Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny
DISNEYIndiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny is the fifth and final outing of Harrison Ford's beloved archaeologist. A franchise that began forty years ago as the brainchild of George Lucas and Steven Spielberg has stood the test of time, mostly. The Last Crusade was a perfectly fitting ending for our adventurous lead character and gave closure to the franchise as a whole. This is before it was dug up and out on display once again in 2008 with the release of Kingdom of the Crystal Skull, a maddeningly sub-par edition of the Indiana Jones mythos. Still, it was a Spielberg and Lucas joint so there was some magic there behind the camera. This brings the franchise to the present day with the release of Dial of Destiny, the first, and possibly last, of the franchise under Disney ownership.
Directed by James Mangold, an intensely talented director all around, but it, unfortunately, doesn't work very well as a whole. The elephant in the room is the massive budget – three-hundred million – and how the first act of the film takes place entirely in the past with a de-aged Harrison Ford gallivanting around with his main franchise enemy, Nazis. It will be fascinating in a few years to learn just how the budget ballooned so far out of proportion to what had come before it. Now, the de-aging effects are unmistakably remarkable, with some closeup shots looking almost real, but the issue with this sequence comes from that key phrase: almost. There's an uncanny valley issue that runs rampant during the whole opening segment. The set piece itself is perfectly fine, if a bit underwhelming due to the overt reliance on CGI, and Mangold does a very good job of keeping the pace up and the action front and centre for the audience. There's just far too much weight and emotion put into the hands of a technology that isn't where it needs to be for this to work.
After this sequence, we are brought back into the present day, and Indy is not doing very well since the audience last saw him. Some things happen off-screen that is explained later but, for better or for worse, Indy is on his own and still a professor. There's a strange ever-present sadness that is constantly running through the DNA of the film's almost 3-hour runtime, and while it is most certainly on purpose, it does feel like a strange choice, even if it is given proper closure during the absolute insanity of the final act. It can just be tough to watch an 81-year-old man recreate his iconic action hero with the downfall of it being able to accomplish many of the stunts that made him an action hero. Crystal Skull was not loved by any means, but it handled Indy's age and relationships much more gracefully, as opposed to the sledgehammer approach Mangold has taken with Dial of Destiny.
There are some strong positives that are brought into Indy's final chapter that being made more recently have allowed. The biggest of these positives is the presence of the always wonderful Mads Mikkelson as the main antagonist in the search for the Dial of Destiny. His charismatic presence is unmatched by so many due to his strength playing an intimidating villain. As a matter of fact, there's not a single poor performance from anyone with substantial screen time in this film. This is something that can be attributed to the collection of massively talented actors and Mangold himself being an excellent director capable of getting the best performances possible
Mangold is able to pull a genuinely heartfelt performance from Harrison Ford, and it is a beautiful portrayal of an aging hero. The biggest issue with giving Indy such a powerful finale comes at the expense of earlier films in the series with an almost total erasure of Crystal Skull. Though Dial of Destiny does have a more well-rounded "sidekick" in Phoebe Waller-Bridge, even if the writing itself that she was given wasn't necessarily the strongest. She gives a very strong commanding tone to the material due to a high level of confidence in the role she is playing and does a nice job stepping away from her Fleabag persona. This is a total shift from what Shia Labeouf brought to the role of Mutt in Crystal Skull; Labeouf brought an aura of haphazardness and fake confidence that dragged the film around him down even more than it had already begun to sink.
The third act is by far the strongest segment of the film, because it allowed the film to dive deep into its themes of ageing and regret while also giving a fitting conclusion to the story at hand. Whenever films are allowed to swing for the fences it is a wonderful thing. This is a movie that swings for the fences. Unfortunately, the very final moments end on a safe, even if emotionally resonant, note. By having the franchise strut towards its final few minutes by bringing Indy back into the status quo the film does a bit of disservice to the films that came before. Though, admittedly, when taken on its own, and not as part of a franchise, the ending works fine as a fitting conclusion for the world's favourite archaeologist.
There are a few fitting pieces of nostalgia strewn through the mammoth runtime (the always magnificent score from John Williams) but at the end of the day, the newer aspects of the film are not strong enough to warrant their own existence. Hopefully, the overlords of Disney allow this franchise to rest in peace now. Indy has been given three separate endings in forty years, and that's more than enough for anyone. This is a movie that will hold a place for years to come due to the franchise it plays a piece of, but unfortunately this is one that should've ended a long time ago.