Destiny...that's a big word, and very much open to all sorts of interpretation, depending on one's world view. And Hollywood. So how does an 80 year old Harrison Ford play it out in Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny, his latest and last Indy (5) adventure ?Very very well indeed. I take my hats off to this old hero - wrinkles, white hair, flabby skin and all.
Apparently Indy 5 is premised on a real historical artefact. National Geographic published on 6/7/2023 reported " Said by some to the world’s first computer, the Antikythera Mechanism rested at the bottom of Mediterranean for more than 2,000 years... (there really is a place called Antikythera - it's an island between mainland Greece and Crete)...its 82 fragments were once a functioning astronomical device that could predict the positions of the sun, moon, and planets." A real human - Archimedes the renowned Greek mathematician - is widely thought to have invented the technology of this device.
Of course, Hollywood weaved real history with a heavy dose of artistic license and came up with an intriguing story of it holding the code to time travel. Throw in a power-obsessed Nazi idealist who aims to change history by going back in time to kill and replace Hitler to win the World War. As Voller the mad scientist puts it, "Yesterday belongs to us... Whoever holds it (the dial) won’t be the King, the Emperor, or the Fuhrer. He’ll be a god." Ya, that's how crazed this villain is, and he's got a team of really bad guys to do the dirty work of killing whoever stands in his way.
All that makes up for hard, fast and furious action that sees all sorts of chases and crashes in all sorts of vehicles across land, sea and air in real world locations . It's like whatever there is that can move - trains, cars, aeroplanes, boats, tuk-tuks - Indy's in it. There's even a horseback pursuit right in the middle of a celebration parade culminating in a subway station that really takes the cake.
And talking about cakes, now there's new icing too - the perfect foil to Indy : a PYT- pretty young thing - certainly not sweet, on the contrary, she packs a powerful punch - literally. Smart and brash, knows what she wants and goes all out to get it - that's Helena Shaw, Indy's god-daughter, who proclaims "Sorry, Indy. I don't do noble. Just hard maths...the only thing you can believe in is cash." Yet she still has a heart left at the end of it all. For she not only stages a fantastic rescue but brings about healing for an old man, who sees no more meaning in life. So after all the mad adrenaline-pumping scenes , it's actually the last 10 minutes of the 2 1/2 hour movie that made me cry.
Actually the emotions had started kicking in as I watched a bored Professor Indiana Jones explaining some ancient history lesson to an even more bored audience of youngsters. What an anti-climax to making history in his hey-days. As his faithful side-kick Sallah reminisced, " I miss the desert. I miss the sea. I miss waking up every morning wondering what wonderful adventure the new day will bring us." Indiana Jones the ultimate adventurer must have felt it every day since he put away his whip and hat to settle for a mundane teaching job. Even worse must be the grief of losing a son to war and the break-up with a wife he still loves. No wonder Indy confesses "Everything hurts."
Obviously it wasn't just the physical aging. The most poignant heart-breaking question he threw back at Helena who was trying to convince him to return to their own time zone came in just 2 words, "For who?" The most terrible feeling in life isn't physical; it's the loneliness and hopelessness of a life that has lost all its meaning; that no one cares anymore anyhow anyway.
I am sure all of us have at one time or another wished we could turn back the clock of our lives, and stay in a certain period where we have experienced the "highs" and never move on to hit the "lows". Surely we have all wished we could somehow go back to erase the mistakes, delete the wrong choices we have made along the way of living.
Well, Indy is in such a hard place he prefers to remain in 214 BC rather than come back to his real-life time in 1969. He is already wounded, physically and emotionally. The Siege of Syracuse is really playing out before him and hey, there's Archimedes himself in the flesh to talk to. The past is way better than his present by all appearances; he's got nothing to lose and all to gain by the looks of it. If he has to die to stay put in 214 BC, so be it.
But that's not what his destiny is. When he asked why Helena saved him, dragging him back into 1969 , she responds so well, "You are meant to be here, Indy." But he still can't see; he's still stuck in the "what for " mode . And then his wife walks in, looks him in the eye and asks pointedly "Are you back, Indy?" That's when the light comes back on in his darkened heart. And to complete it, his buddy Sallah walks in too, kids in tow.
That's destiny. We are all meant to be here today, the time and place of our "now", no matter how attractive the "then of our yesterday." We all have a "home" to return to from our wanderings, where love abides with real family and friends.
That's the destiny a good God has ordained for all of mankind on earth - not to perish, but to be blessed with life eternal. Sin has short-circuited it; got us wandering off into all sorts of alleyways and backways, which attract and distract. But Christ came to set us back on track. And we don't need to go back 2000 years to Calvary where Jesus hung on the cross. The job was already finished there. We have a perfectly beautiful hope-filled destiny here, now and forever, one that has been prepared, was made available and is meant for all who would believe there is a heavenly Father, who's waiting for all to come home to feast at His table as His family in a new tomorrow.
"For I know the plans I have for you, declares the LORD, plans for welfare and not for evil, to give you a future and a hope." (Jeremiah 29:11)
" And He made from one man every nation of mankind to live on all the face of the earth, having determined allotted periods and the boundaries of their dwelling place, that they should seek God, and perhaps feel their way toward Him and find Him. Yet He is actually not far from each one of us..." (Acts 17:26-27)
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