At the time of writing this, Disney’s latest blockbuster starring Johnny Depp not to feature the words Pirates of the Caribbean in the title has already proven a dud at the US box office (at least compared to its gargantuan $225 million budget) and reports say that it’s on the track to lose $190 million when all is said and done. Needless to say that’s not the situation in which the studio wanted to be with this thing.
Stars Armie Hammer (still most known for playing the suing Winklevoss twins in The Social Network) and Depp have spoken recently about it being the fault of US critics who have been bad mouthing the movie for months prior to its release and giving it a bad rap before people have had a chance to see it. Whether there’s any truth to that (I personally think that’s a load of rubbish), much of the blame can be laid squarely at the door of it simply costing too much. Even with Depp in the spotlight as Tonto, arguably overshadowing the title character, and all the requisite spectacle of a summer blockbuster, it’s simply too much of a big ask for it to make the type of money hoped for, especially when it’s trying to sell an awkward mix of old fashioned Western and modern day blockbuster, not to mention the strange image of Depp in make-up with a bird on his head.
Based on the character who first appeared in a 1930s radio series, The Lone Ranger centres on John Reid (Hammer), a big city lawyer and brother of respected Texas Ranger Dan Reid (James Badge Dale), who has come back to his home town. Unbeknown to John, the train is also carrying fugitive Butch Cavendish (William Fichtner) and a strange Comanche Indian named Tonto (Depp), both of whom are kept in chains. Cavendish makes his escape after his gang attack and derail the train, and Tonto gets thrown in the local jail. John is then deputised by his brother in order to help track down Cavendish but due to some double-crossing within the group of Rangers, they are ambushed and left for dead by Cavendish and his gang. Mysteriously, however, John comes back to life where he crosses paths again with now-escaped Tonto and the unlikely duo then pair up to bring Cavendish to justice. With Tonto and a mystical white horse along with him, Reid reluctantly puts on a mask to become the eponymous legend.
The film is at its strongest when it deals with mythmaking and how that has rippled through the years so that even children know who he is and want to emulate him with a toy gun and outfit. Indeed that’s exactly how we’re introduced to the story via a boy at a fairground Wild West attraction talking to who appears to be Tonto in his old age recounting his and The Lone Ranger’s adventures. It works to a point and is actually a rather clever way of easing us into the story but it can come across as gimmicky as it progresses.
The film comes to us from a lot of the same people who brought us the hugely successful Pirates franchise. The trouble with at least the sequels in that series was how messy and drawn out they became, with too many characters and storylines vying for screen-time that it became confusing and dull. Fortunately The Lone Ranger is much more of a straightforward affair, telling a relatively simple tale of double-crossing, horseback adventure and the forging of a legend that has since become a household name.
It’s just a shame, then, that much of the fun gets lost in the sludge of an overlong runtime – it clocks in at just shy of two and a half hours, a bad habit director Gore Verbinski and Co. have picked up from working on Pirates – repetitive scenes of Depp’s offbeat Tonto perpetually giving sideways looks and quipping at every little thing The Lone Ranger does and set-pieces that, despite its grounded Wild West setting, rely too much on CGI. And the over-the-top approach to just about every aspect of the action and the exaggerated character personas sits at odds with the implied brutality of the story; cannibalism and genocide are among the topics covered. The spectacle all looks fantastic because of course it does, it cost over $200 million to make, but one wonders why it needed to cost so much when plenty of films made for half the cost look just as good.
The script is co-written by Ted Elliott and Terry Rossio, two of the writers of the Pirates franchise, alongside Justin Haythe (Revolutionary Road, Snitch) and it feels very much like one written by committee. It’s bland and bloated with underwritten characters and a plot that, while mercifully simple to follow, is basically a string of quirky gags involving Depp and straight man Armie Hammer – who never have good enough chemistry together to make it work as any sort of unconventional buddy movie – leading from one giant set-piece to the next. There’s aesthetically pleasing use of the surrounding landscapes by Verbinski and a peppy, heroic score by the great Hans Zimmer, both of which frequently hint towards Sergio Leone’s classic Western Once Upon a Time in the West (as does this similarly epic runtime). But it only reminds you how masterful that film is rather than being any sort of pleasing nod to it.
Aside from Depp, who’s racially dubious casting just doesn’t sit right throughout, we have Hammer in the lead role and he’s likeable enough though he doesn’t quite have the kind of charisma necessary to completely pull the role off and bring him to life as a character beyond the iconic mask and horse upon which he rides. There’s some joy to be had in the supporting cast, though some of them play characters who are more justified than others. Fichtner’s gleefully sinister Joker-esque bad guy complete with scarred face and menacing one-liners and Tom Wilkinson’s railroad tycoon manager are integral to the plot whereas Helena Bonham Carter’s hooker-with-an-ivory-leg (which just so happens to double as a gun) is merely there to perform an obvious function in a later stage action sequence. However, the focus is on the two leads and actually far more focused on Tonto than it is on the titular hero; it smacks of the studio knowing that audiences loved Depp’s quirky turn as Captain Jack Sparrow and are trying to replicate that with another wacky character. The film is a bit too much in love with Depp and his persona.
Overblown, overlong and, yes, over-budgeted, The Lone Ranger is a lumbering tip of the hat to the idea of legends and their stories, infused with creaky dialogue and humour that’s at once repetitive and clunky. It’s not without its sense of fun – a final showdown in, around and atop a speeding train is insanely well choreographed and is as exciting as it is visually spectacular – but you have to wade carefully through two and a half hours of flabbiness to find it.
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