Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny
Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny is a 2023 American action adventure film directed by James Mangold, who co-wrote it with David Koepp and the writing team of Jez and John-Henry Butterworth. It is the fifth and final installment in the Indiana Jones film series and the sequel to Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull (2008). It stars Harrison Ford, John Rhys-Davies, and Karen Allen reprising their roles as Indiana Jones, Sallah, and Marion Ravenwood, respectively, while new cast members include Phoebe Waller-Bridge, Antonio Banderas, Toby Jones, Boyd Holbrook, Ethann Isidore, and Mads Mikkelsen. Set in 1969, the film follows Indy and his estranged goddaughter, Helena, who are trying to locate a powerful artifact before Dr. Jürgen Voller, a Nazi-turned-NASA scientist, who plans to use it to alter the outcome of World War II.
Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny
- Jez Butterworth
- John-Henry Butterworth
- David Koepp
- James Mangold
- Kathleen Kennedy
- Frank Marshall
- Simon Emanuel
- Michael McCusker
- Andrew Buckland
- Dirk Westervelt
- May 18, 2023 (Cannes)
- June 30, 2023 (United States)
154 minutes[3]
United States
English
$295–387 million[b]
Dial of Destiny is the only film in the series that is neither directed by Steven Spielberg nor conceived by George Lucas, with both serving as executive producers instead. It is also the first film in the series not to be distributed by Paramount Pictures, following Walt Disney Studios' acquisition of Lucasfilm and film rights for future sequels. Paramount retains the distribution rights to the first four films and a residual associate credit.
Plans for a fifth Indiana Jones film date back to the late 1970s, when a deal was made with Paramount to produce four sequels to Raiders of the Lost Ark (1981). Lucas began researching potential plot devices for a fifth film in 2008, and Koepp was eventually hired to write the film in 2016. A release date was set for 2019, which was then delayed several times due to rewrites and the COVID-19 pandemic. In 2018, Jonathan Kasdan replaced Koepp and eventually left the project. Spielberg was originally set to direct but stepped down in 2020, with Mangold taking his place. Filming began in June 2021 in various locations including the United Kingdom, Italy, and Morocco, wrapping in February 2022. Longtime franchise composer John Williams returned to compose and conduct the film's score, for which he was nominated for Best Original Score at the 96th Academy Awards and Best Score Soundtrack for Visual Media at the 66th Annual Grammy Awards, with Williams winning a Grammy for Best Instrumental Composition for "Helena's Theme".[9]
Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny premiered out of competition at the 76th Cannes Film Festival on May 18, 2023, and was theatrically released in the United States on June 30, by Walt Disney Studios Motion Pictures. The film received mixed reviews, and grossed $384 million worldwide, becoming a box office flop due to a lack of wide audience appeal and being one of the most expensive movies ever made, with estimated losses of $143 million for Disney.
Plot
In 1944, Nazis capture Indiana Jones and Oxford archaeologist Basil Shaw as they attempt to retrieve the Lance of Longinus from a castle in the French Alps. Astrophysicist Jürgen Voller informs his superiors the Lance is fake, but he has found half of Archimedes' Dial, an Antikythera mechanism built by the ancient Syracusan mathematician Archimedes which reveals time fissures, thereby allowing for possible time travel. Indy escapes onto a Berlin-bound train filled with looted antiquities and frees Basil. He obtains the piece of the Dial, and the two escape the train just before Allied forces derail it.
In 1969, Indy is retiring from Hunter College in New York City. Marion has recently left him and filed for legal separation due to both parties' depression over their son Mutt being killed in the Vietnam War. Indy's goddaughter, archaeologist Helena Shaw, unexpectedly visits and wants to research the Dial. Indy warns that her late father, Basil, became obsessed with studying the Dial before relinquishing it to Indy to destroy, which he never did.
As Indy and Helena retrieve the Dial half from the college archives, Voller's accomplices attack them. The CIA assists Voller, now working for NASA as "Dr. Schmidt". Helena, revealed as an antiquities smuggler, absconds with the Dial to put it up for auction on the black market. Indy is framed for two colleagues' murders, forcing him to escape through the Apollo 11 moon landing parade, then an anti-war protest.
