Indiana Jones 5 officially announced
- Thread starter ghostryder
- Start date
joberg
Legendary Member
And the Hippie Movement didn't help either
Cephus
Master Member
I've never cared about celebrity. They're all just people. Maybe it comes from knowing so many celebrities, some really nice people, some complete a-holes. I don't give anyone a pass. If you're a jerk, you're a jerk and there are a lot of jerks in Hollywood who think they can get away with murder because they're rich and famous.
I've met a number of actors/ actresses at conventions and now I live in an area where A list stars seem to congregate so my wife and I will see them here and there. We had no clue when we moved here but ended up here for a job opportunity. It's fun because we love movies but at the end of the day, yes they're just people like you and I. No better or worse than anyone else.
Cephus
Master Member
The decent ones are, at least. Then there's a lot of modern-day Hollywood. I used to be the overnight manager at a Taco Bell, back in the mid 80s. Chuck Norris used to come through the drive-thru all the time and I used to sit there and talk to him if nobody was in line behind him. He was a really nice guy, not at all pretentious like a lot of people you see today.
It was great being a fan back in the 70s and 80s, before conventions became absurdly security conscious. A friend and I were at a Star Trek con in LA and DeForest Kelley was sitting at a table so we just went up and talked to him. This was before the Star Trek movies started coming out. He was the sweetest guy in the world. We took him out to lunch. Through him, I got to know a lot of the other Star Trek cast. Some were great, some were not.
It's also how I got to know a lot of the classic sci-fi writers. My wife and I used to run into Ray Bradbury every single year at San Diego Comicon, at the same spot on the convention floor. We'd pull off to the side and catch up, both when he was on his feet and in a wheelchair. We did that for more than a decade before he died.
I met Harlan Ellison at a Westercon in the mid-80s. When there was that giant earthquake a couple of years later, I and a couple of others went to his house and helped him to clean up his library, that had fallen apart.
I was Jerry Pournelle's beer caddy for a long time for local conventions. He'd get up on stage and I'd sit in the front row with a cooler of beer under my chair. When he went dry, I delivered.
The number of people that I've known over the years is absurd, but you can't do that anymore. It's just not the same fannish culture. It's gone from a guy at a table trying to sell their wares to someone at the end of a long line, surrounded by security, and you get 10 seconds while they scribble their name on something for a buck.
I miss the old days.
Egon Spengler
Master Member
Never had a bad encounter at a con with a celeb yet, but well, and I'm not looking for trouble, but if anyone disrespects me or the people I love, I don't give a d--m how famous they are, they'll be getting told.
HeartBlade
Sr Member
That sounds nice.
Im hoping its just social media just amplifies the noise of the dicks but doesnt say much on the nice ones which is why we dont hear much about them. Bieber spits on fans and that news story goes viral. Rupert Grint buys an ice cream truck and gives away free ice cream to kids and thats a nice story to tell grandma somewhere on the internet. Bad press travels far and controversy gets eyes which is why controversial figures get tons of attention (so many youtubers and online personalities basically act like this because of the attention and money that reuslts and it becomes a cycle).
Also, the kinder celebrities probably want their privacy and to be left alone. With social media and smartphones being a thing; basically everyone is a paparazzi who can instantly snap and get a location for a random celeb who is just trying to have a good time in private. Kind of like the Matrix where the celebrities are freed and we the public are agents lol.
Lightning
Master Member
That matches what I've been hearing. Any normal people who have seen is say it's fine. I'll find out tomorrow
Liberance
Well-Known Member
Well, looks like finally this thread can be turned into a proper conversation about the movie?
Spoilers will follow, so be warned.
If you want to hear a positive, this film is easily one of the best ones Lucasfilm has produced under Disney. It's not completely inept in the sense many of these late sequels stripped of their creative voices and authenticity usually are. That's not saying much, but at least there's a story somewhere in there and an attempt to bring some sort of new closure to the character. Unfortunately it can't quite get away from the curse that will unavoidably follow these type of movies from here to eternity for as long as they keep getting made. It just feels like a forgery, a less inventive, less accomplished imitation of something without any of the original spark, touch or cohesion. Kind of soulless and joyless.
I'll try to get into more detail.
