100 hours to go to Kingdom of the Crystal Skull

In 100 hours time those clutching a precious Invitation for the hottest ticket in Cannes - the world premiere of Indiana Jones and the Crystal Skull - will climb the steps to the Grand Theatre Lumiere and sit in eager anticipation of Spielberg's blockbuster spectacular.

What's taken him so long? This week the director revealed that it was Oscar night in 1994 when Indy star Harrison Ford first asked "When are we going to make another Indiana Jones movie? I'm ready." A whole fourteen years ago.

"That was five years after The Last Crusade," remembers Spielberg, talking to the press last week in LA. "I said I didn't know, you have to call George [Lucas]. So Harrison called George and about a week later George called me and said Harrison is serious. He wants to do another picture. So the development of this film started in 1994."

So why the 14 year wait? "It took all that time before David Koepp [the writer of Jurassic Park and SpiderMan] came on board and wrote a script that knocked my Indiana Jones hat off basically," says Spielberg.

"But you know, it had to be right. I was just trying to recapture the magic we were able to achieve in three movies in the 1980s. I wasn't trying to improve on the Indiana Jones character. I was just trying to authentically re-animate the character and that was done through the right combination of the correct writing, the correct tone and Harrison Ford's singular contribution."

On Sunday afternoon Cannes will be the first to see if the 19 year wait since the last Indy movie was worth it.