Wrap-Up

            After watching several “archaeology movies” it is clear that Hollywood has misrepresented what it means to be an archaeologist and that there are many movies out there that people wrongly think are about archaeology when in actuality they are just action-adventure movies dealing with ancient artifacts. There is so much more to archaeology than this. Archaeology is really about learning about the people who made those artifacts. Some may say that archaeology is just too boring to make for an exciting theatrical film but I think there could be an exciting movie about past humans surrounding an accurate portrayal of an archaeologist. Perhaps, though, if you want to see what it is like to be an archaeologist the best way it to watch a documentary or a kids science show like Bill Nye the Science Guy’s take on archaeology which I would recommend to any young archaeologist. Hopefully you have learned a thing or two about how to discern if a movie is actually about archaeology. Sorry for all those out there hoping they would find a great archaeology movie on this site to watch, your best bet that I came across is a kids movie exploring pseudoarchaeology. Happy Watching!

Disney's Atlantis

           This movie explores the realm of pseudoarchaeology and of the lost continent of Atlantis. In this regard it represents the theories quite well down to several different aspects of who the Atlanteans are and how they got to be on a sunken continent. From a truly archaeological perspective, the film was not really about archaeology. However, it did contain many important aspects of the spirit of archaeology that the previous movies lacked.

            If you want to watch a movie about Atlantis, I recommend this one as it shows many of the theories about the people of the so-called lost continent. As from the very beginning when Plato used Atlantis in his hypothetical rhetoric, Atlantis was a highly advanced society. In the film it shows they have a great mechanical leviathan guarding their city as well as the power to harness energy to run ships and make a force field. Others have said that they have lighter than air ships with weapons that are tuned by crystals. These are seen in the movie when Milo and many others use crystals to ride fish-shaped ships. The origin story is also similar to how Plato had written it. The Atlanteans with their great power went to war but after they did they were engulfed and sank to the bottom of the sea.

            Like all the previous movies, this one is not really about archaeology either. This movie is really an action-adventure. The main character, Milo, is not an archaeologist but a cartographer and linguist. He works for a museum, but his job is maintaining the boiler system. While one thinks that they are going there to discover the lost continent, it is even less archaeological than that because the party is actually going to find treasure, displaying blatant disregard for any other information they would gain about the people of Atlantis. Milo is different than the other characters, which I will get to later, but just like the other movies I have reviewed the characters in this one are after prized artifacts as well.

            Compared to all the other movies, though, this one has the truest archaeological spirit to it. It is all embodied by Milo, the one helping the rest find their way to Atlantis. As they are on their way there they reach a sculpted obstacle. Milo stands amazed at it and then it is blown up and he is quite sad. He may have been just admiring its beauty, but to read more into it he may have been looking at it with the eyes of someone trying to understand the people who made them. Throughout the whole movie it is clear he is invested in learning about the Atlanteans and their culture and their past behaviors. The movie shows him studying literature and ancient writings and going off with the main female Atlantean to learn about Atlantis’ past. Another aspect that makes him have the spirit of an archaeologist is that while he was in it for adventure it was not the kind seen in all the previous “archaeology movies.” At one point in the movie he said that he was expecting buildings and pottery to study. As I have learned in my archaeology class, pottery is an important and often-used artifact to learn about the past. All the other movie main characters were in it for some great artifact that people would find amazing on its own. Milo on the other hand would have been excited to find some sherds (broken bits of pottery). Yes, I spelled that right, it's a technical term.

            You may think this is a kids’ movie, but if you are looking for a bit of archaeological fun this movie at least offers some of what archaeology is even though it is not perfect. It also is a great way to learn about the theories of Atlantis in a theatrical way.

Raiders of the Lost Ark

            Finally, a movie that actually has an archaeologist in it. While it has some merit this film is far from an accurate portrayal of archaeology. After this blog I hope you will be able to see that Indiana Jones is a horrible archaeologist. The movie does show some archaeological truths, though, such as the Nazis hunting for artifacts. The spirit of the movie is somewhat archaeological but it is dated and not everything can be excused by having it set in the 1930s.

            The very first scene in the movie shows he is more of a tomb raider that an archaeologist. He braves a temple with all sorts of booby traps to skillfully get the prized golden idol. A real archaeologist would try to learn about the people who made the temple and/or the natives that ended up chasing after him at the end of the scene. Indian Jones tried to take the idol out of its context to be displayed in a museum. It is great for artifacts to be displayed but that rips it from the context of what it is. A real archaeologist would be concerned with what the idol means and the purpose of the temple as a way of learning about past people or even to learn about modern people and why all the natives bowed when they saw the idol. Unlike the protagonists of other movies, Indiana Jones did see value in some small items that he tried showing to his boss when he could not give him the idol. A real archaeologist knows there is value in artifacts that are not necessarily visually exciting because they offer knowledge of past human life. He does show that he has archaeological knowledge when he is teaching in class and when he later meets in the school with the army intelligence officers. He explains to the officers how the Egyptians used the staff to locate the Well of Souls. Indiana also uses a surveying tool when he is looking for the Well of Souls that contains the Ark of the Covenant. Throughout the whole rest of the movie, though, he is running around fighting bad guys and escaping from explosions. What makes him a terrible archaeologist is his reason for being one. At one point in the movie he says that he got into archaeology to find great artifacts like the Ark of the Covenant. As I have said over and over again archaeology is not about the artifacts but what they are and where they came from can tell about the lives of past people. 

