In the 1981 film Raiders of the Lost Ark, who are the eponymous "raiders" referenced in the title?
Are they the archaeologists (Indiana Jones and René Belloq) who are searching for the Ark?
Are they the Nazis who are trying to acquire the Ark to use it as a weapon?
Or are they the U.S. Government who commission Indy to find the Ark, and at the end of the film end up in possession of it for subsequent study and investigation ("raiding its secrets")?
Has the filmmakers' intent behind the title ever been documented or confirmed?
not a definite answer, but might make you think
1982 re-release trailer transcript:
Indiana Jones… is back
pursued by Belloq
befriended by Sallah
threatened by Toht
and loved by Marion
some of them are heroes
some of them are enemies and all of them returning
they are all raiders of the lost ark
it's the greatest adventure film of all time
The original trailer says:
it is desired above all Treasures on Earth by
those who are good and
those who are evil
with shots of all the major characters including Indy.
The 1982 re-release is more explicit though.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grave_robbery
Grave robbery, tomb robbing, or tomb raiding is the act of uncovering a grave, tomb or crypt to steal commodities; the term looting is also used. It is usually perpetrated to take and profit from valuable artefacts or personal property.
Also, look at:
"RAIDERS OF THE LOST ARK"
Story Conference Transcript
January 23, 1978 thru January 27, 1978
George Lucas, Steven Spielberg, Larry Kasdan
https://maddogmovies.com/almost/scripts/raidersstoryconference1978.pdf
The reason I was doing this "is that his character is
international. He's the guy who's been all around the world. He's a soldier of fortune. He
is also... Well, this gets into that other side of his character, which is totally alien to that
side we just talked about. Essentially, I think he is a, and this was the original character
and it's an interesting juxtaposition. He is an archeologist and an anthropologist. A Ph.D.
He's a doctor, he's a college professor. What happened is, he's also a sort of rough and
tumble guy. But he got involved in going in and getting antiquities. Sort of searching out
antiquities. And it became a very lucrative profession so he, rather than be an
archeologist, he became sort of an outlaw archeologist. He really started being a grave
robber, for hire, is what it really came down to. And the museums would hire him to
steal things out of tombs and stuff. Or, locate them. In the archeology circles he knows
everybody, so he's sort of like a private detective grave robber. A museum will give him
an assignment...
if something was taken from a
tomb, stolen and sort of in the underground, sometimes they may send him out to get it.
Essentially he's a bounty hunter. He's a bounty hunter of antiquities is what it comes
down to. If a museum says that there is this famous vase that we know exists, it was in
this tomb at this time. It may still be there, but we doubt it. We think maybe it's on the
underground market, or in a private collection. We'd like to have it. Actually it belongs to
us. We're the National Museum of Cairo or something. He says okay and he tracks it
down. If it's not in the thing, he finds it, finds out who's got it. And he swipes it back.
A lot of times it's sort of legal. All he has to do is get it. It's not like he steals things from
collectors, and then gives them to other collectors. What he does is steal things from
private collectors who have them illegally, and gives them back to the national museums
and stuff. Or, being that his morality isn't all that good, he will go into the actual grave
and steal it out of the country and give it to the museum. It's a sort of quasi-ethical side
of that whole thing.
So, just to compound the idea that even the hero Indy, along with the bad guys, can be seen as just one of the raiders - they are all (tomb) raiders.. of the lost ark.