Indy seeks out his old friend Sallah, now a New York cab driver, who helps him flee the country after surmising that Helena will likely sell the Dial in Tangier. At a Tangier hotel, Indy disrupts Helena's illegal private auction, but Voller and his henchmen arrive and steal the artifact. Indy, Helena, and her teen sidekick Teddy Kumar chase them through the streets in a tuk-tuk. The CIA intercepts Voller after the U.S. government disavows him for going rogue, but his cohorts murder the agents and steal their helicopter.
Indy, Helena and Teddy trail Voller to Greece and team up with Indy's old friend Renaldo, a professional diver. Guided by Basil's research, they dive to an ancient Aegean Sea shipwreck and retrieve a "graphikos" tablet containing directions to the Dial's other half. Voller arrives and murders Renaldo and all of his crew. Indy's group escapes and heads to Sicily, pursued by Voller.
Inside the Ear of Dionysius cavern, Indy and Helena find Archimedes' tomb, the Dial's second half, and a 20th century wristwatch on Archimedes' skeletal arm. Voller appears and captures Indy, wounding him. Helena and Teddy escape and chase Voller. After reassembling the Dial, Voller reveals his plans to travel back to 1939 to assassinate Adolf Hitler and help lead Germany to victory in World War II without repeating Hitler's mistake. At an airfield, Voller activates the Dial and locates a time fissure in the sky. Indy is held captive on Voller's stolen plane while Helena stows away through its landing gear. Teddy follows them in another plane.
Whilst approaching the fissure, Indy realizes that continental drift could have altered the timeline coordinates. Rather than 1939, the group arrives at the Siege of Syracuse in 212 BC. The warring armies shoot down Voller's plane, believing it to be a dragon. Indy and Helena parachute out just before the plane crashes, killing everyone else aboard, while Teddy lands safely. Archimedes finds Voller's body and wristwatch in the wreckage. He gives Indy the Dial but keeps the watch. Indy and Helena learn that Archimedes created the Dial to bring users from the future through fissures that lead only to 212 BC. As the fissure begins to collapse, Indy wants to remain behind, feeling he has nothing left to return to. Helena, fearing a time paradox and unwilling to give up on him, knocks Indy unconscious.
Back in the present, a recovering Indy awakens in his apartment and reunites with Helena, Teddy, Sallah and Marion. Marion and Indy reconcile.
Photographs of Sean Connery and Shia LaBeouf are used to represent their respective Last Crusade and Kingdom of the Crystal Skull characters: Henry Jones Sr. and Mutt Williams (Henry Jones III).
Production
Development
In 1979, George Lucas and Steven Spielberg made a deal with Paramount Pictures for five Indiana Jones films.[26] In April 2008, Harrison Ford said he would return as Indiana Jones for a fifth film if it does not take another twenty years to develop, referring to the long development of Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull (2008), which was released a month later.[27] The film introduced the character Mutt Williams, played by Shia LaBeouf. Writer/producer Lucas suggested an idea to make Williams the lead character in a fifth film,[28] but later decided against this.[29] Lucas said that Ford's age would not be an issue in making another film, saying, "it's not like he's an old man. He's incredibly agile; he looks even better than he did 20 years ago."[28]
Lucas began researching potential plot devices for another film in 2008, and stated that Spielberg was open to directing it, as he had done for the previous films.[30][31] Explaining the process for each film, Ford said, "We come to some basic agreement and then George goes away for a long time and works on it. Then Steven and I get it in some form, some embryonic form. Then if we like it we start working with George on it and at some point down the line it's ready and we do it."[32] Lucas stressed the importance of having a MacGuffin that is supernatural but still grounded in reality with an archaeological or historical background, saying, "you can't just make something up, like a time machine."[33] Speaking about the previous film and the franchise's future, Lucas said, "we still have the issues about the direction we'd like to take. I'm in the future; Steven's in the past. He's trying to drag it back to the way they were, I'm trying to push it to a whole different place. So, still we have a sort of tension."[34] Later in 2008, Ford stated that Lucas's concept for the fifth film was "crazy but great".[35] In November 2010, Ford said that Lucas was still working on the project.[36] In July 2012, producer Frank Marshall stated that the project had no writer and said about its progress, "I don't know if it's definitely not happening, but it's not up and running."[37]