            There were some archaeological truths shown in the movie that give it some archaeological merit. When Indiana Jones is teaching, he talks about how sites can be looted and how they often look potted with the holes dug by looters. Something that some people might not know is that the Nazis really were looking for artifacts. The Nazi party actually has its roots in the misconceptions of pseudoarchaeology. Nazis believed in theosophy, the idea that all humanity evolved from 7 root races and the 5^th race (Aryans) is decedent from Atlanteans which were a greatly technologically advanced society. I think the Nazis were more interested in artifacts related to these ideas rather than finding the Ark of the Covenant to be used as a weapon but I cannot be sure.

The archaeological spirit of the movie is difficult to deal with because archaeology has not always been as it is today and the movie was set in the 1930s. However, the film still does not meet a real archaeological standard even when that is taken into account. In the 20^th century archaeology had progressed to the point that there was systematic study of sites. It may have not been the sectioning off of squares that people think of, but it was not the wanton destruction of anything but the prized artifact. In the history of archaeology there was a time when people did go out to find artifacts for national museums, but that was long before the 20^th century. It is true, though, that archaeology did not have such a strong focus on learning about the past human behaviors and cultures in the early 20^th century. Back then it was more about historical-cultural perspective and creating timelines of human history through artifacts. While this does hurt some of the claims I have made earlier it does not completely counter them. When Indiana Jones is getting the idol out of the temple he does not seem to care about human history with all the other information around him but rather getting the prized object out and into a museum.

I would recommend young archaeologists to watch this film but to be aware of how poor an example of archaeology and of an archaeologist it is. 

Tomb Raider

           Once again we have another film that is barely an archaeological movie. Let me put it bluntly because the title apparently was not enough; Lara Croft is not an archaeologist, she is a TOMB RAIDER. The methods used in the movie were far from what an actual archaeologist would do, much was destroyed and little was learned. The movie does show a true aspect of archaeology in that there are people hunting for artifacts to sell in the black market. This movie went even farther than the last movie, The Mummy, from having a spirit of archaeology and was not about finding about past human life at all.

            There are several aspects of Lara Croft that make it clear she is not an archaeologist. For one thing she does not claim to be one. At one point in the movie we find out she covers her being a tomb raider with being a photojournalist. Plus, since she is a tomb raider she obviously does not act like an archaeologist. This can be seen in the first scene in the movie when she is training. There is a lot of information around her but she is clearly after the shiny thing on the pedestal. She fires her dual pistols at a robot and does acrobatics all over the place; you are not going to see an archaeologist doing that. Throughout the movie she is found of wearing short shorts. An archaeologist knows that wearing short shorts while exploring places like an Indian forest is a bad idea because there can be things like poisonous plants that would brush up against a bare leg. While she is not as bad as the “bad guys”, so to speak, she does not investigate like an archaeologist either. She does analyze artifacts and when she is trying to figure out puzzles she does use context to understand what to do, but this analysis is not done to understand the behaviors and lives of past people.

            The methods used in this movie were all about getting the prized object at whatever cost. This is particularly true for the bad guys of the story. Oddly enough that party includes the one person in the film that claims to be an archaeologist, the character played by Daniel Craig. He in fact hunts for antiquities and sell them on the black market. When he and the rest of his group go to get the first half of the triangle (the McGuffin driving the plot), he disregards and destroys information to get to it. In order to get into the temple, he brings down the wall covering the entrance which had great art work on it that an archaeologist would marvel at because it would give them a glimpse in to the life of the people who built the temple.

            This movie does show the very real aspect of archaeology that people try to obtain items to sell on the black market. Lara Croft and Daniel Craig’s character meet in an auction house where some of the items sold there could have been obtained in illegal ways. When Daniel Craig’s character goes into the temple to get a half of the triangle, he is not excavating the site, he is very much looting it. So is Lara Croft, but at least she has good intentions.

            All in all, the movie is far from the archaeological spirit of learning about past human behaviors. Throughout the film it is always a chase to see who gets the prized artifact first and to see who would get both halves and have the power to control time. They also had to be at a site and do things at a specific time when the planets are properly aligned, or it would not work. Real archaeology has nothing to do with this; it would be finding out who built the triangles and the culture and behaviors of those people. There are archaeological sites that are different depending on when you are there, such as a site where the entryway is lit by an equinox sun, but archaeology can be done whenever.

