Wow, look at that.

Left to right, Harrison Ford (Han Solo), David Prowse (Darth Vader), Peter Mayhew (Chewbacca) and, in foreground, Carrie Fisher (Princess Leia), Kenny Baker (R2-D2) and Mark Hamill (Luke Skywalker).

I chatted with Mark Hamill yesterday for a Comic-Con International preview story I'm working on and he spoke about the period you see in the photo above. "Of course none of us knew what this thing was going to become, there was no way of knowing," said the actor who became part of our pop-culture collective memory with "Star Wars" in 1977. "I never imagined that here, more than 30 years later, we'd still be talking about this movie."

Hamill will be at Comic-Con this year (I'll tell you more about his latest projects on Monday) and Friday (July 24) is Star Wars Day at the convention (details to come on that as well). May the Force be with you...

— Geoff Boucher   

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CREDITS: "Star Wars" cast photo courtesy of LucasFilm. Darth Vader in the bathroom photo by Ian Pool.
 

Tom Selleck has certainly enjoyed a lot of success in his long career but I will always feel sorry for the guy. That's because he came this close to getting the role of Indiana Jones in "Raiders of the Lost Ark." According to Hollywood lore, Selleck was Steven Spielberg's early choice to wear the fedora but, due to the star's contractual obligations, the role eventually went to some guy named Harrison Ford.

Why am I bringing this up now? Well, I came across this fun mash-up of the "Magnum P.I." opening sequence and "Star Wars" and for some reason my first thought was Selleck's watching it and rolling his eyes. "Oh, great, this guy again, copping my mojo..."    

The makers of the mash-up did some painstaking work here to match up with the original opening sequence, as you can see in the side-by-side below...

-- Geoff Boucher

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EXCLUSIVE

Is "Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull," which hits stores today on DVD and Blu-ray, the final adventure for the wise-cracking (and whip-cracking) archaeologist? It sure seemed like it when the movie arrived in theaters in May but then earlier this month a surprisingly enthused Harrison Ford told us that George Lucas is "in think mode" on a suitable story for a fifth Indy film. That's not sitting well with everyone; there's a vocal percentage of fans who think the 21st century revisitation of the great screen hero tainted the earlier glory days of the franchise. I have to wonder if director Steven Spielberg, who certainly has plenty of other projects awaiting him, is really in the mood to take on another Indy project after the backlash this time around, which got pretty personal and malicious, especially during a recent "South Park" spoof. Only time will tell ...

To mark the release today of "Crystal Skull," we bring you two fairly rare movie-set images, one old and one new. Above, a photo shot during an early scene in the classic 1981 film that started it all, "Raiders of the Lost Ark." That chap in the tan coat standing between the camera and the "stunt" Indy is Douglas Slocombe, the film's acclaimed director of photography, whose other credits included "Close Encounters of the Third Kind," "Jesus Christ Superstar" and one of my personal favorites, "The Lion in Winter." Slocombe, the story goes, never used a light meter on the set of "Raiders," preferring to trust his own eye instead. It was a good instinct: The Brit picked up his third Oscar nomination for his work on the action classic.

The photo below is from last year during the making of "Crystal Skull" and shows Ford, enjoying a cool drink and light moment with Spielberg. In the background there, wearing the white shirt and blue jeans, is Janusz Kaminski, the director of photography for "Crystal Skull" and a two-time Oscar winner (he won for Spielberg's two World War II masterpieces, "Saving Private Ryan" and "Schindler's List"). Leave it to two cinematographers to know where to stand when a camera catches a bit of history ... 

Thanks to John Singh at Lucasfilm for finding these two great images and sharing them with the Hero Complex. Both photos are property of Lucasfilm, all rights reserved, and they are used here with the company's permission. To learn about all the extras included on Paramount Home Entertainment's DVD and Blu-ray of "Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull," check out the official Indiana Jones website.

-- Geoff Boucher

Harrison Ford said Friday that momentum is building for a fifth movie in the "Indiana Jones"  franchise and that George Lucas is already cooking up a suitable plot for a heroic senior citizen with a penchant for whips and fedoras.

"It's crazy but great," the 66-year-old Ford said. "George is in think mode right now."

"Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull" grossed $318 million in the U.S. alone and $770 million worldwide and is expected to be powerhouse seller on DVD and Blu-Ray when it arrives in stores Oct. 14. It was a film that many people in Hollywood assumed would never be made considering the difficulty in finding the right time and the right script to reunite Ford, Lucas and franchise director Steven Spielberg after the 1989 hit "Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade."

Now, though, the latest success and the fact that the franchise's old machinery was revived has Ford thinking a fifth movie is not only a viable idea, but an attractive one.

"It's automatic, really, we did well with the last one and with that having done well and been a positive experience, it's not surprising that some people want to do it again," Ford said.

I asked Ford who specifically is stirring up the idea of another revival, whether it was Lucas, Spielberg or the star himself? "Really, it comes from the ethos, from the ether. It's natural. It's a way of nature, of course, success breed opportunities ... also we don't stay as closely in contact as have in the last year, that's part of it."