Fifteen years after the controversial fourth adventure, Harrison Ford dons his well-worn hat and whips out the whip in Indiana Jones and the Wheel of Destiny. Indiana Jones 5 celebrated its world premiere at the Cannes Film Festival.
I saw a wonderfully old-fashioned adventure, with thrilling car chases, nerdy guessing games, a dash of humor and probably that best blockbuster performance of Harrison Ford’s career. In short, Indy 5 is far better than I feared after seeing the trailers. In one respect, however, Steven Spielberg remains irreplaceable.
That’s what Indiana Jones’ new adventure is all about
The film opens with a 20-minute chase through the WWII Alps as Logan – The Wolverine director James Mangold and his team chase the archaeologist through a hail of bombs and over the top of a speeding train.
The figurehead of this sequence is the digitally rejuvenated Harrison Ford. He doesn’t always look convincing, because I’ve never thought so intensively about lifeless CGI cheeks in a film. But the focus is anyway on the athletic body (of another actor). Indy is always on the move, searching for the next artifact that has been lost for eons. Even the millennium cannot stop him from his goal.
Check out the trailer for Indiana Jones and the Wheel of Fate:
Indiana Jones and the Wheel of Destiny – Trailer (German) HD
The cut to the present is all the harder: in 1969 Dr. Henry “Indiana” Jones was woken up by the neighbors in his small New York apartment. There’s Harrison Ford standing up with his real, aged body in his underpants. It’s an image of bluntness that you just wouldn’t expect from a blockbuster hero. Even Hugh Jackman pumped up for his Wolverine final act Logan. But Ford is just that: an actor who captivated us with his down-to-earth presence as Han Solo or Indiana Jones.
Indy is on the bottle and is about to be sent off on his professor’s pension when his goddaughter Helena Shaw (Phoebe Waller-Bridge) rushes back into his life. She’s looking for one legendary artifact of the Greek scholar Archimedes, just like the Nazi scientist Jürgen Voller (Mads Mikkelsen), who did research for NASA on the lunar program. The adventure begins.
The fast-paced action lacks the Spielberg touch
First of all, The Wheel of Destiny is an almost hour-long chase through time and space, from Nazi Germany in the 1940s to New York in 1969 and across the Atlantic through the narrow streets of the Moroccan city of Tangier. Whether it’s emergency braking, a sharp turn in a tuk-tuk or a slap in the face: the force of the action hits the cinema hall. That is not a matter of course. If you have had the sad fate of seeing Jurassic World 3: A New Age, then imagine dino hunting in Malta – but in good spirits and with Nazis instead of dinos.
Disney
Phoebe Waller Bridge and Harrison Ford
Several times I was reminded of the motorcycle or tank scenes from the first three Indiana Jones films, and Spielberg’s great car chase in The Adventures of Tintin. In the positive as in the negative.
Part 5 lacks Steven Spielberg’s visual ingenuity. Think of the ants or the unnecessarily hated refrigerator in the crystal skull. Or think of a picture: Indy standing in front of the golden idol in Peru at the beginning of Raiders of the Lost Ark. The precious metal lights up the sweat on his face, strained by many obstacles. It’s not an image that makes you ponder as much as the giant sphere that will follow. However, it is one that sums up the essence of Indiana Jones.
Harrison Ford is the showpiece of Indiana Jones and the Wheel of Destiny
Unfortunately, Indiana Jones 5 lacks the big pictures, but James Mangold and his co-authors still manage to capture the essence. The film pleases with its solid action, which keeps its distance from the CGI-heavy competition. Phoebe Waller-Bridge brings an erratic energy in the Marion Ravenwood tradition, and once the film settles down a bit it also resumes a key trait of the first three Indy films: the guesswork about clues carved in some stone thousands of years ago became.
Above all, however, Harrison Ford shines, which is enjoying a welcome acting renaissance with the series Shrinking and now Indiana Jones 5. The wheel of fate keeps turning relentlessly for his best blockbuster character. And Ford plays the fractures of aging incredibly touchingly.
Indiana Jones and the Wheel of Destiny opens on June 29th in German cinemas.