He didn’t make number one on AFI’s 100 Heroes and Villains – that went to Atticus Finch, and no one’s gonna argue that – but it’s a very, very close second for Indiana Jones. It’s hard to think of an action hero who could be more universally beloved, for he truly fits the cliche of one whom men want to be and women want to be with. There’s such a balance of extraordinary and ordinary in Indy that it’s impossible for men to resent him, or for a woman to write him off as the too-perfect matinee idol. He’s brilliant, devious, cantankerous, and fearless (except when it comes to snakes). That’s what’s perfect about him as a character; he displays super-human abilities, but mixed in with all of that is always something that reminds us how very human he is.

It’s just this quality that makes my choice for today’s “Best Action Scene.” It’s of course from the best of the series, Raiders of the Lost Ark, and it’s the part where he’s desperately chasing after and fighting off the baddies in the marketplace in Cairo. His love match, Marion, is abducted and winds up in a basket, and he’s just sure he knows where she is. He’ll find her any moment,  just around the  next corner… if these natives and their swords would just get out of the way. He’s fought them off with his fists and his whip, and he’s done his best to get his girl far from harm’s way, but when the crowd parts and he is confronted with some black-clad cross between an Eastern Knight and a ninja, he’s just suddenly and sincerely done. It’s one of the most iconic moments for Indiana Jones; he takes one look at that swashbuckling and sword-twirling that promises he’ll not go down easily, and just decides to save time and energy and shoot him instead.

Now, I’m not arguing that this is the most exciting action scene of all Indiana Jones’ considerably amazing sequences to choose from, because it’s nothing compared to the marathons of abuse he puts himself through again and again chasing what he’s after. It would probably be better described as the action scene that wasn’t, but it best shows character of any I can think of, and what a lovely thing for this genre. Why shouldn’t everything inform character and story? Why shouldn’t things make sense in context? So many action films forget this, and it’s why these (yes, even the second and the fourth films) are such towering examples of the best of movie-making. We love Indy because we never forget that he walks this earth; he gets bruised battered tired, and annoyed, and he bleeds just like the rest of us. Where other heroes never hesitate to leap into the fray, Indy can always appreciate the sense in saving his strength and giving his all only when strictly necessary.

However, the real beauty of this moment is that it wasn’t supposed to happen. Spielberg has famously revealed that the original plan was for a long fight with the swordsman in which Indy would naturally prevail with his whip and superior wiles. But Harrison Ford was struck with dysentery and was very ill on the day they were to shoot it, and it was his idea to scrap the whole thing and go for brevity, injecting a comedic moment into the film at the same time. It must be said that Ford has terribly good instincts and knows his characters well, but his director had a history of stumbling into greatness by going with the happy accidents that passed his way. In Jaws, Spielberg had planned to show the shark far, far earlier in the picture, but the damn mechanical beast just wouldn’t work properly. He shot around it and thus created a textbook example for building suspense.

There are dozens of such moments of providence in film history, and I love them because they remind us that the magic of film can come from very humble places. It’s not only action heroes who are human deep down – filmmakers are too.