zaterdag 19 oktober 2013

The Lone Ranger (2013)

Genre : Western/Action
Country : USA

Cast :
Johnny Depp : Tonto
Armie Hammer : The Lone Ranger
William Fichtner : Butch Cavendish

Director :
Gore Verbinski

Summary
In the 1930s, an elderly Tonto tells a young boy the tale of John Reid, the Lone Ranger. An idealistic lawyer, he rides with his brother and fellow Texas Rangers in pursuit of the notorious Butch Cavendish. Ambushed by the outlaw and left for dead, John Reid is rescued by the renegade Comanche, Tonto, at the insistence of a mysterious white horse and offers to help him to bring Cavendish to justice. Becoming a reluctant masked rider with a seemingly incomprehensible partner, Reid pursues the criminal against all obstacles. However, John and Tonto learn that Cavendish is only part of a far greater injustice and the pair must fight it in an adventure that would make them a legend.

My opinion

Never take off the mask

It seems like ages since I've seen a western. I'm immediately teleported back in time when I was still a little kid. There was almost on a weekly base somewhere an old western on the TV. Usually on Friday afternoons you could see one on a German channel with Roy Rogers, after a cartoon of "Schweinchen Dick" or some slapstick movie starring Buster Keaton. And in the weekends it was always somewhere late at night on ARD, ZDF or WDR. My dad thought there was only one kind of genre movie worth to watch ... indeed Westerns. Everybody was stubbornly silent about the fact that those guys walked around in that time with real crappy guns and probably couldn't hit an elephant at 2 meters. I promised myself that I'd never see a western again... or someone should force me into doing that. I'm filing this immediately under the term "traumatic experience".

And yet, I watched "The Lone Ranger". Also a bit out of nostalgia. My mother sometimes bought me a comic of "The Lone Ranger". And of course the portrayal of Tonto by Johnny Depp was also a reason to give this movie a chance.

It was clear from the beginning that this was a Disney Movie. Improbable situations, surviving a crashing speedy train and reappear unscratched, and Silver performing feats as if it was Rintintin. It's known that Depp always chooses eccentric characters. And ultimately he always plays them all in the same manner. He always seems to be under influance of some drug. Probably it'll be "fire-water" in this movie. He really resembled an Indian Jack Sparrow sometimes. That's a guarantee for some dry humorous one-liners, as expected. And there will be quite a few that'll surely make you chuckle.

Biggest downside for me was that it's a long movie although there's very little to say. Some actions were also exaggerated and over-the-top. But I must admit, I wasn't bored. Some action scenes were very well made up and meticulously put together. Ultimately, it's not just a straight-on harmless Disney movie, given the numerous cases of victims and some imaginative explicit scenes such as the supposedly eating of Dan's heart by the really scary and evil looking Butch Cavendish. The slaughter of Comanches by means of Gatling Guns wasn't exactly suitable for young viewers.

Conclusion: a relaxing action/adventure comic hero-story with lots of action, but little substance. And I still don't understand what was going on with those rabbits ... serious form of myxomatosis, I suppose.