            At least in The Mummy a bit about ancient Egyptian life was uncovered which may or may not be true but in Tomb Raider. Everything was made up and I did not really know who the people were that made the triangles. Watch it if you want, but it is even less of an archaeological movie than The Mummy.

The Mummy

           This movie is barely an archaeology movie. In real life there have been archaeologists that have found mummies but this has nothing to do with that at all. The main female character did have aspects of being an archaeologist but she was not really one. There might have been one actual archaeologist in the movie, but he was a bad example of one and he was such a red shirt minor character that he was the first to die from the curse of the mummy. Finally, the main motive of the movie was about treasure, and artifacts were not treated in context.

            When first assessing a movie for its archaeological merit I try to see if there is anyone who even claims to be an archaeologist, and in this movie there was no such person. You might think that the main female character was one, but she was only sort of one. She may have had aspirations to be Egyptologist, but she is a rather bumbling idiot that, after a long rant, proclaims that she is a librarian. She also goes on the trip to find a book, and when she is in Egypt she selectively hunts for the book rather than learn about ancient Egypt through other materials. However, her one saving grace was her intentions in finding the book; she wanted it to gain knowledge about the religious practices of ancient Egyptians. This fits with the archaeological idea of using material culture (a book) to learn about the behaviors of past people (religious practices). She was lacking in other areas though. When she was learning about the past life of the mummy, it came as if she was just happening to learn it, not that she was actually trying to know anything about him. She also was not very systematic and did not document information before she made it impossible to ever get it again, such as digging for the tomb and opening it.

            There may have been an archaeologist but he was terrible and a minor character. The other group of characters, the ones purely looking for treasure, had a guy in their party that was a little nerdy looking and had glasses. I did not remember seeing him doing anything particularly archaeological but there was one scene that tipped me off that he might be one. In the scene, Brendan Frasier (the main male character that has a love interest with the main female librarian) gives the librarian a tool set and the guy in the other party says it is his. It includes the most important tool and symbol of an archaeologist, the trowel. He did not seem like the kind of guy that intended to use it though. He was interested in getting the treasure and was the first to go when the mummy came to claim his canopic jars.

            The movie as a whole did not have a real archaeological spirit to it; it was an adventure, treasure hunting, horror movie. Except for learning from the book of Amun-Ra there was no intent to learn about ancient Egyptians’ life. They actually disregarded information about the past that would make them realize how dangerous the place was. The main goal was to find treasure, risking lives through booby traps to get it. Characters even tried to pick shiny pieces from the walls that ended up being flesh-eating bugs. Another issue is that artifacts were treated out of context and even the one-hope-character for anything archaeological (the librarian) did not see anything wrong with this. This violated an incredibly important ternate of archaeology. In the beginning of the movie, the brother shows her the key that is used to open the ancient Egyptian book, but they could not have known that because it was taken out of context and they just thought it was a box that had a map to the city of the dead. The librarian also later takes an ancient Egyptian book from the other party but since she did not know it came out of the box with Imhotep’s canopic jars she did not realize it might bring the mummy back to life. While this sounds ridiculous (and in real life the mummy would not come to life) it just goes to show that one needs to take things in context and learn about the past lives of the people whose artifacts you are examining.

            If you are bored one night you can watch this movie but it is not deemed an archaeological movie. It lacks an archaeologist and the spirit of archaeology and should not be perceived as an archaeological movie.

Introduction

           Hello internet! Do you have a hankering for an archaeological movie night and are scouring the web for a list of movies to choose from? I am sure you have come across a few lists out there, but are the ones that often appear really what you are looking for? This blog will go through a number of said “archaeology movies,” picking apart fact from fiction and discerning a movie’s archaeological merit. You may be wondering who am I to tell you if a movie is accurately portraying archaeology. Bonus points if you were because there are a lot of people out there who try to teach erroneous information about archaeology that have no right doing so. I do not have a PhD in archaeology, but I do know a thing or two from my college archaeology course. With this knowledge I will shine a light on where Hollywood has gone wrong and hopefully point out some parts where they get it right. I will also explore pseudo-archaeology (the erroneous information you should be wary of) and how accurately its ideas are presented in film.

            To help me on this endeavor,  for a couple of reasons, is my beloved boyfriend. Archaeology movies are going to take over our next several movie nights, so I figured I would at least let him pick which one we would be watching. Additionally, I want there to be a third party to decide what “archaeology movie” means. He is a something of a genius in many things, but his major is engineering and hopefully his ideas will be a fair enough sample of what the unknowing masses would think are “archaeological movies.” For the next several weeks he has come up with a list of movies for us to watch. It contains—The Mummy, Tomb Raider, Indiana Jones, and Disney’s Atlantis.

            All of these movies are rather well-known but I will be going in a good amount to what goes on in these movies, so if you do not like spoilers than you might want to watch the movies first. It is not as if any of them have a twist ending but I thought I would give fair warning.