The most obvious challenge this thing was gonna face is following up four films directed by Steven Spielberg. James Mangold is not a bad filmmaker, you could even say he's the best pick we've seen to handle the Lucasfilm legacy so far, he's just nowhere near as creative or creatively free to pull off the kind of visual ideas or story mechanics Spielberg crafted to define the Indiana Jones series. Right off the bat, Dial of Destiny is muddy, unfocused, lacking distinct direction, inspired shots or fun staging choices of any sort. Every single sequence drags, and badly. The pacing is quite terrible, and particularly for an Indiana Jones film. You can already sense it within the prologue when the film keeps cutting back and forth between an expository conversation among secondary characters and Indy walking from one train car to another without anything new or exciting happening in each one. You never find yourself smiling at the audacity of the character using a broken pole to take down a motorized Nazi as if they were in a Medieval joust, or finding a group of mannequins in a soon-to-be devastated nuclear test site mirroring the family unit he's been avoiding all his life. Every scene is mundane, serviceable and as a consequence kind of forgettable.
The structure of these movies has been laid out four times already, and it's quite clear: a fast-paced action sequence mostly designed around clever visual beats preludes an expository early segment, following which we don't bother much with long dialogue again as we're launched into a series of unique set pieces that eventually take us to some big pyrotechnic finale with fantastical elements. Dial of Destiny respects all this, but it follows it awkwardly. This is the first time in the series a flashback is introduced mid-story, and to add absolutely nothing we hadn't already learned through previous dialogue. It's odd choices like this, or the journeyman feel of the many overlong action pieces that drags the whole thing down. An entire ticker-tape parade was recreated in Glasgow to finally amount to nothing, as the characters do nothing of consequence with the fact that they're in the middle of such thing. An endless chase through the streets of Tangier could be summed up with they turned here, then went there, eventually made a left and then it ended. Indiana Jones is supposed to be the opposite of this, with tightly cut sequences literally filled with narrative surprises and refreshing visual gags to the last frame. But that's the thing with this movie, even though it never really feels poorly made, it just always ends up being frustratingly insipid.
Although perhaps the one thing some people will react more negatively to is the tone. As uneven as the film is structurally, what I personally struggled the most with was the tone.
Indiana Jones films are supposed to be lighthearted adventure stories, and any downer beats have been carefully inserted in the past in ways that didn't mess with the overall feel of the movie. Spielberg is a master when it comes to walking these kind of tightropes, so we witnessed the potential death of Marion, Indy's descent into hell, or a moment of remembrance for those who passed in quick vignettes that never distracted from the main story or took over the tonal quality of the film. Dial of Destiny does not follow up on this. Indiana is stuck in a perpetual state of mental defeat and he literally needs to be punched in the face at the very end of the movie to snap out of it, without really having gone through any character transformation along the ride. Secondary characters are murdered in cold blood out of nowhere by the antagonists, in a way that makes you feel like you're watching Munich instead of an Indiana Jones film every now and then. In what was likely conceived as the "aha!" concept that motivates the entire character journey for Indy, Mutt is unceremoniously killed off screen and his death turned into an old trauma that ultimately broke Indy and Marion's marriage. In what world does this feel right within the context of these movies? The film just carries a weirdly somber vibe throughout its full length, and I for one cannot understand what made the filmmakers think this felt right for an Indiana Jones adventure at any point. If the goal was to make an older Indy look back at his life and reconsider things, there's plenty of questionable choices he made in the previous movies without having to resort to story ideas that belong in completely different genres, bringing down the mood to such an extent that you virtually blow the entire film.
Yet here we are.
After all that, it may sound off if I say I didn't hate the movie. But I didn't. It was competent enough that it didn't feel like some Jurassic World or Rise of Skywalker. I appreciate the effort to try to add something to the character, even if in the end the whole thing ended up being just a redundant take on the exact same story Kingdom of the Crystal Skull tackled imperfectly, but ultimately better. I suppose it's somewhat interesting to finally have seen Indy in World War II—despite the fact that, as Frank Marshall once said, that was avoided because it turns the segment into a war movie. There was something fun about seeing Indy woken up by partying youths, and his last lecture getting interrupted by a report on the Moon landing. And that last scene between him and Marion was a rather touching beat that took good advantage of the characters' history and brought their story to a close in a more elegant way than the Spielberg wedding ever did.
