When the dreadful de-aging effects are gone, and we’re in the movie’s present day of 1969, Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny settles into something quite good.
The film opens in 1944 in Europe, with the Nazis going down in flames, and a de-aged Indiana Jones encountering an artifact known as Archimedes’ Dial. The accompanying action sequence would be fine, were it not for the thoroughly unpleasant distraction of de-aging visual effects that seem to exist as a proof of concept more than something that actually belongs in the film. You’re going to find it was easier to believe Indy survived a nuclear explosion inside a refrigerator more than you’ll believe you’re looking at the real face of a real human being.
I’m dwelling on this one aspect of Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny, the one thing about the movie that I didn’t really like, because the movie really wanted me to enjoy it. I found it was unpleasant and distracting enough to shave a point or two off a very fitting conclusion to one of my favorite film characters of all time.
Dial of Destiny has a far better story than the film’s middling marketing campaign will have you believe. One involving Indiana Jones living alone, separated from the family he gained at the end of Kingdom of the Crystal Skull, and on the verge of being forced into retirement at Hunter College in New York City. Events that occurred in the film’s opening, involving an artifact known as Archimedes Dial, an object with the ability to predict naturally-occurring fissures in time itself, will soon force our hero into his final glorious adventure. And is it in fact a glorious final adventure?
It is. Director and co-writer James Mangold really hasn’t missed in a long film career that began with the exceptional neo noir thriller Cop Land in 1997, and he’s the right director to helm a story that puts Ford and his character front and center, while surrounding him with interesting characters and emotional beats that resonate nicely.
Harrison Ford as Indiana Jones is of course the most important element to any Indy film. I was relieved that the film gave Ford space to portray Jones as a much older man than when we saw him 15 years earlier, let alone for the first time in 1981. The film acknowledges his aging nicely, but this is still Indiana Jones, and he’s still played by Harrison Ford, and both of those things still kick ass. Ford is the heart and soul of why this movie is fun, and why this movie has a heart beneath its modern special effects and abundance of IP value. There’s also a lot of other elements that work to the strength of Dial of Destiny.
The film’s action sequences are often very entertaining, including a fantastic chase sequence near the beginning with Jones riding a horse through the streets of New York, and another involving an auto-rickshaw in Tangier. Dial of Destiny also has some great characters. Phoebe Waller-Bridge makes her own mark as Jones’ goddaughter Helena “Wombat” Shaw, the daughter of a late colleague of Jones (played nicely by the great Toby Jones), with some good one-liners and banter with Ford. She’s credible as a partner for Jones, with her own reasons for wanting Archimedes’ Dial. Perhaps most satisfying of all is Mads Mikkelsen as a Nazi scientist, fresh from his triumphs at NASA, who wants to use the Dial to unlock the secrets of time travel. Mikkelsen is perhaps the best villain since the last time Indiana Jones slapped some Nazis around.
Everything works, even as Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny heads for a pretty wild conclusion. I’m not going to spoil the movie where it really counts, but I can say it’s a conclusion that feels like the best farewell to Indiana Jones you could ask for.
Dial of Destiny gives us plenty of action, and plays as mostly a film able to stand on its own, while also evoking the spirit of the best of the previous entries. This trend runs through most of the film, and I think Dial of Destiny will restore the faith of those who still believe Kingdom of the Crystal Skull ruined some part of their lives.
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