Indiana Jones 5’s opening sequence will feature a de-aged Harrison Ford, reverting the 80-year-old actor back to his younger self, as seen in Raiders of the Lost Ark, The Temple of Doom, and The Last Crusade.
James Mangold, who takes over the directorial reins from Steven Spielberg for Indiana Jones 5, shared the news during an interview for Empire’s January 2023 issue, confirming that the movie starts in an era that would necessitate a much-younger-looking Indy.
“I wanted the chance to dive into this kind of full-on George-and-Steven old picture and give the audience an adrenaline blast,” Mangold told Empire, which teased a “setpiece that dials the clock back to 1944, set in a castle swarming with Nazis” and how audiences can expect a Raiders-era Indy thanks to the miracle of de-ageing technology.
“And then we fall out, and you find yourself in 1969,” Mangold added, teasing a transition to the main action of the film. “So that the audience doesn’t experience the change between the ‘40s and ‘60s as an intellectual conceit, but literally experiences the buccaneering spirit of those early days… and then the beginning of now.”
Empires goes on to explain how Industrial Light & Magic tackled the challenge of bringing an younger Ford to life for the fifth installment of the franchise:
Several techniques were employed to pull the sequence off, including new ILM software that trawled through archived material of the younger Harrison Ford before matching it to the freshly-shot footage. The original Raiders jacket was even pulled out of storage (possibly from the sprawling Area 51 warehouse) and tried back on by Ford, before being replicated thread-for-thread.
“My hope is that, although it will be talked about in terms of technology, you just watch it and go, ‘Oh my God, they just found footage. This was a thing they shot 40 years ago’,” says producer Kathleen Kennedy. “We’re dropping you into an adventure, something Indy is looking for, and instantly you have that feeling, ‘I’m in an Indiana Jones movie.’”
Indiana Jones 5 is scheduled for release in theaters on June 30, 2023.
The previous installment, Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull, released in 2018 and introduced Mutt Williams, Indy’s son, played by Shia LaBeouf, but he does not appear to have a role in the new film that also stars Death Stranding and Another Round’s Mads Mikkelsen.
Discussion (7 replies)
Join Discussion →They were really serious about releasing another Indy movie, huh? Wow! What's next, Rocky 18?!
C'mon! Just let it go, Hollywoke!
Yyyeeeaaahhh that surprised me. Especially since 4 wasn't received all that well, from what I recall.
If I could edit Shia out of 4 I'd completely enjoy it. I did like the story parts without his character. I get what they were hoping to do. It's been the same with Ghostbusters (although I did enjoy the newest one) in trying to find a way to hand it off but this attempt fell off a cliff. I'm not entirely sure the 5th won't either. I sort of think they need to just retire this franchise for a bit and do a reboot in around 10 years or so down the road. Just lay it to rest for a bit.
Eh, well, it was also aliens so....? I think the hardest part of any reboot is finding actors that can fill a void. Really, who could replace Harrison Ford as Indy even in ten years? There's literally nobody I can even picture as doing Iron Man other than Robert Downy. Aside from that, they've got all these terrible scripts. My wife wanted to watch the new or remake of Point Break, and I slogged through it. But as a condition, I told her we had to watch the original the next week. And sure enough, she found Reeves and Swayze, along with a better script, a much better movie. It's entirely too difficult to pull off when the originals were so damn good. This isn't just about being old and grumpy. It's about quality, and sadly it's super hard to find these days. Very happy I saw Top Gun Maverick in theaters. Was a sight for sore eyes.
Point Break. When the original came out I was getting bored with both actors but was completely taken off guard by how good that movie was. Yet another they should've just left alone. I also agree on quality and how difficult it is to find these days. If focus could just be maintained a lot of it would follow through but so many projects, tv or movie, seem to have no focus. There are genres neither of my wife like but if done right we'll check things out. Case in point, right now we're enjoying Tulsa King. Not that much into Stallone of gangster stuff (but watched my share of each in my life) but we are really enjoying it so far. It's the same old stuff but we do appreciate that, so far, it's staying on its own tracks in a definitive direction.
Wooow, so it's real, they actually went and did it: [embedded media]
Saw that! Withholding judgement. I can't tell if this is a train wreck or not yet. I'd like to be optimistically excited but have so many, many, many disappointments. :ROFLMAO: Guess I'll just have to keep the fingers crossed.