10 Things You Didn’t Know About Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom
The Indiana Jones franchise has always been a victim of its own success. 1981’s Raiders of the Lost Ark was such an unbelievable film that it was going to be hard to follow it up… but given the money it made, there was no way they weren’t going to follow it up, so that put 1984’s Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom in an unenviable spot.
The decision was made to go darker for the sequel (which in actuality was a prequel).While that decision definitely gave the movie a different vibe and didn’t it allow it to fall in the rut many sequels have where they are simply rehashing everything from the original, the critics weren’t as kind this time around with many balking at the not so kid friendly content and that would lead to the birth of the PG-13 rating.
The PG-13 story is one of many that were shared on the Making of Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom bonus feature (included on the DVD and Blu-ray collection releases) and it was that Making of feature that served as the source material for today’s post, as I present 10 Things You Didn’t Know About Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom…
1. The raft scene and the mine cart scene were actually storyboarded for Raiders of the Lost Ark, but there was simply not enough room for them in that movie, so they were put in a drawer and repurposed for Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom.
2. Famously, the character of Indiana Jones was named after George Lucas’ dog. The dog trend continued in Temple of Doom… the Willie Scott character was named after Steven Spielberg’s dog Willie and the husband and wife writing team of Willard Huyck and Gloria Katz had a dog named Short Round.
3. Steven Spielberg originally wanted to bring Karen Allen back as Marion Ravenwood, but the decision was made to take a page out of the James Bond playbook and each move have its own “Indy Girl”. Spielberg auditioned 15 to 20 actresses for the role of Willie Scott, but when he took the tapes over to Harrison Ford’s he only showed him one he felt was the one… Kate Capshaw’s. When Harrison saw the tape, he agreed with Steven and there was no need to look at anyone else.
4. For the opening dance number, Kate Capshaw put in the work… learning “Anything Goes” in Mandarin and learning all the tap dancing choreography. One problem, the dress that was designed for Willie fit like a glove, which did not provide enough range of motion… so there was no tap dancing for Willie Scott.
5. The dress was also part of an insurance claim. The song and dance number was actually the last thing that was shot for the movie, however Willie has the dress with her as she finds herself on the road to Pankot Palace with Indiana Jones and Short Round. In one scene she has it hanging up to dry in the background, while the trio is sitting around a campfire and an elephant actually ate the back of the dress… when this was discovered costume designer Barbara Matera had to be flown to England to do emergency repairs on the dress before the musical number could be filmed.
6. The movie was originally set to be shot in India (where much of the film takes place), however India was very protective of foreign films being shot in their country and had to approve the script before the movie could be made there. After many rewrite requests from the government of India, including them not wanting the term Maharaja used, the decision was made to instead shoot in Sri Lanka.
7. Ke Huy Quan, who played Short Round, originally had no intentions of auditioning and instead was there accompanying his brother who was auditioning. When the casting people saw Ke Huy Quan coaching his brother on what to do, they convinced him to audition and next thing Ke knew he was on his way to Sri Lanka.
8. Harrison Ford’s back went out during the fight scene in his suite at Pankot Palace with one of the thugee henchmen. After several days of trying his best to gut it out, the decision was made to fly Harrison back to Los Angeles where he underwent an experimental surgery that used papaya enzymes… the surgery was a success, but there was still several weeks of recuperation time needed. Instead of shutting down the whole production, Spielberg shot what action scenes he could with Harrison’s stunt double Vic Armstrong.
9. The move to Sri Lanka proved to be serendipitous as there was a huge team of engineers working on the construction of a dam in Kandy, Sri Lanka which was not far from where they were filming. These engineers were tapped to design the suspension bridge that went over the gorge for the movie’s big action finale.
10. Speaking of the suspension bridge scene, it was actually shot on three continents… Sri Lanka where the bridge was actually built… The shots of Indy, Willie, Short Round and Mola Ram climbing up the bridge after it is cut was all done at the Elstree Studios in England… And the shots of the alligators in the water down below in a feeding frenzy were done in Florida.
