunted houses. He became the art department. With Strompolos acting the lead role and Zala directing, the film-making team was complete.
In 1981 there were no video stores in Mississippi, the internet didn't exist and home computers were in their infancy. So Strompolos and his crew set out to learn the basics of film-making: "We kind of just started organically," he says.
They worked mainly from memory - Strompolos estimates he saw the film 20 times in the local cinema, where he and Zala would takes notes and secretly record dialogue - using the comic book for reference.
Self-taught and learning by trial and error, the trio did receive some camera training - theirs was a "a chunky, loud, heavy, ridiculously inefficient old Betamax home video camera" - from a camerman at the local TV station where Strompolos's mother worked.
The other boys' mothers also helped: they chauffeured the trio around (for most of the shoot the boys weren't legally able to drive) and Zala's house became the official Raiders: The Adaptation headquarters.
"We transformed the entire home into one sound stage," Strompolos recalls. "Every room had stuff nailed to the walls and the ceilings, and we had rubber snakes, fire, sand, props, mud and just memorabilia everywhere, we really just dominated the house.
"Our mums were great. They were all single mums and supported us as much as they could. I mean, imagine if an 11-year-old approaches you and says: 'Hey Ma, I want to make Raiders of the Lost Ark."'
The boys paid for the film from their combined weekly pocket money and summer job wages: Strompolos estimates the film eventually cost about $US5000 to make. Props were found, essentials requested for Christmas and birthday presents.
Schoolmates and family were cast - Zala's younger brother Kurt eagerly played many of the extra roles - and a girl from Zala's church, Angela Rodriguez, was cast as Jones's love interest Marion Ravenwood. (In true Hollywood style Strompolos fell in love with his co-star and their on-screen kiss was also his first.)
Remarkably, the friendships survived the project. "I think that's one of the amazing variables about this whole saga, that the friendship actually managed to stay intact," Strompolos says.
"There were lots of arguments and lots of frustration, cursing, drama and disaster: it was not an easy process. But summer after summer, we all managed to come back to the same location and keep shooting ... not doing Raiders was not an option."
The film has taken on a life of its own. After it was finished, it lay dormant for a decade, apart from occasional screenings to friends. Then the movie website aintitcool.com got hold of a copy and posted a glowing review. This led to Vanity Fair running a feature last March, which opened the floodgates.
After various stints in the music and video game business, among other things, the men are finally pursuing the careers they dreamed about as schoolchildren. Strompolos and Zala have formed a production company, Rolling Boulder Films (named after one of Raiders' most famous scenes).
Copyright laws mean they cannot profit directly from screening Raiders: The Adaptation, but they show it at film festivals and to schools as an education tool.
Last year, they were invited to screen the film at Lucas's Skywalker Ranch to many of the LucasFilm employees who worked on the original. Then, a month ago, Spielberg invited them to his office to see the outtakes and gag-reels of the original Raiders and chatted to them about movie-making.
When Strompolos recalls meeting Spielberg, he sounds like the wide-eyed child in awe of Indiana Jones 24 years ago.
"Oh my god," he sighs. "It was just one of those things that you check off your life list of things to do. He was an amazing man, a very kind, very warm, very amicable man. And he gave us probably the greatest compliment that anyone could give. He said: 'Well boys, I watched your movie, and I watched it again, and I just wanted to let you know that it inspired even me.' I was like: 'Well, I could now die a happy man."'
The story of the project is being made into its own movie, written by comic book author turned screenwriter Daniel Clowes (Ghost World) and produced by Scott Rudin (The Truman Show, The Royal Tenenbaums).
Strompolos laughs at the bizarre turn of events. "The levels of circular reference here are just hysterical," he says. "But ours is a very unconventional story. People are constantly striving to figure out how to get their foot into Hollywood and I've worked my ass off in Los Angeles for many years ... [Yet it is what] I did when I was 11 years old that's opened the door to my career."
Source: The Australian News
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