Let’s get this out of the way at the outset: it’s impossible to review Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny without having to discuss a certain amount of cultural baggage. Indiana Jones is one of those cultural artefacts that belongs in a museum. Most of us have strong opinions about the films, the character, and even the studios. It is beloved by many but hated by a few, being the personification of the big blockbuster era of the 1980s, popcorn moviedom with a veneer of critical success, as well as the Disneyfication of popular culture.
Right here and now, Dial of Destiny is a film that’s going to get review bombed and review lauded, often deliberately but sometimes invertedly. It’s a franchise whose roots have penetrated deep into our subconscious minds. It makes it impossible to judge it in situ, as a thing unto itself. Fans will love it as an unexpected return to an abused and forgotten franchise or hate that it wasn’t made 30 years earlier. They will resent seeing Harrison Ford up on the screen at 103 years old, delivering all his lines with the help of an athletic support… And they have a point. In an ideal world, we’d happily trade Sabrina, Six Days and Seven Nights, Random Hearts, and Regarding Henry for just one more Indiana Jones movie with Ford at his peak.
And yet… It is what it is. And what it is is better than we could have hoped for and (whisper it quietly) pretty damn good. If you accept the logic that Indiana Jones movies are ranked Raiders, Last Crusade, Crystal Skull, and Temple of Doom (with the last two swappable depending on your mood), then Dial of Destiny slips effortlessly into third place. It might even be snapping at the heels of Raiders and Lost Crusade, though only because overfamiliarity with those two classics has reduced their effect.
Dial of Destiny also lends credence to the argument that Indiana Jones is only as good as his co-stars and antagonists. Certainly, Crystal Skull failed because of the weakness of both. Fans did not buy a ticket to watch Shia LaBeouf be prepped as his replacement, whilst Kate Blanchett’s Irina Spalko was the series’ least effective villain, even less substantial than her cameo for Sparks at Glastonbury. Conversely, Indy at his best was supported by Sean Connery, Karen Allen, Paul Freeman, Denholm Elliott, Julian Glover, and, of course, River Phoenix in the stellar sequence introducing the young Henry Jones Jr.
Dial of Destiny does not have that weakness. It succeeds largely because Ford is helped along by a strong supporting cast. In the long opening sequence, set in World War 2, his help is in the form of Toby Jones, with Mads Mikkelsen providing the Nazi threat, as he does in the rest of the movie. The sequence is noticeable for the use of face replacement technology to make Ford young again. It doesn’t work or only works sporadically: great when he’s looking towards the camera, unconvincing from every other angle. This is not the Marvel movies where the de-ageing technology is seamless. Too many moments shock you out of the fiction to realise you’re looking at CGI. In one scene in which Jones is hung from a noose, even the noose looks like it’s been generated in CGI. It’s all very off-putting.
The good news is that the rest of the film doesn’t suffer from anything like these faults. There are a couple of shots when old Indy is riding a horse through New York where the same technology fails, but it’s forgivable. It’s the “de-youngified” Ford who carries the movie with many of the qualities that made him the best action star of his generation. You have to be perhaps a real fan of the franchise to understand that nobody runs like Ford but, if you do, then be assured: in this film Ford runs like Ford. And at no point during the subsequent two hours do you think him too old for this film. It makes enough allowances and doesn’t stress him too much. He’s acting his age. It’s good.
Instead, we have Phoebe Waller-Bridge playing his goddaughter. On some level, her casting is a bit jarring. As if to play into her “Fleabag” identity, she’s here labelled “Wombat”. If you’ve seen Stewart Lee’s brilliant ‘Basic Lee’ set, you might be left wondering if he’d only been a little braver it would have been him hanging around Ford’s neck but, in truth, Waller-Bridge is very good. Her character has enough sass and edge that she’s more in the spirit of Karen Allen’s Marion than Kate Capshaw’s hysterical and annoying Willie Scott from Temple of Doom. She’s aided by Teddy Kumar played by Ethann Isidore who fills the Short Round role. That’s not as bad as it sounds. Ke Huy Quan has achieved success thanks to the Oscar he won for Everything Everywhere All at Once but it shouldn’t be forgotten that his part as Short Round was one of the most ruinous factors around Temple of Doom. Thankfully here Teddy is likeable and even when he shouts it’s in the audible range and isn’t likely to affect dogs, low-flying aircraft, and the migratory patterns of sperm whales.
Quite a few of the main beats of the film feel like they’ve been lifted from the other movies (or, if you prefer, provide some of the stock generic elements). Creepy crawlies. Ancient mechanisms. Rusty McGuffins wrapped in dirty old bits of cloth. People will point to the final sequence, which might be as jarring as the alien element in Crystal Skull, but none of it is any more outlandish than the Biblical magic in Raiders or the ridiculous Thuggee mysticism in Temple of Doom.
You really do know how it goes and it’s enjoyable and, rarest of all, edgy. Yes, this Indiana Jones is old and cantankerous but that’s to overlook that the young Indiana Jones was already older than his age and always cantankerous. Remember the Ford who scowled his way through his first love scene with Karen Allen in Raiders of the Lost Ark? This Indiana Jones is not a whole lot different now he’s in his seventies.
A few of the old cast make cameos and, in the case of this viewer, something did get in my eye (twice) and John Williams’ score hits all the right notes, not simply underpinning the action but weaving a sonic tapestry that seems to bend space and time to tie it all in with similar moments from the other films. Arguably the only thing lacking is Spielberg’s touch – those two of three shots in every film where the camera dollies towards Ford’s face or does something amazing and you bow to the man’s genius – but for all of that, the direction by James Mangold is respectful, albeit to the point of being a little too reserved.
This was the movie we should have had with Crystal Skull but, as it is, that mistake allowed us to get three “final” Indiana Jones movies (assuming that The Last Crusade was also meant to be the last one). And this one will probably be the last.
Probably.
Because there’s one last word to be said about that face tech. AI is still in its infancy and if the face tech is this good now (albeit not quite good enough to carry 20 minutes of a film), then maybe Indiana Jones 6 is not that unlikely, if not with Ford than with his likeness. Disney is a consummate raider of popular franchises. This didn’t feel like an ending as much as it is a new kind of beginning.
@DavidWaywell
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