✯✯½
After a highly disappointing previous chapter in Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull, a new chapter had to come by in order to provide the proper closure that Steven Spielberg and George Lucas’s long-running franchise had deserved. But without Steven Spielberg at the director’s chair, and George Lucas writing a story, it’s clear something is missing. With directing duties passed on over to James Mangold, who previously directed Logan and Ford v Ferrari, it’d be easy enough to at least hope the shoes are filled. Yet when we’re talking a film series that started with Raiders of the Lost Ark, which was just about the perfect action-adventure movie anyone can ask for, those would be such massive shoes to fill for a fifteen year wait in between the preceding chapter and this one. Sadly, it seems like all those years have left Indiana Jones to conclude not with a bang, but with a whimper.
The start of Dial of Destiny takes us back to the days of WWII, going back after Kingdom of the Crystal Skull’s setting during the Cold War days which left us with villains from the Soviet Union. This is without doubt the best part of the film, with a de-aged Harrison Ford coming back as Indiana Jones reclaiming a relic from the Nazis. For one, it’s maybe the closest that this film has ever come to feeling like Indiana Jones, just the way we loved him all throughout the years, especially as we watch him fighting against the Nazis like the old adventures to take back one half of the dial of Archimedes from a charismatic doctor named Jürgen Voller (Mads Mikkelsen). This section almost feels like its own film, but then there’s another two hours that come by.
As we return to a time closer to the present, now based around the time of the moon landing, an elderly Indiana Jones finds himself out of place with the changing times. His students don’t share the same enthusiasm he once did, and he plans to retire, although not until his goddaughter Helena “Wombat” Shaw (Phoebe Waller-Bridge), prompting him to go for one last adventure. Unfortunately for him, the former Nazi whom he claimed one half of the dial from also happens to be hunting him down – and thus begins a race through time. This is where we’re going back to the adventure roots once more, but all the cracks in the foundation of Dial of Destiny show themselves here.
While it’s easy enough to respect how an aging Harrison Ford still retains the energy that we’d want for a traditional Indiana Jones film all these years, it also can’t be helped but it’s felt that this is a series that had already run its course. Given how the first three movies all came out within close range of one another, perhaps a long-belated conclusion to the Indiana Jones series would present itself as a cash-in on nostalgia – which, unfortunately, it seems like that’s how wrung dry this film feels like. Being made on a gargantuan budget of $300 million (if compared to the budget of Raiders of the Lost Ark, when adjusted for inflation today, cost around $67 million), you see how they’re desperate to recreate the feel more than anything else rather than actually suck you in. It looks the ugliest of the five films, with most of the action being in the dark, and some shoddy visual effects work (granted, it was never great in Crystal Skull, but there was a clear idea what was going on) to recreate that look.
This brings forth one of my biggest gripes with Dial of Destiny, but now with Disney taking over as the primary studio from Paramount (given that Lucasfilm is now a Disney property), it comes out looking like the most sanitized Indiana Jones movie. Which may just as well have been par for the course given that Disney has aimed for child-friendly material, but when you consider how the Indiana Jones movies originated, they were always rough and bloody. The bloodlessness of Dial of Destiny is one thing, but with the amount of PG-13 blockbusters that Disney puts hundreds of millions of dollars out for, it begins to beg the question as to where the money is going. And since everything looks clean, it just makes the action feel boring, which is the last word anyone should want to use to describe an Indiana Jones movie.
At 154 minutes in length, Dial of Destiny is the longest Indiana Jones movie to date. Unfortunately, the gargantuan length can be felt, because it seems like this is the one Indiana Jones movie that spends the most time either on exposition or your average history lesson as if you’re in a class that isn’t that of Indy’s. But even then, with all the ridiculous elements pertaining to science fiction, fantasy, or the supernatural in past Indiana Jones movies where you’ve had hearts ripped out from people’s bodies in Temple of Doom or aliens in Kingdom of the Crystal Skull, Dial of Destiny fails at finding the balance that perfectly leads into this because of all the dead time in between action scenes. There’s not much adventure anymore, it just feels like stretched boredom.
The film’s highs can be felt in the chemistry that Harrison Ford and Phoebe Waller-Bridge share with one another. If anything, where Harrison Ford’s old age would render Indiana Jones into an old crank, it’s fun seeing Phoebe Waller-Bridge come into the picture in order to knock sense into Indiana Jones for his last venture. Mads Mikkelsen is also a fun villain, but it’s also a shame that the energy of the three leads carrying this film never really feel like they’re enough. John Rhys-Davies’s return to these films as Sallah is fun, but compared to what you’re seeing in the trailers, his part is essentially a glorified cameo. This unfortunately is how many of the new characters come across: in particular, it’s Boyd Holbrook who seems to suffer the most as a result.
It’s not fair that I say James Mangold is no Steven Spielberg, because no one is. But when you feel how much is missing without Spielberg at the helm, it shows. As disappointing as Kingdom of the Crystal Skull might have been, there’s enough touches to Steven Spielberg’s direction from being so closely attached to this franchise that keep it afloat up until its third act. James Mangold, not having that same connection that Spielberg does can only try so much to replicate that and as a concluding chapter to the Indiana Jones saga, Dial of Destiny doesn’t work. There’s nothing new to the franchise coming about, and it just rings as a hollow imitation of what once was greatness.
Watch the trailer right here.
All images via Disney.
Directed by James Mangold
Screenplay by James Mangold, Jez Butterworth, John-Henry Butterworth, David Koepp
Produced by Kathleen Kennedy, Frank Marshall, Simon Emanuel
Starring Harrison Ford, Phoebe Waller-Bridge, Antonio Banderas, John Rhys-Davies, Toby Jones, Boyd Holbrook, Ethann Isidore, Mads Mikkelsen
Release Date: June 30, 2023
Running Time: 154 minutes
Cinema from the Spectrum 