Review: Indiana Jones And The Dial Of Destiny
A Legend Will Face His Destiny.
THE PLOT
Finding himself in a new era, approaching retirement, Indy wrestles with fitting into a world that seems to have outgrown him. But as the tentacles of an all-too-familiar evil return in the form of an old rival, Indy must don his hat and pick up his whip once more to make sure an ancient and powerful artifact doesn’t fall into the wrong hands.
QUICK REVIEW
There was a time where the Indiana Jones film series was a highly heralded franchise that got Oscars attention, raved by critics, and drew massive box office alongside great audience scores. But then came the fourth installment in 2008 which got mixed reviews, and though it did well at the box office, its easily the most reviled among audiences. I for one don’t get the hate for that movie as I consider all the movies in the series’ catalog to be A-tier fun romps, but I am easily in the minority versus the public at-large.
So we get yet another nostalgic-driven attempt to cap off the franchise on a high note with what will undoubtedly be the truly final film in Indiana Jones And The Dial Of Destiny. And once again the reviews have been mixed, however the audience reception I’m following is much better than the previous film. It seems to be landing around a ranking as a lesser film versus the original trilogy, but nonetheless the regular movie go-er seems to be having more fun with it than the other post-eighties installment. But how did I land?
Well if I actually consider the much maligned Indiana Jones And The Kingdom Of The Crystal Skull to be a fun romp, its no surprise that I fall in the same place for this new entry. Granted its by no means perfect. Its overlong, there’s a kid side-character that is a woeful attempt at re-capturing the magic of the Short Round character, the Helena character Phoebe Waller-Bridge plays might steal the show a little too much for some (This was not a problem for me), and the franchise’ big weakness of weak villains continues here though the great Mads Mikkelsen does try his best with the material given to him.
But the sense of adventure remains, Harrison Ford still knocks it out of the park as Indy, the focus on history and mythology is still there, and the iconic score still does the job of bringing back all those nostalgic feels. The finale might not work for some, but it finishes things up for Indy in a way that wraps things up for our hero to a satisfying conclusion. And keep in mind I binged the previous entries before watching this one so perhaps seeing all of these back-to-back-to-back-to-back-to-back did affect my viewing a bit but for me they all just weld together as a great epic adventure series that spans time.
This won’t be the awards contender some thought it could be, and there will be some who think it doesn’t justify its existence, but I thought it was a great adventure flick that used the nostalgic love for the Indy series very effectively to wrap up the story of the action-hero archeologist. I might have to rethink my grading by the end of the year, but for now I’m gonna’ go ahead and give Indiana Jones And The Dial Of Destiny just enough to crack the A-tier for me.
INTIAL GRADING
