KARLA'S CHOICE

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Had to give up on Nick Harkaway's debut under his dad's John Le Carré name, KARLA'S CHOICE. Liked what I read of it (and I adore Harkaway's work, GNOMON especially; his turning of phrase and rhythm is spectacular) and Harkaway made an honest go of it, but it lacked the authenticity of his dad's work. Not in the spycraft sort of way, but in the human voice behind it. Felt too much like reading a really good novelization of a really good film adapt of a Le Carré classic: I'd rather read the original. Had a similar feeling watching Mangold's INDIANA JONES flick: the characters are there but the absence of the heart behind is acutely felt. Time to let Le Carré rest. Solid go, but no.

INDIANA JONES and THE DIAL OF DESTINY (James Mangold, 2023)

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(Directed by James Mangold from a script by Jezz Butterworth, John Henry Butterworth, David Koepp, and Mangold; starring Harrison Ford, Phoebe Waller-Bridge, Mads Mikkelsen, Toby Jones, Antonio Banderas, John Rhys-Davies, and Boyd Holbrook. Released 30 June 2023; watched 2023w50 via 4k)

If I learned anything from this entertaining-enough trip down memory lane, it's that Spielberg is as integral to INDIANA JONES as Harrison Ford is under the fedora: Mangold is one of the best, most competent storytellers working today with a panache for finales (LOGAN, I mean... damn) and DIAL is a competent, occasionally thrilling exercise in old-school adventure filmmaking, but for DIAL to truly feel like the farewell to one of the best, most iconic franchises of the last 42 years that it was intended to be, it needed more than competence: it needed Spielberg's unabashed heart and Spielberginess. His decision to not direct DIAL, to "pass it on to a new generation" – perplexing, considering that that's something you would do if the series was continuing which this clearly isn't (P.S. the only actor working today I could see convincingly playing Indy would be Ryan Gosling) – will, I think, go down as the greatest tragedy of the series – yes, even more so than CRYSTAL SKULL which, for all of its LeBeouffery and vine-swinging with monkeys and nuclear-explosion-survival-via-refrigerator excesses, nonetheless wore those excesses proudly and in the best spirit of the series's Saturday matinee / Republic serial inspiration. I'll stick with THE LAST CRUSADE as the farewell, with CRYSTAL SKULL and now DIAL OF DESTINY as wistful and flawed approximations of memories in a family photo album.