October 11, 2010 - Jonah Hex

Alright, last time I stretch the rules, I swear. Jonah Hex is by no means a good movie, but it still deserves to find a an audience. Really, I jut feel bad because the entire thing feels like everyone came on board truly believing it was going to be good. It's got an incredible cast, some great ideas, and no one feels like they took the job for the pay cheque. It's just that the business side of thing took over, and slowly squeezed all the ambition out of it.

Let's start with the writing. Neveldine/Taylor have never played it safe. In fact, they seem to relish in going as far overboard as they can. They are the only writers credited, but I refuse to believe that they wrote something so by the books and bland as this. There are still a few cool moments, some truly awesome ideas, but you can read the studio notes as if they were on the screen. Stopping the movie for exposition, redundant dialogue, shoe-horned in love interest, no interesting use of his powers. Scenes happen for no reason, and with little connecting tissue to what came before or will happen after. Though, that might not be entirely the writer's fault, which means me to my next point.

The editing. The movie is barely 70 minutes long. And it's clear the movie they shot was supposed to be a great deal longer. Major actors like Michael Shannon and Will Arnett have barely 5 minutes of screen time. Nothing fits together quite right, it's like the trimmed 10 frames off of the beginning and ending of each clip in the editing suite. I'm sure whole subplots are lying in a can somewhere. And the fights are mostly garbage. At one point, Jonah Hex and his prostitue love interest are fighting bad guys and we never see how the fights started. Not to mention that for all the exposition they force feed us, very little is explained. I have no idea of the limits of Jonah's powers. I don't know how the MacGuffin works. Sloppy work all around.

Just like the effects work. This is the one thing I can't sugarcoat. There is a lot of terrible CGI work in this film. Nothing seems to be occupying the same space as the real world. There is terrible green screen work, and the design of most things is boring. Even the practical stuff seems cheap. Hex's scar always seems about to start peeling off. The movie itself isn't that badly shot. Boring, but competent. With some practice, I can see the director making some decent low budget action in the future.

Like I said, the cast is amazing. Josh Brolin, John Malkovich, Michael Fassbender, Michael Shannon, Lance Reddick. All great people, and with the exception of Malkovich who seems bored, they all actually try. It's like they all signed on to do a very different movie then what we got. Even Megan Fox isn't terrible. It's a waste, which is the worst thing I can say about the film.

I know it must feel like I'm tearing this movie apart, but only because it's frustrating to see a movie that could be great get gutted in post. Jonah Hex should have been a better than average supernatural Western. What we got is frustrated mess, but one that's fascinating to watch and wonder what if?