But that's about it. For me, it clearly sits at the very bottom of the series, and I'm not sure it really needed to exist. Hopefully others will enjoy it more. I'm sure some will.
Spoilers will follow, so be warned.
If you want to hear a positive, this film is easily one of the best ones Lucasfilm has produced under Disney. It's not completely inept in the sense many of these late sequels stripped of their creative voices and authenticity usually are. That's not saying much, but at least there's a story somewhere in there and an attempt to bring some sort of new closure to the character. Unfortunately it can't quite get away from the curse that will unavoidably follow these type of movies from here to eternity for as long as they keep getting made. It just feels like a forgery, a less inventive, less accomplished imitation of something without any of the original spark, touch or cohesion. Kind of soulless and joyless.
I'll try to get into more detail.
The most obvious challenge this thing was gonna face is following up four films directed by Steven Spielberg. James Mangold is not a bad filmmaker, you could even say he's the best pick we've seen to handle the Lucasfilm legacy so far, he's just nowhere near as creative or creatively free to pull off the kind of visual ideas or story mechanics Spielberg crafted to define the Indiana Jones series. Right off the bat, Dial of Destiny is muddy, unfocused, lacking distinct direction, inspired shots or fun staging choices of any sort. Every single sequence drags, and badly. The pacing is quite terrible, and particularly for an Indiana Jones film. You can already sense it within the prologue when the film keeps cutting back and forth between an expository conversation among secondary characters and Indy walking from one train car to another without anything new or exciting happening in each one. You never find yourself smiling at the audacity of the character using a broken pole to take down a motorized Nazi as if they were in a Medieval joust, or finding a group of mannequins in a soon-to-be devastated nuclear test site mirroring the family unit he's been avoiding all his life. Every scene is mundane, serviceable and as a consequence kind of forgettable.
The structure of these movies has been laid out four times already, and it's quite clear: a fast-paced action sequence mostly designed around clever visual beats preludes an expository early segment, following which we don't bother much with long dialogue again as we're launched into a series of unique set pieces that eventually take us to some big pyrotechnic finale with fantastical elements. Dial of Destiny respects all this, but it follows it awkwardly. This is the first time in the series a flashback is introduced mid-story, and to add absolutely nothing we hadn't already learned through previous dialogue. It's odd choices like this, or the journeyman feel of the many overlong action pieces that drags the whole thing down. An entire ticker-tape parade was recreated in Glasgow to finally amount to nothing, as the characters do nothing of consequence with the fact that they're in the middle of such thing. An endless chase through the streets of Tangier could be summed up with they turned here, then went there, eventually made a left and then it ended. Indiana Jones is supposed to be the opposite of this, with tightly cut sequences literally filled with narrative surprises and refreshing visual gags to the last frame. But that's the thing with this movie, even though it never really feels poorly made, it just always ends up being frustratingly insipid.
Although perhaps the one thing some people will react more negatively to is the tone. As uneven as the film is structurally, what I personally struggled the most with was the tone.
Indiana Jones films are supposed to be lighthearted adventure stories, and any downer beats have been carefully inserted in the past in ways that didn't mess with the overall feel of the movie. Spielberg is a master when it comes to walking these kind of tightropes, so we witnessed the potential death of Marion, Indy's descent into hell, or a moment of remembrance for those who passed in quick vignettes that never distracted from the main story or took over the tonal quality of the film. Dial of Destiny does not follow up on this. Indiana is stuck in a perpetual state of mental defeat and he literally needs to be punched in the face at the very end of the movie to snap out of it, without really having gone through any character transformation along the ride. Secondary characters are murdered in cold blood out of nowhere by the antagonists, in a way that makes you feel like you're watching Munich instead of an Indiana Jones film every now and then. In what was likely conceived as the "aha!" concept that motivates the entire character journey for Indy, Mutt is unceremoniously killed off screen and his death turned into an old trauma that ultimately broke Indy and Marion's marriage. In what world does this feel right within the context of these movies? The film just carries a weirdly somber vibe throughout its full length, and I for one cannot understand what made the filmmakers think this felt right for an Indiana Jones adventure at any point. If the goal was to make an older Indy look back at his life and reconsider things, there's plenty of questionable choices he made in the previous movies without having to resort to story ideas that belong in completely different genres, bringing down the mood to such an extent that you virtually blow the entire film.