In October 2012, The Walt Disney Company acquired Lucasfilm, giving Disney ownership rights to the Indiana Jones intellectual property.[38][39] In December 2013, The Walt Disney Studios purchased the distribution and marketing rights to future Indiana Jones films from Paramount, with the latter studio retaining the distribution rights to the first four films and receiving "financial participation" for any additional films as well as an "in association with" credit in the film's billing.[1][2] The fifth film would become the first in the series to be co-produced by Walt Disney Pictures and Lucasfilm.[40] With the 2012 acquisition, Lucas passed Indiana Jones 5 to new Lucasfilm president Kathleen Kennedy.[41][42] Lucasfilm planned to focus on the Star Wars franchise before working on a fifth Indiana Jones film.[43][44][45]
In May 2015, Kennedy confirmed that Lucasfilm would eventually make another Indiana Jones film.[46] Kingdom of the Crystal Skull ended positively for Indiana Jones, with his marriage to Marion Ravenwood. However, Ford did not necessarily view the film as a definitive ending for Jones, wishing to make one more film that could expand the character and conclude his journey.[47] Ford felt that Crystal Skull "ended in kind of a suspended animation. There was not a real strong feeling of the conclusion or the closure that I always hoped for."[48] According to Kennedy, "we all felt that if we could conclude the series with one more movie, given the fact that Harrison was so excited to try to do another one, we should do it."[49] Kennedy, Spielberg and Ford had discussed a couple of story ideas by the end of 2015.[50]
Pre-production
In March 2016, Disney announced that the fifth film would be released on July 19, 2019, with Ford reprising his role. Spielberg would direct the film, with Kennedy and Marshall as producers.[51] In April 2016, Marshall said the film was in early pre-production.[52] A MacGuffin had been chosen for the film,[53] and work on the script began a few months later,[54][55] with David Koepp as the screenwriter.[56] The story was conceived by Koepp and Spielberg. Koepp had previously written several other Spielberg films, including Kingdom of the Crystal Skull.[57] It was initially reported that Lucas would not be involved in the project,[51] although Spielberg later said that Lucas would serve as an executive producer: "Of course I would never make an Indiana Jones film without George Lucas. That would be insane."[58] Later in 2016, it was announced that Lucas would have no involvement,[59] with Marshall stating two years later that "life changes and we're moving on. He moved on."[60]
In 2017, the film's release date was pushed back to 2020, as Spielberg was busy working on Ready Player One (2018) and The Post (2017).[61] Koepp said "we've got a script we're mostly happy with."[62] Spielberg set Indiana Jones 5 as his next film, with production set to begin in the UK in April 2019.[63] However, filming was pushed back as a final script had yet to be approved.[64] In early 2018, Lucasfilm met with screenwriters Scott Beck and Bryan Woods for an "open canvas talk" including the Indiana Jones and Star Wars franchises. Beck stated that they had considered writing the next Indiana Jones installment, but that ultimately he and Woods were more interested in establishing an original franchise.[65] Marshall said that a lot of people had pitched ideas for the film.[60] Jonathan Kasdan was eventually hired to replace Koepp in mid-2018,[64][66] and a new release date was set for 2021.[67]
Kasdan had departed the project by May 2019, and it was rumored that writer Dan Fogelman would take over.[68] In September 2019, Koepp announced that he had re-joined the production as writer, stating that the filmmakers had "a good idea this time."[69] Koepp ultimately wrote two versions of the film, but neither were approved.[70][71] He said that efforts to produce the film had failed because of disagreement between Spielberg, Ford, and Disney regarding the script.[72]
Themes and influences
Ford and Mangold both felt that Crystal Skull did not do enough to highlight Jones' age and the new era in which he lives.[48][76] Speaking about Dial of Destiny as a finale to the franchise, Mangold said, "It became really important to me to figure out how to make this a movie about a hero at sunset". He said that Jones's age would be a major part of the film, something that was touched upon only briefly in the earlier drafts: "The issues I brought up about Indy's age were not things I thought were being addressed in the material being developed at the time. There were 'old' jokes, but the material itself wasn't about it. To me, whatever your greatest liability, you should fly straight towards that. If you try to pretend it's not there, you end up getting slings and arrows the whole way".[47] According to Mangold and Ford, Dial of Destiny is about age, time and family relationships.[211][85] Mangold said the film "is not about aging per se, but time — the way time travels for all of us, the way we all get older as the world changes around us".[85]
