Watch these kids remake Raiders of the Lost Ark in 1982 in first trailer for Raiders!

By Rick Marshall February 26, 2015

RAIDERS! The Story of the Greatest Fan Film Ever Made - SXSW TEASER

Over the course of seven years beginning in 1982, two 11-year-old boys created a shot-for-shot remake of Steven Spielberg’s Raiders of the Lost Ark. That film came to be known as Raiders of the Lost Ark: The Adaptation and was as much a painstakingly produced fan film as it was a story of childhood friends with an all-consuming mutual goal, racing against the onset of adulthood in order to accomplish it.

As the story goes, the effort these amateur film fanatics created eventually found its way to a host of filmmakers and cinephiles — including Spielberg himself — and despite all the positive attention it received, the pair still lamented the one, iconic scene they never got to recreate for their movie. The new documentary Raiders! The Story of the Greatest Fan Film Ever Made chronicles not only the making of the film, but the pair’s attempt to reconcile and get the old filmmaking team back together to finish what they started over 30 years later.

Set to premiere at the South by Southwest Film Festival in March, Raiders! now has a trailer that offers audiences a preview of Chris Strompolos and Eric Zala’s attempt to complete a fan film three decades in the making.

From the content of the trailer, it seems reasonable to expect no shortage of cameos from filmmakers and notable film fans paying tribute to the efforts of the Raiders! cast and crew, who must find a way to recapture that energy and excitement they had when they were kids in order to finally accomplish this ambitious challenge they set for themselves back in 1982.

Raiders! The Story of the Greatest Fan Film Ever Made will premiere at SXSW Film Festival in Austin, TX, on March 14.

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