Unless you’ve been living under a rock, you probably know that Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny premieres in theaters on June 30. It’s been screened at the Cannes film festival, and we’ve known the basic beats of the film for a while. But will it, put simply, suck?
What we know
The film takes place largely in the late 1960s, where we find Indiana Jones ready to retire. There is, apparently, a long flashback sequence to 1939, where a de-aged Harrison Ford delivers a performance that’s supposed to be identical to what you’ve seen from the first three films. There’s also Phoebe Waller-Bridge, a brilliant comic actor. There are hints that she will continue the franchise, if people want her to.
What we’ve seen
A lot of people consider Raiders of the Lost Ark to be one of the more perfect films of the late 20th century. I’ll say, for a long time I was one of those people. But, although it’s a loving homage to the serial films that came before it, it’s not perfect. It’s darn good and very entertaining, but it’s weird and creaky in spots and sometimes it just loses the plot.
The next three films in the franchise were more or less well-regarded. Many considered 1984’s Temple of Doom the best of the whole series. With today’s lens, though, it suffers from some really uncomfortable racial stereotyping. I personally had little regard for the Last Crusade back in 1989, finding it a retread of the first film. Still, it’s aged much better than other films in the series. We thought of 2008’s Kingdom of the Crystal Skull as a dud in its initial release. I rewatched it a couple of months ago and found it was better than I remembered.
The bottom line, though, is that none of the succeeding films really ever captured the magic of the first one, and none succeeding in advancing the film’s mythology past what we knew back in 1981. With another Nazi-heavy plot, it seems likely that Dial of Destiny won’t move things forward either.
Yes I will see it anyway
There are very few franchises that people will pay to see even if they know they’ll hate the film. Fast and the Furious, Star Wars, and Mission: Impossible movies come with some regularity and we all shell out the fifteen bucks to see them. We know we’ll come out cranky and unsatisfied. But at this point that’s sort of part of the fun.
I expect that when I leave the theater after having seen the latest Indiana Jones film, I’ll shrug and say “meh, that was a way to spend three hours.” I won’t get all revved up like I did in 1981. But then again, I’m 42 years older and nothing is going to light me up like it did then. So I take the thrill ride I can take and move on.
But shouldn’t we expect more?
For over a generation, we as a society have complained that “franchises” have ruined Hollywood and made it nearly impossible for new ideas to succeed. Obviously there is no greater example of this than the Marvel Cinematic Universe and its roughly 23 films of declining quality. Each film makes a ton of money even if it’s not very good, and crowds out other more deserving films in the process. Then, as it’s slowly petered out, it’s left moviegoers wondering if they should even bother to go back to the theater.
Don’t get me wrong folks. It’s great for me that most successful films just recycle characters from my youth. But it’s only going to get us so far. My rough guess is that over two-thirds of Americans living today weren’t even born in 1981, never mind being old enough to see a movie. Where does it leave them? How engaged are they going to be at a retreaded franchise that started when their parents were kids?
At some point there will be a huge “snap” and moviemakers will stop catering to the childhoods of boomers and GenX. The real question is, will it be too late.
The destiny of Dial of Destiny
My gut tells me that a generation from now, film historians will look at Dial of Destiny as one of the last gasps of a movie franchise system that desperately needed to die. It will never be spoken of other than in that context. It, along with the Star Wars TV shows and the last films in the Fast franchise, will be pleasant memories. Still we will say they were doomed from the start. Not even a dial of destiny could save them.
Meanwhile, all I can say as I prepare to see the film is, please at least let me be entertained.
