Review: New Indiana Jones movie deserves better reviews

Critics have been hard on “Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny,” the fifth and final installment of the Indiana Jones movies (starting in 1981 with “Raiders of the Lost Ark”). But whereas the current Indiana Jones movie is by no means as good as Raiders of the Lost Ark (perhaps not as good as any of the previous Indiana Jones movies), it’s an enjoyable film worthy of summer viewing.

As in “Raiders of the Lost Ark,” Indiana is again tangling with Nazis over an ancient artifact. The year is 1944 and Germany is in tatters as it heads to inevitable and crushing defeat at the hands of the Allies. Indiana Jones (Harrison Ford) manages to seize from a Nazi train a dial dating back to 212 BC and which was owned by the mathematician Archimedes. The other half of the dial is somewhere at the bottom of the Mediterranean.

Fast forward to 1969. Indiana is an aging and retired archaeology professor at Hunter College in New York.  On this particular day, there is a ticker-tape parade for the Apollo 11 astronauts who have just returned from the first manned mission to the Moon. Indiana is relaxing in a bar when he is approached by a person from his past. Helena Shaw (Phoebe Waller-Bridge) is both his god-daughter and the daughter of Indiana’s late colleague. She has a proposition for Indiana that the both of them try to retrieve the other half of the dial.

Indiana invites Helena to the archives to show her the half of the dial he had seized and is now in the possession of the college museum. They are at this time accosted by thugs, one being Nazi astrophysicist Jurgen Voller (Mads Mikkelsen). Helena manages to evade the bandits and flee with the dial (and abandoning Indiana). She goes to North Africa to sell the dial on the antiquities black-market. Indiana follows Helena to North Africa and confronts her as she is engaging in the bidding war for the dial. At the same time, the Nazi thugs appear and seize the dial. After several involved chase scenes (perhaps too involved), the duel ends up between two boats on the Mediterranean with Indiana recovering the dial.

But it’s important at this time to discuss the importance of the dial. Its value is way beyond the fact that it is an ancient artifact. Archimedes believed the dial possessed the power to form a time fissure, in other words to enable time travel, if only the dial could be connected to its missing half. Indiana and Helena find the other half while deep sea diving in the Mediterranean.

Whereas Indiana is skeptical of such power, Voller is convinced of it. His plan is to travel back in time to Germany in 1939. Voller intends to assassinate Hitler prior to the latter waging war. Not that Voller is trying to avoid a world war.  It is his position that Hitler was a fool and that the Third Reich would have triumphed had it only rid itself of him.

Voller and the Nazi thugs again seize the dial (this time with its other half) and by plane create a time fissure to travel to Munich, Germany in 1939. They have also taken Indiana as a prisoner. Helena pursues them also by plane and everyone ends up beyond the time fissure. But the results aren’t what Voller had expected.

The several pursuits back and forth are tiring and take up too much a part of the movie. But the film is in the fun tradition of Indiana Jones and there is genuine suspense toward the conclusion of the movie. Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny is an enjoyable film and the two plus hours go by fast (a sign of a good movie). Director James Mangold has delivered a quality film the whole family will enjoy.

John O’Neill is an Allen Park free-lance writer.