Jane Got a Gun

"Life stopped being something you live after that day. It's Just something you endure." Jane Hammond (Portman) has been taking care of the homestead and her daughter while her husband is away. When he returns, injured with bad news Jane must find a way to save everyone. Her only chance is to ask her ex-lover Dan Frost (Edgerton) for help. This is a decent movie but a little slow in some parts. The movie really felt like it wanted to do more but was held back somehow. It is still better than many westerns recently, but had the possibility of being better. Portman is a good choice and the idea is interesting but there was just something missing to make this as good as it wanted to be. Some of the scenes were a little long and repetitive and really hurt the pace of the movie. On the other hand though I did like it OK but my mind started to wander in a few places. Overall, one of the better recent westerns, but was missing something to make it special. I give this a B-.

.. a ranch and a bunch of other stuff (including something attributed to men when they are fearless/a lot of courage). While many have seen or rather predicted the death of the Western "genre" (some might argue it's not a genre itself, just putting this out there), it's still alive and kicking and this movie is testament to that fact.

Natalie Portman is a great actress and she saw something in the character here, that made her want to play the role. It had to do with both the toughness and the vulnerability of her. The script may be predictable (the flashbacks give out bits and peaces, but you can put it together far ahead of the time, so I don't think there are too many surprises, except maybe for the ending), but you can't fault the setups and everything the film does to portray what is going on. Some might feel it's too long and there is definitely not enough action for others, but those who stick with it get a nice story

Jane Got a Gun is directed by Gavin O'Connor and collectively written by Brian Duffield, Anthony Tambakis and Joel Edgerton. It stars Natalie Portman, Joel Edgerton, Ewan McGregor, Noah Emmerich, Boyd Holbrook and Rodrigo Santoro. Music is by Marcello De Francisci and Lisa Gerrard and cinematography is by Mandy Walker.

Jane Hammond (Portman) has to turn to her ex lover, Dan Frost (Edgerton), for help when it's revealed that the notorious Bishop gang are heading her way in search of her husband Bill (Emmerich).

It's going to be one of those films more talked about for what it could have been than what it is. Changes in production staff were unbound, from director, writer, photographer and some big name cast changes, it was a production blighted and destined to be on a loser. It hasn't helped that with it being a slow paced character based picture, and a Western at that, the market for a fan base was already running low on potential supporters. So what we left with?

It undoubtedly is one for hard core Western fans only, it's hard to envisage newcomers entering into the genre for the first time, perhaps lured by the casting of Portman, being won over to the point of seeking out other classic Westerns of past and present. Yet it's got a lot going for it, because if you have the want, then it may just take a second viewing to fully absorb and enjoy.

At its core it's a straight Oater of redemption, opportunities waylaid by fate, and of course a good old good versus bad axis. Relying on a flashback structure to set up the character dynamics, it can get a bit disorientating at times, hence the shout out for a second viewing. However, it may not be the perfect way to build the principal characters, but they are worth the investment for there's a big emotional pull there.

Having laid the foundation for the first two thirds of the pic, we shift to good old honest violence, for siege read backs against the wall, and not without invention, in fact there's much resourcefulness on show, with Jane at times very much leading the way. The last third pays off handsomely, even if there's the (arguably) inevitable sugar coated candy to swallow as part of the final deal. Cast are dandy and turning in perfs of note, though it needed more of McGregor's John Bishop, because with what little he gets he does make a villainous mark.

It looks terrific, Walker's photography bringing to mind the genre work of Roger Deakins, with the New Mexico locations blistering in their beauty, and while the sound mix for dialogue exchanges is a little poor, the musical score is thumping in its tonal appreciations. It's tricky to recommend with confidence even to Western fans, especially in a year when "Jane" had to compete with the more rambunctious Magificent Seven reboot, but give it a chance if you liked something like Slow West, and you may just be pleasantly surprised. 7/10

Jane Got a Gun is a good example of what a movie can do for you if you're going in with certain expectations, especially when they're of an exceptional variety. In the case of this, the word 'troubled' is putting it lightly for the production, as numerous stars (Fassbender quit, Jude Law was briefly hired, as was Bradley Cooper, and Edgerton actually had the role of the *villain*, not the sort of co-hero), and the director (Lynn Ramsey) left while in the midst of shooting over problems with the producer and a lack of final cut. It's the kind of production that has 'disaster' as its mark, and that's not a fair way to immediately judge a film, at least not initially. What if this was the next superb western, in a time when there seem to be a good amount considering how few westerns come out nowadays (i.e. The Hateful Eight, Bone Tomahawk, and Slow West all in the past year or so)?

