Overview and Main Points

Let’s start off with an overview on our first ever post. My siblings and I saw Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl, for the first time, on July 12th-2005 after borrowing the DVD from a friend. We loved it and watched it again over the months until we could recite whole scenes of witty dialogue. We also saw Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man’s Chest in July of 2006. In September of 2006 we borrowed “Raiders of the Lost Ark” from the library and watched it, for the first time. We were surprised and pleased by how good it was; but while we were watching it we noticed that certain things seemed familiar. By the middle of the movie we had noticed many similarities to Pirates of the Caribbean and they were beginning to add up. I searched online to see if anyone had caught what we’d seen…but no, very few people had. We bought the Indiana Jones Trilogy in October for my brother’s birthday and proceeded to watch the rest of the movies. We were shocked to notice many, many, more similarities to Pirates and finally we started making a list. This post will explain several of the largest parallel themes and plot lines.

1: The head piece of the Staff of Ra is very much like the Aztec Gold medallion; thus the whole plot of “Curse of the Black Pearl” is shockingly similar to “Raiders of the Lost Ark.” Girl has a medallion that an evil and/or supernatural power covets, much fighting over it, and finally the evil is destroyed by the very thing they wanted to find. A cursed chest and a cursed chest…not very subtle now that you think about it.

2: The entire Marion and Belloq tent scene is paralleled by the Elizabeth and Barbossa dinner scene in “Curse of the Black Pearl.” Notice the apples on the table as Marion and Belloq sit down, the butter knife being hidden by Marion and used in an escape attempt. Belloq has a dress for Marion to change into, just as Barbossa does. Also, note that Captain Katanga has a dress on board ship for Marion and this is referenced by Jack in “Dead Man’s Chest” saying, “I have a dress in my cabin.”

3: Marion shooting the thug in the bar and Indy thinking for a second that it was meant for him is parallel to the “one last shot” scene in the cave on “Curse of the Black Pearl.”

4: The monkey on the dark side and the monkey on the dark side. (Raiders just had the sense to kill the monkey while the killing was good. :-) )

5: Indy is protective of his hat and Jack is protective of his hat.

6: South American Natives chasing Indy across the field and the Natives chasing Jack across the beach in “Dead Man’s Chest.”

MK