This Agence France Presse article complains that many aspects of Peru shown in the latest Indiana Jones movie, "Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull," are incorrect. Ya think?
AFP reports Peruvians are upset about misconceptions like finding Mayan ruins in the Peruvian rain forest, and the Nazca lines shown being too close to Cuzco. For that matter, why couldn't a bilingual speaker of Spanish and Quechua be riding with Pancho Villa? Do Peruvian Indians never travel or emigrate?
My view: the Peruvians should lighten up. The entire Indiana Jones oeuvre exists in a parallel universe where the U.S. government quietly rounds up magical items and warehouses them in Fort Knox (first film) or in Area 51 in the Nevada desert (film four).
In the Indy universe, magic "works." The ark of the covenant melts the faces of various Nazi goons in film one. A shaman tears out a human heart with his bare hand in film two. Water from the holy grail saves the life of Indy's gut shot father in film three. And in film four ... oops, I almost included a spoiler here.
To complain about inaccuracies in Indiana Jones films is like carping that the curses and spells in Jo Rowling's Harry Potter series don't actually work. Like Potter, Indiana Jones is fantasy and should be enjoyed as such.