Yet here we are.
After all that, it may sound off if I say I didn't hate the movie. But I didn't. It was competent enough that it didn't feel like some Jurassic World or Rise of Skywalker. I appreciate the effort to try to add something to the character, even if in the end the whole thing ended up being just a redundant take on the exact same story Kingdom of the Crystal Skull tackled imperfectly, but ultimately better. I suppose it's somewhat interesting to finally have seen Indy in World War II—despite the fact that, as Frank Marshall once said, that was avoided because it turns the segment into a war movie. There was something fun about seeing Indy woken up by partying youths, and his last lecture getting interrupted by a report on the Moon landing. And that last scene between him and Marion was a rather touching beat that took good advantage of the characters' history and brought their story to a close in a more elegant way than the Spielberg wedding ever did.
But that's about it. For me, it clearly sits at the very bottom of the series, and I'm not sure it really needed to exist. Hopefully others will enjoy it more. I'm sure some will.
Last edited:
HMSwolfe
Master Member
I appreciate the dissection. I’ve got a ticket to tomorrow’s showing (which, by the way, can anybody tell my brain was fried all last week while I was sick? I thought last week was the last week of June, and the release date around here for Indy V. Whoops.) Sounds like ultimately what I figured, not quite what I’d hoped, but certainly not what the fear- (or perhaps hate?)-mongering YouTubers have been screaming.
JiminSTLouis
Sr Member
I ABSOLUTELY LOVED this movie! A good ol’ fashioned Indy film. And Disney finally got the de-aging tech perfected.
Last edited:
I also loved the movie. For me it fit neatly right in the middle of them all.
Raiders
Crusade
Destiny
Temple
Crystal Skull
That’s my personal ranking.
It made me appreciate Crystal Skull more since we have now seen young Indy all the way to an old (KOTCS) and now the oldest Indy we will ever get. Which they nailed to a tee in my opinion as well. He didn’t do anything too crazy that took you away from him being in fact, an old man.
I concur on the de-aging. They got it about as close as possible. I only saw tiny things that threw it off a little bit but it was so minor that it didn’t matter. And if you weren’t looking for them you probably wouldn’t notice.
I think the pacing was good for what basically was a story about an old man called back into action one more time. It wouldn’t be non stop back to back action like in the past if you were that age. They kept it pretty realistic to that overall.
I actually felt bad for Indy as a character because no matter how bad ass we all think we are or were, eventually old age and retirement comes to us all if we are lucky. It was obvious in this film, but also welcomed because it just felt real for lack of a better word. You just feel the weight of the characters and how they also know it isn’t their world any longer but in regards to Indy, get to have one final adventure in it.
Thumbs up from me.
Raiders
Crusade
Destiny
Temple
Crystal Skull
That’s my personal ranking.
It made me appreciate Crystal Skull more since we have now seen young Indy all the way to an old (KOTCS) and now the oldest Indy we will ever get. Which they nailed to a tee in my opinion as well. He didn’t do anything too crazy that took you away from him being in fact, an old man.
I concur on the de-aging. They got it about as close as possible. I only saw tiny things that threw it off a little bit but it was so minor that it didn’t matter. And if you weren’t looking for them you probably wouldn’t notice.
I think the pacing was good for what basically was a story about an old man called back into action one more time. It wouldn’t be non stop back to back action like in the past if you were that age. They kept it pretty realistic to that overall.
I actually felt bad for Indy as a character because no matter how bad ass we all think we are or were, eventually old age and retirement comes to us all if we are lucky. It was obvious in this film, but also welcomed because it just felt real for lack of a better word. You just feel the weight of the characters and how they also know it isn’t their world any longer but in regards to Indy, get to have one final adventure in it.
Thumbs up from me.
Last edited:
CT1138
Sr Member
I have mixed feelings about this one. All our heroes have gotten old and sad, and it made it kinda depressing to watch. Added to that, there were a few details that felt like deliberate jabs at Crystal Skull, which I just felt did "Old Man Indy" better. At the same time, I can't deny it was fun. It felt very serial and pulpy, and I could definitely imagine Spielberg and Lucas having made this movie.
