Monday, June 21, 2010

Jonah Hex review


I did a bit of research before I sat down to write this. See I've been following the production of "Jonah Hex" for quite some time now. First off I'm a fan of Josh Brolin and the idea that the dude was going to attempt to dive into being an action hero struck me as cool. Second was that "Crank" and "Crank 2" creators Neveldine & Taylor were writing and directing the film. And third because of the previous reasons and knowing that the world would have a hard R-rated action piece with a nice sized budget about a disfigured gunslinger fighting supernatural evils. Sorry art world, but that shit will win my bucks any day. Unfortunately as time passed a lot changed. Neveldine & Taylor were out as directors and in was Jimmy Hayward; director of "Horton Hears a Who!".... I'll let everything I've told you sink in. So I wanted to know what happened, but we'll get to that later.

Now I'm all for giving people a chance to try something new, but that's considering if the material works for that person. For Hayward... ehhhhh I'm gonna go with no. All that R-rated shit... out the door. Time for some good ole' fashioned PG-13ing which is apparently what Warner Brothers was looking for. Now in addition to Brolin let's bring in John Malkovich cause he sell anything... Megan Fox for all those horny men out there and then toss in some other familiar faces for good measure. Yeah... now we have a movie that someone will buy to see right? Right?!

Apparently wrong goop for brains. The story of Jimmy Hayward's "Jonah Hex" is basically this... Hex was a soldier whose family was killed by Quentin Turnbull (Malkovich) for killing his son and Hex's best friend (reasons are pretty paper thin). He's now a supernatural fighting, disfigured bounty hunter that's been hired by the government to hunt down Turnbull who is going for destroy Washington D.C. with a super weapon (aka a big ass cannon on boat) for some reason. Oh and he apparently likes Lilah, a hooker played in a couple scenes by Megan Fox. I don't know... call me crazy, but there could be some holes in this story.

As it turns out Malkovich can't sell everything. For example being a ex-southern general who wants to destroy the capital. I guess we're supposed to believe that since he was a confederate that he's just hell bent on destroying the U.S. or something of that sort. But as little sense as he's whole dastardly scheme makes, still it'd be nice if he could sound like a southerner. Instead he does this odd vocal changing that makes him sound more like slack-jawed northerner than anything else. Equally Megan Fox's accent is flimsy, but sometimes works. I'm not a Fox hater and I think she's far from being a horrible actress. Mainly because she's never tired to be anything out of the norm character wise that would make me think that. It doesn't take Kate Winslet to read Fox's lines in "Transformers" and most of the Fox haters I've discovered are simply people who dislike her media attention. I could care less. The thing of it is she can work and with someone like her in your film you can use what she has (ala' some skill, but lots of looks) to your advantage. Instead she has about four or five scenes, is loosely connected as a "love" interest for Hex and really has no reason to be in the story except to be there and get people to see the movie.

Rounding out the casting fuck ups is the under using of great talents like Will Arnet, Jeffrey Dean Morgan, Michael Fassbender and worst of all Michael Shannon who has ONE LINE. A man who is one of the very best working actors today... has one fucking line in this film. He had more lines in "Bad Boys II"! He had more lines in "Bad Lieutenant: Port of Call, New Orleans"! What in the living shit is going on?! At least that was what I was asking myself for the latter half of the movie. The first twenty or so minutes isn't terrible. The introduction to Hex is alright; as is the following train sequence. But after that it's all downhill, with the only saving grace being Brolin.

I can honestly say that despite all the fuck ups in the film, Josh Brolin is a great looking and acting Hex. He'd be even better if he wasn't neutered and was allowed to be the ultimate badass he could be. As far as spouting quirky one-liners and the dispensing of bad guys however he's pretty darn good. I should also mention that with all the killings and what not that we don't see a drop of blood or anything. In fact one thing that kills the pretty nice train scene is the fact that when the cart with all the people in it blows to kingdom come, the aftermath simply shows a couple of fully intact, semi blackened bodies near the rails. The final battle between Hex and Turnbull is also strange. It's short, shot through awkward close ups and honestly the most forgettable thing about the movie. Oh and there's this completely ridiculous and pointless "dream fight" where the two battle in the red clay desert type arena that keeps getting cut to in the sequence.

So who's to blame? Neveldine & Taylor are still credited as the screenwriters however their script is VASTLY different from what they ended up doing. How different? Well being a fan I did some digging and discovered this great article going through what they intended to happen versus what was made. Also on Neveldine & Taylor's website you can actually purchase their scripts including their original one for "Jonah Hex"; something I might do the next time I've got some extra cash. From what I've read and heard their version would have been without a doubt superior and could've really delivered that kick in the pants the summer season has yet to really get.

I would love to think that someone, somewhere is reading that article or their screenplay and is realizing how much Warner Brothers screwed up. I'd love to think that they're going to wait it down for a while and try to figure out a way to use this character from something worth while. Of course that MIGHT have been the case if they hadn't released the film against "Toy Story 3"; one of the biggest movies of the year. You see if you have a shit movie and you know it's a shit movie and you just want to release something to grab some cash and be done with it all... then perhaps picking a proper release date would be wise. The film opened at #8 so it's my guess that it won't be making back it's $65 million dollar budget (by the way... I'd LOVE to know where that money went). However their is a silver lining to all this. As it turns out someone did love what Neveldine & Taylor wanted to do for "Jonah Hex" and apparently wants them to do that for another back-burner comic book character, Ghost Rider. And while co-writer/ director Mark Steven Johnson ("Daredevil" and "When In Rome"... yes the one with Kristen Bell) did make the first awful damn movie, it seems the "Crank" boys will sweep in to actually turn it into something fresh, exciting and I'm sure quite ballsy. Everything "Jonah Hex" was not.

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