David Koepp reveals absolutely nothing about Indy 4

Koepp is under strict orders not to blow Indiana Jones’ cover. But as someone who was inspired to become a screenwriter by Raiders of the Lost Ark, writing Episode 4 definitely ranks as a sweet gig.
Wednesday, January 17, 2007 at 11:45 AM
By Daniel Robert Epstein

Although screenwriter David Koepp jokes that the Dreamworks secret police will track him down if he reveals anything about the upcoming sequel Indiana Jones 4, he was able during a recent interview with FilmStew to drop a few pebble-sized hints.

“I spent about a year on it, first doing drafts with Steven and then doing drafts with Steven and George,” he explains. “It was a lot of fun. The first thing is that you realize this is a beloved character, probably one of the most in film history, and a lot of people are going to be angry no matter what I do.”

“I’m going to get my *ss handed to me on some level, even by my fellow filmmakers or the audience,” Koepp continues. “So you just accept all that and go and do the best thing you can with as much love as you can. I worked with Steven a number of times but never with both of them [Spielberg, Lucas]. They’re big guys with big opinions and it’s definitely a challenge, but a challenge worth stepping up to.”

Koepp agrees that it would be crazy not to take into account star Harrison Ford’s real age for this next installment. In fact, he suggests that if it were not in the script, Ford would likely insist on references to this being added. Koepp himself was 18-years-old when Raiders of the Lost Ark first hit theaters back in 1981 and, ironically enough, says that’s the movie that made him want to become a screenwriter.


“This one was hard, because there’s the wait of expectation which I felt also on Spider-Man,” Koepp reveals. “At the time, that had been a comic for 35 years, so there’s a big audience out there for it and it’s beloved.”

“People have a lot of preconceptions about what it ought to be and that’s the same kind of pressure you feel with Indiana Jones,” he continues. “It’s hard to write when you feel the audience looking over your shoulder, but you just try and put it out of your mind.”

As much as he is a fan of Indy lore, Koepp says it’s essential to discard that point of view when tapping out further adventures. “You can’t write a fan script,” he insists. “You have to pretend that this movie exists without the other one.”

“The worst thing to do would be to have him make reference to things he said in the first movie, like to pun on lines of dialogue,” he argues. “That’s tempting, because you’ve seen the movie a hundred times and you know all the dialogue, but no human being remembers exactly what they said 25 years ago word for word, much less make reference to it. So you try to put aside the other movies and yet be in the spirit of them.”

If you’re going to work as a screenwriter in independent film, this is pretty much the best way to go. As Koepp points out, because Lucasfilm is underwriting Indiana Jones 4, the project is technically an indie (or is that "Indy?"). And pray tell, will this indie start with a gigantic set piece?

“Now, how would that not be telling you what happened in the movie?” Koepp teases. “I’m not going to tell you what happens. But with set pieces, sometimes it’s common sense and sometimes it’s a bad idea.”