Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom

Orientalism is sadly a huge part of American culture. From books to movies, Orientalism is deeply embedded in nearly everything that has to do with the Middle Eastern part of the world and Asia. A few instances that I can think of include movies such as The Great Wall starring Matt Damon as a white hero in Asia, Lone Survivor which portrays the Middle East as run down and poor, and The Dictator which is a comedy film in which the main character is a man of Middle Eastern decent and is born with a full beard. All of these films contain heavy instances of Orientalism. The specific film that will be focused on in this blog is Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom starring Harrison Ford and directed by Steven Spielberg, two of the biggest names in our film culture.

From the beginning of the film, there is a savage/barbaric portrayal of non-whites in the movie. For instance, in the first scene Indiana Jones is at a night club and encounters a group of Chinese men. Eventually, the Chinese men pull out guns on Indiana and he has to save the white woman, Willie, from harm. Indiana somehow eliminates all of his opponents, even though there was clearly an uneven ration of "gangsters" to him. Although, this is not entirely the point. Steven Spielberg labeled these Chinese men as savages by instantly having a scene of violence. Despite this, the fact that Indiana killed every single one of these men and he left the scene without a scratch creates a mindset that white men are better and more heroic than other men of different races.

Not only does the first scene of the movie depict Orientalism, but the entire plot does. Indiana Jones's plane crashes in a small, poverty stricken town called Pankot in British India. When Indiana arrives, the villagers of the town all tell him that their children are going missing and are no where to be found. So of course, the heroic white man attempts to find the children. He visits a beautiful Indian palace and while there he notices an underground area where the children are being treated as slaves. Also while in the underground area, he finds a human sacrificial venue where people against their will are being sacrificed to the gods. Undoubtedly, this is one of the most random and racist plots that many people have watched but have not thought for one second that the film is completely wrong to make. For starters, crashing in a poor Indian town and then traveling to a beautiful ruler's palace exhibits the false class status in India. It creates a mindset in viewers that people in India either have it all, or have nothing. Secondly, the use of child slaves and human sacrifice adds an entirely new layer of Orientalism. Hollywood made it seem as though Indian culture is barbaric in the ways that they treat their children. To add on, the human sacrifice for the gods creates a thought process to viewers that India is ancient in their ways and are still lagging far behind America. The first time I watched this film was when I was twelve years old. To a young audience, this film only creates false concepts about other cultures, influencing a person's outlook on places other than America.