INDIANA JONES AND THE DIAL OF DESTINY

Name: INDIANA JONES AND THE DIAL OF DESTINY
Item: INDIANA JONES AND THE DIAL OF DESTINY
Author: Gaby Gaduh

"Love Is the True Treasure"

Content: -1 Caution advised for older children, including teenagers, and sensitive adults.

Entertainment Quality:

	None	Light	Moderate	Heavy
Language
Violence
Sex
Nudity

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What You Need To Know:

Harrison Ford returns in INDIANA JONES AND THE DIAL OF DESTINY. In 1944, Indiana Jones and his friend, Basil Shaw, fight a National Socialist engineer named Voller for half of an ancient device invented by Greek mathematician Archimedes. Basil and Voller believe the device, when completed, can open a fissure in time to change the past. Twenty-five years later, after helping America’s moon program, Voller wants to find the device’s other half so he can change the outcome of World War II. Only Indiana Jones and Basil’s daughter, Indy’s goddaughter, stand in his way.

INDIANA JONES AND THE DIAL OF DESTINY is revisiting an old friend. It has the exciting, suspenseful action scenes and narrow escapes moviegoers expect from an Indiana Jones movie. DIAL OF DESTINY has a strong moral worldview, with some Christian, redemptive content, including three references to Jesus Christ’s crucifixion. Eventually, the hero discovers that love is worth all the knowledge in the world. However, there’s some foul language and scary moments involving murder, plane crashes, bugs, and a bevy of eels underwater. So, MOVIEGUIDE® advises caution for older children.

Content:

(BBB, CC, ACACAC, LL, VV, S, N, A, M):

Dominant Worldview and Other Worldview Content/Elements:

Very strong moral worldview, with Christian, biblical references to the crucifixion of Jesus, promotes wisdom, good over evil, doing the right thing, and love , plus the villain and his henchmen are National Socialists trying to revive the Third Reich in Germany, so the hero is always fighting against them to foil their plans

Foul Language:

18 obscenities (mostly “h” words with three “d” words), henchman says a Jesus profanity, and three light exclamatory profanities

Violence:

Lots of strong and light action violence such as gunfights, bad guys murder several people in cold blood, lots of fighting, villains fire guns at heroes, several chase scenes, men fight one another atop a speeding train, two men dive from a train trestle into water, man is hit by a large beam, hero almost dies from hanging, explosions during bombing raid in World War II, hero frantically rides horse through city streets and subway tunnel to get away from bad guys, vehicles crash into one another, boy and henchman struggle underwater, a bunch of eels inside an ancient wrecked ship scare divers, two people are trapped in a cave section filling up with methane gas, but they escape, two planes start to fall through sky after losing power, scenes of ancient ships besieging the city of Syracuse in Ancient Sicily

Sex:

No sex scenes, but it’s lightly implied that a young woman has been with unmarried men, and that she’s jilted a man by becoming engaged to him with no intention of marrying him, plus married couple kisses

Nudity:

Brief upper male nudity when men put on diving suits

Alcohol Use:

Brief alcohol use

Smoking and/or Drug Use and Abuse:

No smoking or drugs; and,

Miscellaneous Immorality:

Villains take young teenage boy hostage, hero’s old Egyptian friend appears to be a Muslim immigrant living now in the United States with his family, children and grandchildren, but there are no specific Muslim references, and heroine is somewhat materialistic in an immoral way where she justifies stealing, but she comes to her senses.

More Detail:

Harrison Ford takes up the mantle again in INDIANA JONES AND THE DIAL OF DESTINY, where Indiana Jones, with help from his goddaughter, must stop a former Nazi rocket scientist in 1969, who’s trying to find an ancient time travel device invented by Greek mathematician Archimedes so he can change the outcome of World War II. INDIANA JONES AND THE DIAL OF DESTINY has all the exciting, suspenseful action scenes and narrow escapes moviegoers expect from an Indiana Jones movie, with Indiana Jones finding, once again, that love is worth all the knowledge in the world, but the movie has some foul language and scary, violent moments that warrant caution for older children.

The movie starts off with a bang. In the Fall of 1945, Indiana and his fellow archeologist, Basil Shaw, are behind German lines following a lead to the Spear of Longinus that pierced Christ’s side. However, the Nazis have captured Indy and are about to hang him, when an Allied bombing raid frees him. Indy dons the uniform of a dead German soldier he shot to infiltrate the Germans and see if the Nazis have the spear.

Meanwhile, a Nazi rocket scientist named Voller has found what looks to be the Spear tip, but he tells the German Colonel taking it back to Hitler that it’s a faked replica. However, Voller tells the Colonel he’s got something much better. It’s half of an ancient device invented by Greek mathematician Archimedes. Voller thinks it’s a time-travel mechanism that can help the Nazis change the past. The Colonel is highly skeptical.

He and Voller get on a speeding train to Berlin. Indy’s friend, Basil, is also on the train after being captured. An exciting chase ensues as Indy drives a car, then a motorcycle to hop on the train, fight a lot of Nazis, and get the device.

Cut to 25 years later, in 1969 New York, just before the Aug. 13 ticker-tape parade for the first astronauts to land on the moon, Neil Armstrong, Buzz Aldrin and Michael Collins. Indy has been teaching for 10 years at Harper College there, where he’s now set to retire. Sadly, his son died in the Vietnam War and his wife, Marion, is suing him for divorce because of how the resulting grief and acrimony hurt their marriage.

Voller is still alive and has spent years helping the moon rocket program for the United States. He’s now convinced the CIA to help him search for the second half of the Archimedes device. He, a black female CIA agent and a group of vicious thugs hired by Voller have followed Indy’s goddaughter, Helena, the late Basil Shaw’s daughter to New York. Helena has come to New York to get the device from Indy, who hid it away somewhere after her father became too obsessed with the device and what it can do. Basil thought the two halves of the device could find or create fissures in time to investigate the past.

Helena and Indy are skeptical about her father’s theories, but she wants to take the device from Indy and sell it at an illegal antiquities auction in Morocco. Of course, Voller, the CIA agent and the Nazi thugs show up, trying to grab the device. They kill several people and chase Indy and Helena through New York, including the ticker tape parade and an antiwar protest.

Helena steals the device from Indy and heads off to Morocco. So, Indy follows her there, with Voller and his Nazi thugs not far behind. The chase is on to find the other half of the device before Voller does.

Watching INDIANA JONES AND THE DIAL OF DESTINY is like revisiting an old friend. The movie has a lot of the exciting and suspenseful realistic action and narrow escapes that one expects from an Indiana Jones movie, but it also has some of the fanciful action that places the action adventure franchise into the realm of heroic fantasy. For example, the more realistic action scenes include a chase sequence shot in the streets of New York and one in Morocco. In the opening sequence, there are some special effects where Indy runs across the top of the speeding train, where he also has to fight Voller and the German Colonel for the device. The final action sequence includes some similar special effects work.

INDIANA JONES AND THE DIAL OF DESTINY has. However, there is some foul language and scary moments involving murder, plane crashes, some bugs in a cave, and a bevy of eels in an underwater sequence. So, MOVIEGUIDE® advises caution for older children.