I wonder what was the reason why Elsa gave Donovan the wrong cup which lead to him aging very fast and him turning into a skeleton? I also thought Donovan was a total hypocrite for trusting Elsa with the cup.
shareShe was in the wrong. For some reason, she thought Jesus was a rich, materialistic man on earth. That's why she went for the most grandiose cup. Indy had the right idea.
shareI LOVE that idea, and as a kid who didn't appreciate nuances, I initially assumed that was the case (that she *honestly* picked the wrong cup), but, alas, it's clear from further viewings and from the film's novelisation, which I read shortly after I first saw the film, that she was betraying Donovan (although it's still curious how shocked she was when he suffered the gruesome consequences of drinking from the wrong cup; the smart thing to do would have been to have stood far away from Donovan after giving him the wrong grail).
Still, I'm sure I can fool myself so that in my head canon, she stupidly chose the wrong cup on accident, rather than as a way to get Donovan out of the picture.
Speaking of nuances, in the film
there is a look that Elsa gives Indy, directly after giving the cup to Donovan subtly giving away her betrayal.
That's the nuance I was referring to (and I love Indy's facial reaction in this instance; he still doesn't know what to make of Elsa, as much as he despises Donovan).
I also believe that after Donovan dies, both Indy and Elsa agree that the real grail will be the basic cup of a carpenter rather than something more ornate.
Still, like I say, I prefer TinaKimo's reading, even if the evidence is pretty irrefutable (i.e. that Elsa chose the wrong grail on purpose).
Ahhhh, got ya.
And agreed on all you points.
Haven’t read the novelization, I’ll have to check that out sometime.
I mostly agree with this, that Elsa betrayed Donovan...although my interpretation of Elsa's look on her face when Indy picks up the correct one was a look of almost disgust, as if to say "really? That one?"
shareAhh, I like it!
I like your implication that Elsa knowingly picked the wrong grail for Donovan, but still didn't know which the *right* one was, without Indy being there.
She was an evil woman
shareI think she did it deliberately.
shareThat's what Donovan deserves for shooting Henry and betraying Indy.
share👍... and congratulations (3000 posts)
shareYes, that was probably the turning point. She is genuinely horrified when Donovan shoots Henry Jones.
And, yes, as overseas7 says, congrats on getting to 3000 posts.
Thank you all for congratulating me on my 3000th post, I've been using the IMDB chatboards/Moviechat for nearly 17 years now.
shareElsa wanted the cup for herself, and she was ambivalent about being on the same side as Donovan and the Nazis.
Personally, I would have much preferred it if she'd made a genuine mistake regarding the cup, but no doubt Spielberg and co felt duly obliged to 'soften' Elsa, so she wasn't a *complete* villain (*sigh* because heaven forbid that we have a *completely* evil beautiful woman character), especially after all the backlash Temple of Doom got for Willie Scott.
Thankfully, much more *progressive* filmmakers than 1980s era Spielberg, like Indian director, S.S. Rajamouli, are giving people like me what they want, and casting the likes of Alison Doody in RRR as *completely* unrepentant racist blonde, blue-eyed white supremacist villains, proving that one can be pretty and blonde, and still be an evil POS (didn't the ARYAN Nazis teach us anything FFS?)
My question is why would Donovan trust her (or anyone else's) selection over his?
It's literally a life or death decision.
Always seemed foolish to me he let her choose as if it were a decorative piece for a living room....
True, but I'm pretty certain Dovovan didn't expect such a terrible fate from drinking the wrong grail. Then again, he does seem to be confused and confounded by the choice, as if to imply that he knows it's a one-shot deal, and that he can't pick another grail if the first one turns out to be a dud.
He trusted Elsa, because she was the 'grail expert'. That's why he hired her to begin with. And he didn't expect her to betray him.
Still, the smart thing would have been to make someone else drink from the grail first. He should have threatened to shoot someone else.
I think it tries to imply that once the cup is in Donovan's hands he is bewitched....
He is bewitched by thoughts of power, greed and glory. He is so seduced that the rational part of his mind is not active.
It's also crucial for the plot rather than him getting some faceless monkey in first to sample the different cups.
I think Donovan knew the stakes of choosing, because the Knight explained it before Elsa chose.
But, yeah, him giving in to Elsa because she was his expert makes perfect sense.
What did the Knight actually say, again, before Elsa chose the (wrong) grail?
shareJust paraphrasing, from memory "You must choose wisely for the Grail will give you life, the false will take it from you."
shareAh, I think I remember now. Thanks for jogging my memory.
I wonder how seriously Donovan took that warning, or what he, Indy and Elsa thought the Knight meant (i.e. would life be *automatically* taken from the person who drank from the wrong grail?)
My question is why would Donovan trust her (or anyone else's) selection over his?
People like Donovan, in real life as well as in the movies, think their money can buy them anything. Donovan thinks his wealth has bought him control over the Nazis and Elsa’s undying loyalty, even after seeing her reaction to Henry Sr.’s gut-shot.
It fits.
Added to which, Elsa gives him exactly what a rube like Donovan would think the grail looks like, not the cup of a carpenter but a gaudy, bejeweled monstrosity that a tasteless rich guy might think is the “cup of the king of kings.”
Elsa gave Donovan the wrong cup intentionally because she knew it would kill him. Her little smirk when Donovan had the first reaction to drinking from the wrong cup shows that.
By the time they had arrived at the temple with the knight, Elsa had flipped to Indy's side - she could have "screamed" to turn Indy over the Nazis and she didn't - which is why Indy tried so hard to save her at the end.
Donavan wasn't a hypocrite, he was just so consumed with acquiring the Grail that he missed the clues that Elsa was becoming disenchanted with him and the Nazis.
Yes, there was a streak of good in her. That's why Indy tries to save her instead of kicking her in the head to her doom while grinning and calling her nazi scum. It's a classic "Bond Babe" situation where he converts the femme fatale to team good guy.
share
Except of course that Bond used the old "magic wand" to convert them to goodness. All Indy used was his bad boy adventurous guile.
No, Indy is a good man. It had nothing to do with her being a good un. If she was so virtuous she would NEVER have aligned with the Nazis to begin with. She was a blonde, blue-eyed Aryan Nazi through-and-through. But Indy was moral. We see that in Temple of Doom when he even tries to save the big guy, who was whipping the little children, from the rock crusher. He tried to use his rope as a pulley to force the big Thuggee up, but it was not enough.
Elsa was gorgeous, but I'm not so dazzled by a pretty blonde white woman, as many are in society, that I'm going to simp for her. She was a NAZI and that's all you need to know. 😠
STOP THE SIMPING. We don't do it for Black men. We don't do it for older women, poorer women, Black women or Jewish women, so why do we ALWAYS do it for pretty, blonde, blue-eyed white women?
She was selfish. Think of her later line. "It's ours, Indy! Yours and mine!" She wanted to have her cake and eat it too. She wanted to be rid of Donovan, and then switch back to Indy's side, and have both him and the Grail. And she almost managed it.
share100% THIS.
She was a selfish Nazi who like you say, wanted to have her CAKE and eat it.
Even though she knew she was betraying Donovan, it's doubtful blondie would have been able to find the REAL grail with out the MUCH smarter NON-NAZI Indy by her side.
I don't SIMP for blonde, blue-eyed NAZI chicks, no matter how hot they are. 😠
The only thing I disagree with is how close she was to managing her ill-thought-out 'plan'. Blondie's foolishness got her easily killed, especially since Indy was unable to grab and pull at the ruthless, greedy and vain blonde, blue-eyed NAZI. She was too heavy for him, and thus her greed caused him to lose his grip, and she fell to her death.