When Steven Speilberg’s ultra-slick pulp film “Raiders of the Lost Ark” was released in 1981, it was a massive success.
Spielberg, following the template laid out by George Lucas a few years earlier on “Star Wars,” made an old-world 1930s adventure serial with modern filmmaking techniques and storytelling tropes, transforming the simple, low-budget glories of the past into the marvels of the present.
In many ways, “Raiders of the Lost Ark” is a better sequel to “Star Wars” than “The Empire Strikes Back.” I can imagine a world wherein “Star Wars,” rather than direct sequels, spawned an anthology series wherein each chapter was a modern filmmaker doing their take on the pulp adventures of the past.But that’s not the way Hollywood works, as sequels are a more natural outcropping of a single success.
As such, just as “Raiders” was raking in fistfuls of money, Lucas, the film’s producer and story writer,…
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