Delayed Reaction: Jane Got a Gun

The Pitch: The Magnificent Seven  - 6

Occasionally, it's fun to watch a movie that I know was in production hell for a while. I recently watched Get A Job which was in release hell. Jane Got a Gun had a lot more variety. Director changes, rewrites, recasting (both finding new actors for roles and changes the roles that actors were originally cast in), studio bankruptcy, and delayed release. The only consistent thing I could find was Natalie Portman, who I believe was a fairly active producer as well as the star. I'll be honest. The movie does plays like it had trouble coming together. It had the same "let's just make this and be done with it" attitude that The Good Dinosaur had. The film began as a Black List movie in 2011 and (like many blacklist final products) it's hard to see why. It's fine. It's basically a "defend your land" movie with a touch of "lovers separated by circumstance". Jane (Portman) has to defend her house from a criminal boss (Ewan McGreggor) and his gang who are after her husband (Noah Emmerich), so she calls in help from her neighbor and former love (Joel Edgarton). Nothing's all that memorable. I think there's a version of this film in which Ewan McGreggor could've taken over as the central protagonist, a la Christoph Waltz in Inglourious Basterds (or maybe Val Kilmer in Tombstone is the better comparison, despite not being a villain in that). Portman and Edgarton are fine and that's it. I won't pretend the Star Wars reunion (Portman and McGreggor, obviously, but don't forget that Edgarton played Owen Lars in Eps II and III) didn't entice me somewhat. It doesn't really play into the film though (It's not like Portman and McGreggor did much together in those movies anyway). I keep hoping that director Gavin O'Connor will wow me again the way he did with Warrior, which I adore. It's ably shot. Nothing more.

I have to quit being so negative. The bare bones of the movie is fine. It mixes flashbacks with the present effectively. The relationships between the characters are explained well. The showdown at the end is satisfying in all the ways you want and ends nicely.

Verdict (?): Weakly Don't Recommend