Craig and John spend the entire episode discussing and dissecting Raiders of the Lost Ark, looking at both its structure and scene work.
This amazing and iconic 1981 film established so much of what we expect of out movie heroes and set pieces — but a lot of what it does would have a hard time getting through modern studio development. Five-minute exposition scenes! Nazi monkeys! Helpless heroes at the climax!
And yet it works so well. There are great lessons to be learned for screenwriters in every genre.
This episode originally aired on January 22, 2013.
Links:
* [Tickets](https://go.wgfoundation.org/campaigns/8810-the-scriptnotes-holiday-live-show) are on sale for the Holiday Live Show!
* The [Scriptnotes Listeners’ Guide](http://johnaugust.com/guide)
* Raiders of the Lost Ark on [Wikipedia](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Raiders_of_the_Lost_Ark), on [IMDb](http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0082971/?ref_=sr_1), [iTunes](https://itunes.apple.com/us/movie-collection/indiana-jones-complete-adventures/id561542568) and [Amazon](http://www.amazon.com/dp/B0014Z4OMU/?tag=johnaugustcom-20)
* George Lucas, Steven Spielberg and Larry Kasdan’s [Raiders story conference transcripts](http://moedred.livejournal.com/2009/03/04/)
* [“Apple for teacher? Why’d he do that?”](http://raven.theraider.net/showthread.php?t=6083) thread on theraider.net (via [@sethgs](https://twitter.com/sethgs/status/292779295905021952))
* T-shirts are available [here](https://cottonbureau.com/people/john-august-1)! We’ve got new designs, including [Colored Revisions](https://cottonbureau.com/products/colored-revisions), [Karateka](https://cottonbureau.com/products/karateka), and [Highland2](https://cottonbureau.com/products/highland2).
* [John August](https://twitter.com/johnaugust) on Twitter
* [Craig Mazin](https://twitter.com/clmazin) on Twitter
* [John on Instagram](https://www.instagram.com/johnaugust/?hl=en)
* [Find past episodes](http://scriptnotes.net/)
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* [Outro](http://johnaugust.com/2013/scriptnotes-the-outros) this week is [A British Tar](http://www.guntheranderson.com/v/data/britisht.htm) from the HMS Pinafore by Gilbert and Sullivan, performed by John Rhys-Davies ([send us yours!](http://johnaugust.com/2014/outros-needed))
Email us at ask@johnaugust.com
You can download the episode [here](http://traffic.libsyn.com/scriptnotes/scriptnotes_ep_73_rerun.mp3).
**UPDATE** 1-25-13: The transcript of this episode can be found [here](http://johnaugust.com/2013/scriptnotes-ep-73-raiders-of-the-lost-ark-transcript).