Comment by fractallyte | Hacker News Reader

Comment by fractallyte | Hacker News Reader

Hah, and not a mention of the movie from which they 'borrowed' so much, Secret of the Incas!

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Secret_of_the_Incas

One of the most famous scenes - positioning the artifact at just the right moment to reflect the rays of sun to reveal... - straight out of the 1954 movie.

Secret of the Incas was filmed on location in Cusco, before it was a tourist destination. The city is raw, colorful, a snapshot in time. The script is full of humorous sarcasm, with an interesting (but fairly slow) story, based in fact.

As for Charlton Heston's character? The prototype for Indiana Jones: fedora hat, leather jacket, pistol, mannerisms...

The full movie is on YouTube: https://youtu.be/OYQD24HrNlU

>The full movie is on YouTube: https://youtu.be/OYQD24HrNlU

There's a 1080p Amazon WEB-DL in existence.

I think that was intentional as they really wanted to reach back into the golden age of Hollywood as something of a reaction to the “new Hollywood” styles of the 1970’s.

Interesting it was filmed on location way back then as that must have been very expensive and difficult with the tech they had in the 50’s.

I'm pretty sure that Secret of the Incas didn't invent that trope, although it may be the inspiration for Raiders. Journey to the Center of the Earth also has a scene involving standing at the correct place at the correct time for the sun's rays to cast a shadow in the correct place, and I'm sure it's even older than that.

If you're referring to the version of Journey to the Center of the Earth featuring James Mason, that came out in 1959, five years after Secret of the Incas. Not sure if that scene was included in Verne's original 1864 novel.

I'm referring to the 1864 novel :)

What do you know, it has a TV Tropes page[0]. Journey to the Center of the Earth does seem to be the oldest thing on there, after all - not that TV Tropes is necessarily comprehensive.

[0] https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/SundialWaypoint

Thanks for posting. That was interesting to skim through. IJ really is a blatant rip off of it.

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