Conclusion

One of my favourite quotations is from Johnson’s (1999) book:

"Archaeology can be very boring, distressing and physically uncomfortable. Every year we excavate thousands of sites, some with painstaking and mind-numbing patience, some in a great and undignified hurry. Every year we get chilled to the marrow or bitten half to death by mosquitoes while visiting some unprepossessing, grassy mound in the middle of nowhere. Miles from a decent restaurant or even a warm bath, we try to look interested while the rain comes down in sheets and some great professor whose best work was twenty years ago witters on in a monotone about what was found in Trench 4B. Every year we churn out thousands of interminable, stultifyingly dull site reports, fretting over the accuracy of plans and diagrams, collating lists of grubby artefacts to go to microfiche that few will ever consult or use again" (Johnson 1999: 1)

I bet Lara never does any of this! What is described here are the elements of archaeology that movie directors and producers strive to keep out of their films. Perhaps it is this monotony which force creators to ‘spice up’ the profession in the movies. Archaeology does, however, span many disciplines and covers a lot of the past. This undoubtedly is one of the reasons why the portrayal of archaeology and archaeologists in motion pictures is as compelling today as it has been in the past.

The affect that the portrayal has on the general public must not go unrecognised. It is more likely that, if prompted to name an archaeologist, a member of the public would mention Indiana Jones rather than Colin Renfrew. Who? These stereotypes, however, have been portrayed less in recent years in Tomb Raider, certain scenes in The Mummy and The Mummy Returns and in Stargate. Along with the advent of popular archaeological television programmes, people are becoming more aware of what it is that archaeologists really do and are seeing these stereotypes as more fiction than anything else.

It must be remembered that the films mentioned on this site are only a small selection of these archaeologically based films. A genre that has gone totally unmentioned on the site is that of foreign films. These movies must not be disregarded. Indeed, as Day describes:

"Foreign films offer more realistic portrayals of archaeologists than do domestic productions" (Day 1997: 43)

There has been a lot of mention of stereotypes on this site. However, it must be remembered that, in many of the films mentioned, there is at least a glimmer of actual archaeology based fact or theory. Indiana Jones speaks various words of wisdom in his first and third outings where Daniel Jackson (Stargate) always seems to know what he is talking about. The portrayal of archaeology and archaeologists in motion pictures is an interesting topic and has only been discussed briefly on this site. Whether or not they are stereotypical, they always seem to pull in the audiences. As Day states:

"The past, at whatever level and at whatever time, has lost none of its power to inspire. Archaeologists, whether on screen or off, hold a key to that treasure box" (Day 1997: 44)

Mankind has an inherent fascination with the past and archaeology motion pictures can, for two hours of the day at least, open a window into the past, quite literally in Lara Croft: Tomb Raider, and create whatever adventures they want to along the way. This will always be the appeal of the archaeologist in film whether or not they are the most accurate portrayals ever printed onto film.

In conclusion, therefore, it is apparent that archaeology does not have its own specific pigeon hole within cinema. It spans many genres including horror, science fiction and adventure – genres which some would argue have nothing to do with archaeology as a profession. Some of these films have been based on real archaeological events whilst others are pure fiction. The depiction of the archaeologist themselves may range from the gun toting hero or heroine to the fumbling librarian as depicted in The Mummy (1999) showing, in a sense, the different disciplines of study and fieldwork within the profession. Themes and locations used in the films are almost always exotic whereas, in real life, archaeologists are rarely so lucky. Perhaps most importantly, archaeologists are not treasure hunters, not in the sense that they keep the artefacts themselves. As a character remarks in Tomb Raider:

In contrast to his other ‘whip-crackin’ antics, Indiana Jones does actually conform with this idea. He gives his finds to the character Brody to be shown in his museum.

In short, the fact is that this trend of archaeology films seems to be showing no sign of dissipating. With rumours of a fourth Indiana Jones movie circulating and the cast of Tomb Raider already signed up to do two more films, it would seem that if we were to ask Harrison Ford (Indy) or Angelina Jolie (Lara):

"Are you still pretending to be an archaeologist?" (Lara Croft: Tomb Raider 2001)