Tintin Forums

I saw it the other night, i must say after being a hige indy fan my whole life I was not disappointed! Spielberg got the balance of indy nostalgia and originality perfect. I'd recommend it for any fan, or anyone interested in a good adventure movie, gaping plot holes are made up for the brilliance of it all, as with the others before it, I'm going to go see it again soon with my friends!

I saw it today. Great film but not on par with the first three I thought. I'm not sure the Russians have the same impact as the Nazis did in the first three. I thought the same as the OP. I didn't think it similar to Prisoners of Sun but I did think the ideas in the movie were a very similar to Flight 714. Mind you the idea behind this film has been around for a long time now perhaps before Hergé thought of Flight 714, I'm not sure. All very interesting and who knows it could be conceivable.

If you mean the "ancient astronauts" aspect, it certainly wasn't an original idea of Hergé's by any means.
Following on from the whole flying saucer/ UFO phenomenon of the late forties, Italian journalist Peter Kolosimo had published Il pianeta sconosciuto (The Unknown Planet) in 1959, which started the "men from space visited the world centuries ago, and built the pyramids"-sort-of-thing bandwagon. He was probably eclipsed by Erich von Däniken and his Chariots of the Gods? stuff, the book (the first of many) which came out in 1967 - about the same time as 714.
It seems to have attracted the same sort of people who bought into the whole "mysterious world" fad, and were "in" to the likes of George Adamski, who also wrote about flying saucers, and mystics such as Lobsang Rampa.
I've a feeling that Hergé might have been sympathetic to such avenues of enquiry at the time, although it would have been interesting to see how Alph-Art might have swung in the other direction, with its lampooning of the trendy jet-set and their following of cult leaders.

Yes I was thinking of the 'ancient astronaut' aspect. Thankyou for the info Jock, very interesting

I have seen photographs in books of ancient wall carvings (or paintings) where the figures looked to have been wearing astronaut type helmets and one figure was sitting in a capsule a bit like how the astronauts sat in the Apollo rockets. I saw these photos ages ago and I can't remember which ancient civilisation carved or painted them. One from South America I think.

As a story I really like Flight 714. When I first read it as a child I quite liked the UFO. Having said that as a child I don't think I understood the ideas behind the story and focused on the characters more than anything else.

Isn't it Flight 714?

I watched a documentary where the “evidence” which von Däniken had photos of in his books was thoroughly de-bunked. The carving of the “Apollo astronaut” is the lid of King Pacal’s sarcophagus, in the Mayan Temple of Inscriptions. While there is a superficial similarity in pose to a reclining spaceman, the image is far better interpreted as showing his descent into the Mayan underworld, and the symbols are identifiable as a serpent’s jaws, the waters of a river and other traditional motifs.
The best one though was his picture of a “runway and turning-circle” for alien space-ships at Nazca, which is pictured in one of his books next to a photo of a modern air-port, and yes it surely does look very similar…
…until the reporter in the documentary went and stood on the Nazca feature, and you could see that a) he absolutely dwarfed it in size, b) it was absolutely and undoubtedly the bulgy knee of a bird design, and c) the ground was so fragile that anything landing on it would have destroyed the outlines (the marks are made by scraping dark stones away from a layer of brighter sand beneath, and could be wiped away with a stroke of your foot).
So the Ancient Astronauts are a nice story, but they don’t stack up…

I would see that this film is like a warming up for ''uncle" Spielberg before he is actually directing the Tintin Movie.

As far as I know he is also Tintin's Fans...

But for the Indiana Jones IV movies, it would be great if he make the movies was shoot in Indonesia as is appear on the original books, and I might volunteer myself to become a participant...