So I went into this with an open mind, to see what is in front of me (via Warrior director Gavin O'Connor) and left with the opinion that simply... it's OK. Sometimes a little more than OK, and mostly thanks to a game cast. The premise is somewhat simple initially, that a woman finds that her husband (Natalie Portman and Noah Emmerich respectively) has been shot and though she's tending to her wounds she realizes from him more men are coming after him, so she goes and hires a man (Joel Edgerton) who she used to know... actually in some intimate ways.

The movie has a flashback structure that is not really too new. Matter of fact, by 2016 this sort of thing has become kind of tired; of course the drama is meant to be this siege that develops at their home: they can't ride away since Emmerich's Bill Hammond is too injured, so they'll have to set up some things to make sure they aren't caught like fish in a barrel when Ewan McGregor and his men come. But the bigger issue is that the movie has just a lot of peaks and valleys as far as compelling scenes; when people do pull guns on one another and there's set-up with that we see (the plan to fortify the outside of Jane's home with liquid explosives and such is clever), it's exciting.

What seemed to not work quite so well are the quieter scenes, where confessions are made and that drama has to be tapped as to who did what to who in relationships and the old wounds being scorched. There is one really tumultuous sequence where Bill discovers Jane inside of what seems to be a brothel (or it just is) and after he kills a bunch of people she starts sobbing. Moments of high drama register but it's the quiet moments that fall a little flat, or they don't register as they should in a movie that depends on their quiet moments for impact. And it's not so much the actors at fault - Portman and Edgerton are formidable, and McGregor makes a fine figure with that mustache (a bit of a chip off the Val Kilmer in Tombstone block), and one of America's underrated character actors, Noah Emmerich, is terrific even as a lot of his performance is post-shooting in a bed - but with the script.

Strange since the screenplay was originally on the "Black-List" (best scripts produced that got submitted, across the world basically), and Edgerton actually did work on the script too (whether this was before the production problems or during I'm sure I don't know). It's hard to know if it was due to the producers not allowing final cut - a big reason why Ramsey left, which might have been wise - but as a Weinstein Company release it seems a little fishy, like there may have been better material that got left out or moments put together that don't quite fit.

And yet for all these odd feelings watching it, overall I would recommend it to fans of Westerns (believe me, I've seen weaker offerings), and the climax is really solid. James Got a Gun has some original moments, and yet wrestles with becoming generic at the same time: bad-asses pulling guns on one another has been done for so long and in such gritty tones. Maybe it's missing... a tiny bit of humor(?) It's a strange movie to peg what doesn't work about it, but it's not all bad. For all the hard times it took to get to being completed, I'm glad it exists in some form.

A nice, solid, little Western starring Natalie Portman and Joel Edgerton. The two were engaged before Edgerton had to go off to war, but she took off west after not having heard from him in three years. She ended up in New Mexico married to a former outlaw (Noah Emmerich) who saved her from a white slaver (Ewan McGregor? That doesn't seem right; I definitely didn't recognize him if he was the villain, and the character name on IMDb seems wrong, too). Most of that history is told in flashbacks throughout the picture. The main bulk of the story has Emmerich wounded by McGregor and his men. Portman has to defend him, and she rounds up Edgerton, who settled in the area after he found out what happened to his former fiancée, to help her protect them. The story's simple, but Portman and Edgerton carry the film nicely. They have a believable sense of history between them. It's not an action-packed film, but it delivers well when it gets to the climax. There are some weaknesses in the details of the film, especially in the flashbacks, which often seem skeletal in their scripting (Joel Edgerton co-wrote the screenplay with two others). Not great, but good.