Raiders of the Lost Ark, Opening Scene

Instead of traveling to the Peruvian Rainforest where the scene was supposedly set, Spielberg chose Kauai to shoot the unforgettable opening sequence of his classic adventure Raiders of the Lost Ark. You’ll recall that Indy was chased by blowgun-wielding Amazonians through the dense jungle, jumping in the river to reach his plane just in the nick of time. The Wailua River stood in for the mighty Amazon, and the jungle you see in the movie is actually Kauai’s beautiful Wailua River State Park. This wasn’t the last time that the famed director would take advantage of the area’s tropical grandeur, as he later returned to film yet another adventure classic—Jurassic Park.