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Guy Ritchie’s movies are a mixed bag. He got his start with edgy crime comedies like Lock, Stock, & Two Smoking Barrels and Snatch, which made us think he was Great Britain’s answer to Quentin Tarantino. Then he swam across the pond and began churning out kooky big-budget reboots of Sherlock Holmes and The Man From U.N.C.L.E. Ritchie’s kinetic style was urbanely macho and a lot of fun. His films were distinct and refreshing. 

We started thinking that maybe he could keep a foot in both worlds. Be the dark and wacky maestro of brotastic action like The Ministry of Ungentlemanly Warfare and the helmer of glossier studio fare like Disney’s live-action Aladdin remake. But his output has been wildly inconsistent over the last few years. For every grimly satisfying flick like The Gentleman, we get a messy reimagining of King Arthur. And yeah, what’s up with that live-action version of Aladdin? 

Ritchie’s become more hired gun than lone wolf. Now he’s back with his latest effort, a rollicking adventure about the search for the fabled Fountain of Youth. Now streaming on AppleTV+, the appropriately titled Fountain of Youth stars John Krasinski (Jim from The Office and Jack Ryan on Prime’s spy series) and Natalie Portman (Luke and Leia’s mom in the Star Wars prequels) as adult children of a famous archaeologist. They’re scouring the globe for the legendary waters that will bestow youth, beauty, and untold power to whoever drinks from it.

This flick plays like the jealous cousin of Indiana Jones. The plot and characters feel heavily influenced by those movies, especially Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade. You’ve got action, a bristly family dynamic, and a rich dude funding an expedition for eternal life. Krasinski and Portman are likable performers, but they’re no Harrison Ford and Karen Allen. They’re not even Brendan Fraser and Rachel Weiss, who ripped off Indy with far more zippy authenticity in their Mummy movies. Krasinski metaphorically tries on that iconic fedora, but it just doesn’t fit. 

The cast is game, but Krasinski doesn’t nail that splendid hybrid of scholarly obsession and reckless bravado that made Indiana Jones so appealing. Krasinski comes across more like a grad student who aced his karate class on a field trip. Portman’s along for the ride, but her delivery is tentative and awkward. She’s saying clever lines instead of performing them. The two leads play bickering sibs with conflicting motivations, but they never really gel together onscreen. 

Most scenes describe their relationship instead of showing us their dynamic. Their banter falls flat. Krasinski has much stronger chemistry with Eiza Gonzalez (from Baby Driver and The Ministry of Ungentlemanly Warfare), who plays his adversary. She’s some kind of soldier employed to protect ancient secrets (I think). Her background is kept vaguely mysterious as she chases Krasinski around the world. 

She’s trying to stop him from acquiring clues to the fountain’s hiding place and they flirtatiously spar through a series of fight sequences. It’s like they’re in a rom-com with John Wick. Overall, her character is more plot device than love interest. Gonzalez’s shadowy employer has protected the Fountain’s location for centuries and the clues to finding it are hidden in six classical paintings. Our heroes race from Thailand to London to Vienna and Egypt to nab them with Gonzalez hot on their heels. 

The globehopping is imminently watchable with the movie unspooling like it’s made by the people behind the Fodor’s travel guide. Ritchie and screenwriter James Vanderbilt (Ready or Not and Scream VI) keep things moving, but it’s at the expense of most of the character development and any reasonable logic. In one scene, our heroes raise a portion of the sunken Lusitania from the depths of the Celtic Sea. This moment is pure movie magic, but it’s laughably defiant of the laws of physics. 

It’s so beyond any reasonable feat of engineering that you can’t just shut off your brain and enjoy it. I’m pretty liberal with my suspension of disbelief when movie watching, but this one was a bit much even for me. As fantastic as the events got in the Indy movies, they still felt based in reality. You got the impression that Spielberg and Lucas were trying to tell a coherent story. Ok, maybe not during Kingdom of the Crystal Skull, but definitely during the first three flicks.

Fountain of Youth has exotic locales, fun chases, and graceful fight choreography, but it’s all just fireworks distracting you from a silly story and thin characters. This flick tries way too hard to be a successor to Dr. Jones and falls short. For all Ritchie’s style and verve, his movie plays more like a stunt showcase than a rousing adventure yarn. You paid to see Raiders of the Lost Ark, but instead got The Indiana Jones Stunt Spectacular. It’s fun, but instantly forgettable.

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