I liked it. Not 100%, but I liked it.
I wasn't particularly annoyed by the kid (and when it comes to movie kids I usually am), but he's no Short Round.
I had avoided learning about the film beforehand as much as possible, so I didn't even know if Williams had scored it. As I watched, I became sure he hadn't. Oops.
The chases in NY and Algiers were scored rather unimpressively, especially NY: the music did not pull its weight in reinforcing the action. It didn't help, though, that the music was mixed so bloody low.
The score during the opener was a lot like that of the opener for Crystal Skull, where various themes from the trilogy are revisited for no reason other than as memberberries. (For example, in CS, he had no business using the Ark theme when they open up the warehouse. It doesn't matter that as an Easter Egg we later learn the Ark is there--it isn't what the scene is about.) The score for the WWII scenes felt like a temp track edited from existing recordings.
End credits music: no Raiders March? Really?? This reminds me of the end credits of Revenge of the Sith: he revisits the Throne Room march, but plays it so slowly it loses its power (and that's how he plays it now in concert).
Maybe the loss of Alexander Courage's orchestration has had an even greater effect than perhaps anyone expected.
With much sadness I must conclude Williams doesn't have any more masterpieces in him. But no shame in that, he's given us so many.
I wasn't particularly annoyed by the kid (and when it comes to movie kids I usually am), but he's no Short Round.
I had avoided learning about the film beforehand as much as possible, so I didn't even know if Williams had scored it. As I watched, I became sure he hadn't. Oops.
The chases in NY and Algiers were scored rather unimpressively, especially NY: the music did not pull its weight in reinforcing the action. It didn't help, though, that the music was mixed so bloody low.
The score during the opener was a lot like that of the opener for Crystal Skull, where various themes from the trilogy are revisited for no reason other than as memberberries. (For example, in CS, he had no business using the Ark theme when they open up the warehouse. It doesn't matter that as an Easter Egg we later learn the Ark is there--it isn't what the scene is about.) The score for the WWII scenes felt like a temp track edited from existing recordings.
End credits music: no Raiders March? Really?? This reminds me of the end credits of Revenge of the Sith: he revisits the Throne Room march, but plays it so slowly it loses its power (and that's how he plays it now in concert).
Maybe the loss of Alexander Courage's orchestration has had an even greater effect than perhaps anyone expected.
With much sadness I must conclude Williams doesn't have any more masterpieces in him. But no shame in that, he's given us so many.
Liberance
Well-Known Member
I can attest to this.
I knew Williams scored it, and I had high hopes for that, cause that man almost never disappoints. Sadly, a trend that started to get a bit irksome with the Star Wars sequels continues here. He recycles cues from the previous movies so heavily that it just feels like someone else remixed the old soundtracks rather than a composer trying to make a point.
The cues from Raiders and Crusade in Crystal Skull were perhaps a bit heavy handed, but at least they were justified. I'm gonna assume that he was going for a feeling of callback by reusing a lot of his music from the old movies—which admittedly, was probably the same goal with Star Wars considering the sequel films practically remake the original trilogy. However, the end result just feels lazy. The music never surprises you or works toward giving the film some kind of identity.
Another possibility is that this is just his way of dealing with studio-led movies. Considering how messy the development of these projects where a director isn't in control is, chances are he never had the clear vision and clean edits he usually works from with Spielberg to develop something interesting here. When there's no clear action or themes to describe, it's probably easier to just slap on old cues and move on. Helena's theme is the only theme with some sort of presence, but even that one doesn't really find a place to exist in the movie.
Temple of Doom continues to get no love…
Well, except from these guys
Every 'Indiana Jones' movie, ranked (including 'Dial of Destiny')
In honor of Harrison Ford's Indiana Jones hanging up the fedora for good with "Dial of Destiny," we're ranking all of Indy's big screen adventures.
www.usatoday.com
Well, except from these guys
That has to be a factor.
Speilberg/Lucas would never be shooting 4-5 endings for an Indy movie. Their movies are a cohesive item that works towards a predetermined finish. That's what it looks like when there's a storyteller in charge and not a corporate committee.
I agree with this list. I enjoyed the hell out of Destiny.
Interesting to see what is happening with the audience score.
Similar threads
