Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny
Indy’s fifth outing, with an 80-year-old Harrison Ford returning to the fray, now seems terribly quaint and old hat.
Digging for old: Phoebe Waller-Bridge and Harrison Ford
Some legends are best left to turn to a golden hue in the memory. The motor oil of nostalgia can only get one so far – and the summer marketplace seems choked with the stuff. Indiana Jones is now 70, and Harrison Ford is 80. And, yeah, Ford could pass for 65, but one minute Indy is complaining about his age and the next he’s jumping on a horse and galloping down the New York subway. He can’t have it both ways. He looks even younger in 1944, where he appears to have attained almost superhuman powers and looks just like Harrison Ford of yore. The computer-generated imagery is as much a constant element here as the archaeological artefacts and it does wonders with 1960s’ Manhattan and all the excitement of the moon landing. For crooked Nazi Dr Schmidt (adopting the surname that George Lucas originally chose for Indiana), science has conquered space and it’s time to move on to another frontier – and another bloody portal: time travel.
Steven Spielberg, who directed the first four chapters of the franchise, was loath to bring the Germans back, having directed Schindler’s List and closed that particular book. But this time James Mangold is at the helm, working from a screenplay by the brothers Jez and John-Henry Butterworth, David Koepp and himself. And, sure enough, the opening scenes are swarming with Nazis, who are rounding up their stolen booty before the enemy stops them in their tracks. But Indiana Jones (a digitally de-aged Ford) and his friend and fellow archaeologist Basil Shaw (Toby Jones) have been captured while in pursuit of the Lance of Longinus, the spear which pierced Jesus’s side while on the cross and which apparently holds supernatural powers. But there is something even more valuable on board the Nazis’ “plunder train” – an astrological clock designed by none other than Archimedes – the dial of the title. Following the familiar shenanigans on the roof of a speeding train – mind that bridge! – the story jumps forward to 1969, where we encounter a decrepit Indy delivering an exceedingly boring lecture at Hunter College. Things perk up with the arrival of Helena Shaw (Phoebe Waller-Bridge), Indy’s smart if unscrupulous god-daughter, along with Dr Schmidt (Mads Mikkelsen) and his trigger-happy cronies still in search of the ‘clock’, actually an analogue computer, aka the Antikythera.
It is regrettable that this $295 million behemoth, so long in gestation, arrives just days after the release of Sam Hargrave’s Extraction II on Netflix. By comparison, the stuntwork in Dial of Destiny seems quite tame – almost quaint – as the “ageing graverobber” (Helena’s words) dashes around the backstreets of Tangier in a tuk-tuk. And there’s more homage than you’ll find in a month of lifetime achievement acceptance speeches. There’s the wily little street kid (a moustachioed Ethann Isidore), the scene with the giant creepy crawlies and something both serpentine and slithery. Inevitably, John Williams’ theme tune is raided at constant intervals and there are musical allusions to Jaws and even Lawrence of Arabia (a favourite of Spielberg’s). It’s all more cosy than awesome, although the inspired casting of Phoebe Waller-Bridge does add considerable class.
JAMES CAMERON-WILSON
Cast: Harrison Ford, Phoebe Waller-Bridge, Antonio Banderas, Karen Allen, John Rhys-Davies, Shaunette Renée Wilson, Thomas Kretschmann, Toby Jones, Boyd Holbrook, Olivier Richters, Ethann Isidore, Mads Mikkelsen, Martin McDougall, Alaa Safi, Francis Chapman, Nasser Memarzia.
Dir James Mangold, Pro Kathleen Kennedy, Frank Marshall and Simon Emanuel, Ex Pro George Lucas and Steven Spielberg, Screenplay Jez Butterworth, John-Henry Butterworth, David Koepp and James Mangold, Ph Phedon Papamichael, Pro Des Adam Stockhausen, Ed Michael McCusker, Andrew Buckland and Dirk Westervelt, Music John Williams, Costumes Joanna Johnston and Stella McCartney, Sound Kyrsten Mate, Gary Rydstrom, Josh Gould and Warren Hendriks, Dialect coaches Jill McCullough and Gerry Grennell.
Walt Disney Pictures and Lucasfilm Ltd-Walt Disney Studios.
154 mins. USA. 2023. UK Rel: 28 June 2023. US Rel: 30 June 2023. Cert. 12A.
