Movie Review: ‘Indiana Jones And The Dial Of Destiny’

Review by James Lindorf

Inexplicably Nazis are back, and that means the return of Antifa icon Indiana Jones. Yes, the famed archeologist, now played by 80-year-old Harrison Ford, is back on the big screen for another globetrotting adventure. From New York to Tunisia to the Aegean Sea, danger and friends lurk behind every corner. Newcomers Phoebe Waller-Bridge, Toby Jones, Antonio Banderas, and Mads Mikkelsen join Indy on his journey to save the world. While Karen Allen and John Rhys-Davies are each back for their third go around. “Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny” opens exclusively in theaters on June 30th.

Harrison Ford is continuing his career victory lap playing Indiana Jones for the fifth and final time after previously returning to the roles of Han Solo in 2015 and Rick Deckard in 2017. It has been 42 years since Ford first donned the fedora and 15 since Spielberg threatened to pass it on to Shia LaBeouf. With the apparent desire to return to this world after so much time, it is surprising that they did so without much to say. “Dial of Destiny” doesn’t want to talk about aging unless they are making a joke or two, and they definitely don’t want to touch on the resurgence of nationalism and Nazi idolization. A boilerplate adventure may not be the event of a lifetime, but it can still be a great time it comes down to the details.

“Dial of Destiny” opens with a prolonged segment near the tail end of WWII. Using a mix of quality CGI and “Uncharted 3” graphics, director James Mangold reintroduces the audience to our hero at his swashbuckling peak as well as introducing this film’s prized artifact and its main bad guy Dr. Jürgen Voller (Mads Mikkelsen). From there, we jump nearly 25 years into the future and see Jones as a lonely, cranky archeology professor on the final day of a long career. His miserable alcohol-fueled life is disrupted by the reappearance of his goddaughter Helena Shaw (Phoebe Waller-Bridge). Helena has continued the work of her late father and Indy’s friend and colleague Basil Shaw (Toby Jones), who had become obsessed with the Antikythera, aka Archimedes’s Dial, aka the dial of destiny. The pair bond, and Jones is convinced to show her the half of the Antikythera he has kept hidden for nearly 20 years. The reunion is broken up by the appearance of numerous government agents and thugs working on behalf of Dr. Voller sending everyone on the run to protect or claim the dial through multiple action set pieces and a dramatic moment or two. Along the way, Indy visits new and old friends such as Antonio Banderas’ deep sea diver Renaldo and Sallah (John Rhys-Davies). He even meets this movie’s version of Short Round, Teddy, an aspiring pilot and criminal played by newcomer Ethann Isidore.

The single best element of the film is its cast and, in particular, the supporting cast. Toby Jones is as wonderful as ever, and Phoebe Waller-Bridge is fantastic. I would be there on opening day for a “Helena Shaw and the MacGuffin” spinoff because she has all the talent and charisma that made audiences fall in love with the original Indiana Jones films. Slightly less successful on the heroic side are Ford and Isidore, who both give fine performances but occasionally flub a delivery and fail to reach the heights of Waller-Bridge and Toby Jones are giving us.

On the evil side, Mads Mikkelsen is also giving an excellent performance. Unfortunately, he has to make the best of a bad situation. Voller is an underdeveloped villain surrounded by henchmen who might as well be known as Shooty (Boyd Holbrook) and The Giant (Olivier Richters), for how one note they are.
Four different writers were involved in the construction of this story: Jez Butterworth, John-Henry Butterworth, David Koepp, and director James Mangold. Every one of them failed this cast. They handed an A+ cast a C+ script. Whether in-fighting, laziness, overconfidence, fear of an octogenarian leading man, or a dozen other reasons that led to the issues, they came up short of what could have been.

The good news? The cast is excellent. The bad news? The writing is middle of the road. The ugly news? “Dial of Destiny” is an ugly film when CGI comes into play. The cities have the depth of the average alley. Once you get beyond the area, the actors are working; it looks like the world started buffering. It gives every impression that this was filmed in as few locations as possible with a green screen providing much of the world. Some things had to be done in person, but for everything else, at least the set design and costuming are great. Some may argue having the child character choose to kill someone is the ugly part. On the other hand, people may not think twice because it was a Nazi, perhaps the least sympathetic group of all time.

“Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny” is good, just not great. It does most things well and some distracting things not so well. The run time should have been at least 15 minutes shorter to get closer to the two-hour mark, which would increase the pacing, which makes you forget about the inferior elements because they are already on to the next thing. “Dial of Destiny” may not be “Raiders.” Still, it is a solid conclusion to the Indiana Jones franchise that should satisfy fans of all ages. And who knows, it could be the start of something great if that rumored spinoff goes into production. “Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny” dialed in a score of 3.5 out of 5 from me, and we hope to hear what you think in the comments or on social media.

Rating: PG-13
Genre: Adventure, Action
Original Language: English
Director: James Mangold
Producer: Kathleen Kennedy, Frank Marshall, Simon Emanuel
Writer: Jez Butterworth, John-Henry Butterworth, David Koepp, James Mangold
Release Date: June 30th, 2023
Runtime: 2h 24m
Distributor: Walt Disney Pictures
Production Co: Lucasfilm Ltd.