Mangold said of the film's cinematic style that the opening sequence, set in 1944, is meant to contrast with the main plot, which takes place in 1969, allowing the film to start with a blast of classic Indiana Jones action reminiscent of the first three films (1981–1989). The transition from the pulpy cinematic language of 1940s films brings the characters from an "older world" into the "modern" 1960s, a present strongly influenced by the Cold War, nuclear power, space travel, intrigue and the lack of black-and-white morality. Mangold sought to portray "an accurate and realistic appraisal of where this character would be at this time in his life", describing Jones as "a hero who is used to a black and white world" when it comes to villains, who now finds himself in a gray world with a lack of "clear good guys and bad guys".[10] Jez Butterworth noted the presence of ex-Nazis involved in the U.S. government's Moon-landing program.[21] This makes Jones grow distrustful of his country, feeling like a man out of time in an era in which idealism is gone.[21][10] It was Ford's idea to start the 1969 storyline with Jones at a low point in his life, and then gradually "rebuild him from the ground up" as the film progresses.[212]
Mangold compared Dial of Destiny to his final X-Men film Logan, enjoying the notion of what a hero can do for the world when it no longer has a place for him, allowing classical heroes to be seen through the "prism" of today's "jaundiced contemporary attitudes". However, Dial of Destiny would lack the seriousness of Logan, with the latter being regarded as a "purposefully and intentionally" grim adventure.[10]
Reception
Box office
Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny grossed $174.5 million in the United States and Canada, and $209.5 million in other territories, for a worldwide total of $384 million.[235][236] With an estimated production budget of $294.7 million, not including marketing costs, it is the most expensive film in the Indiana Jones franchise, as well as one of the most expensive films ever made.[133][237] Due to its expensive production cost and marketing budget, the film was deemed a box-office bomb.[238][239] Collider estimated the film would need to make around $600 million to break-even, and $800 million to be considered a success.[240] The film lost Disney an estimated $143 million,[241][242] making it one of the company's largest financial film failures since John Carter (2012).[243]
In the United States and Canada, Dial of Destiny was released alongside Ruby Gillman, Teenage Kraken, and was projected to gross domestically $60–65 million from 4,600 theaters in its opening weekend. It was also expected to gross around $80 million from international territories, for a worldwide debut of around $140 million.[244] TheWrap claimed that Americans under the age of 30 had a "much lower presence in ticket presales compared to the average summer tentpole" and that the film's tracking was also underperforming in Asian markets.[245] The film made $24 million on its first day,[246] including $7.2 million from Thursday night previews.[247] It went on to debut to $60.4 million over the three-day weekend,[248] the second-best total of the franchise (not adjusted for inflation), behind its predecessor Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull (2008), and a total of $83.9 million over the five-day Independence Day holiday,[249] finishing first at the box office;[250][251] Deadline Hollywood noted that a majority of the opening weekend audience (58%) was over the age of 35.[5] The film made $26.5 million in its second weekend, finishing in second behind newcomer Insidious: The Red Door; the 56.1% drop was the largest of the franchise.[252] The film made $12 million in its third weekend and $6.7 million in its fourth, finishing in fourth and fifth place, respectively.[253][254]
Overseas, the film made $69.6 million from 52 countries in its opening weekend. The largest markets were the United Kingdom ($8.9 million), France ($5.9 million), Japan ($4.7 million), Korea ($4.1 million), Germany ($4.1 million), Spain ($4 million), Australia ($3.8 million), Italy ($2.7 million), China ($2.3 million), and Mexico ($2.3 million).[255] Variety said that the lukewarm critical and audience response to the film was in-part to blame for the "weak opening", and noted its global debut of $130 million was less than The Flash's $139 million opening two weeks prior.[256]
Future
Disney CEO Bob Iger said in 2016 that the future of the franchise with Ford was unknown, but that the fifth film would not be the final installment in the franchise.[282] In 2022, Kennedy reaffirmed earlier comments that Ford's role as Indiana Jones would not be recast,[283] while Ford confirmed that the fifth film would be his last in the series.[215] That November, Disney considered multiple options to continue the franchise, including additional films or a television series for Disney+. By March 2023, Lucasfilm was reported to have canceled Indiana Jones movies and television series because they want to focus on the Star Wars franchise;[284] it would have been the second prequel series following The Young Indiana Jones Chronicles.[285] Disney confirmed the following month that the film would indeed be the last in the franchise.[286]