The Lone Ranger

In what seems to have become an annual event, the movie I enjoyed most in 2013 didn't do terribly well at the box office. In 2010 it was SCOTT PILGRIM VS. THE WORLD. 2011: COWBOYS AND ALIENS (the extended cut on the Blu-Ray is better than the theatrical release by the by). 2012 was of course the year of JOHN CARTER. Now just in time for 2013 we have THE LONE RANGER.Sigh. What can I say? Some people say they want something different at the movies. I genuinely do.The press leading up to its release was awash in negativity. The snark came in basically two kinds: Those who thought it was racist to cast Johnny Depp as Tonto, and those who thought it was racist to make the movie at all.Johnny Depp having some amount of Native American blood and being proud of that part of his ancestry in interviews going back at least twenty-five years counted for nothing. The film production courting the Commanche community and Depp being made an honorary member of the tribe didn't matter. The biggest movie star on the planet wanted to play the role and was the only reason the movie got greenlit at all, but you don't understand, he lacks the requisite genetic bona fides. He's no Jay Silverheels.Yeah, about that. Jay Silverheels played Tonto on The Lone Ranger tv series of the 1950s. Somehow in some people's heads Silverheels' performance is better and worthier than Johnny Depp's could ever be because you know, he was a full blooded Mohawk. But have you watched episodes of The Lone Ranger lately? Silverheels did the best anyone could with what is a total nothing part. Tonto is basically only there to serve his Caucasian kemosabe. The fact they got a real Native American to play that doesn't mean we should accord it more praise than it deserves.Ideally what the complainers wanted was for someone like Adam Beach or Lou Diamond Phillips to be cast. They mean well, but that line of thinking is creatively limited and leads to hewing too close to crappy tradition. I've seen Depp's performance criticized variously as being a racist cliche and as being nothing more than Jack Sparrow in the Wild (Wild) West. It can't be both, so which is it?Actually? It's neither.Depp famously took Rolling Stone Keith Richards as inspiration for his career defining role as Captain Jack Sparrow in the PIRATES OF THE CARIBBEAN movies. Once that was pointed out, it was obvious: He seems permanently intoxicated, is always slightly slurring his words, he dresses a bit like a gypsy, and his body language is loose and fluid like the rum he clamors for.Depp's Tonto is miles away from that. He's quiet and determined where Sparrow was flamboyant and dissolute. He moves with smooth precision while all around him is chaos. He's a planner not a schemer --the definition being that a planner focuses on how to solve a problem, while a schemer's focus is on manipulating someone else in solving it.In short: Depp plays Tonto as Buster Keaton, "the Great Stone Face" of silent film comedy, with a left turn at the Jay Silverheels. You can see it in the deadpan facial expressions (the white warpaint helps with this tremendously and more about that later), the body language, and if you still don't get it: The finale is an extended tribute to the two train chase in Keaton's THE GENERAL.What Depp takes from Silverheels are his speech patterns. It's a nice nod because to millions of people, that what Tonto sounds like. Depp's turn is a more interesting conversationalist though. It all builds to subversive effect when the Lone Ranger meets some Commanche elders and none of them talk like Tonto. In fact, they think he's a bit touched in the head. They're saying, "We know our ways are strange to you, white man, but Tonto is an eccentric weirdo even by our standards."Here Tonto's given a backstory and motivation of his own ala Sergio Leone's ONCE UPON A TIME IN THE WEST. He's a man without a tribe, separated from his people and society because of a tragedy he feels responsible for. He's given --dare I say it-- a personality.Which is refreshing. Unlike every other depiction of the character on screen, Tonto is shown to be more than just his race, more than just the Lone Ranger's trusty Indian companion. Not being a full blooded Native American himself, Depp doesn't see the character as a spokesperson for Native Americans everywhere. Which frees him to do what real artists always do: Take inspiration and use it to create something new.The complainers went on about Tonto's strange look, saying it wasn't in accordance with any tribal tradition, but they missed the whole point of it: Like the Lone Ranger this Tonto has his own mask. It's one he wears for his own reasons and one he never takes off. If you doubt what I'm saying, just look at the advertising logo and tell me whose eyes those are behind the mask.Which brings us to the Lone Ranger himself, played by Armie Hammer. I've heard criticisms about how the movie treats the character, saying it's not respectful and he's not cool enough. If you go back to the tv and radio shows though, you see the Ranger was never cool. He didn't shoot to kill --ever. Didn't drink, smoke, cuss, or show an interest in the ladies. He's the man who'd go into the toughest saloon in town and order a glass of milk.Despite what you might've heard, the movie doesn't ridicule the character. What it does is stay true to the "straight arrow" children's hero created by Fran Striker in 1933. The twist is everyone else (including Tonto) react to it the way people actually would. Which is funny. In the end, he still wins against the bad guys on his own terms --which is even better.What else? The movie tells the story of how John Reid became the Lone Ranger. It sticks very close to the story detailed in the original radio show (and later tv series). The cinematography is beautiful and shows off Monument Valley better than anyone since John Ford. It has an old fashioned sense of storytelling informed not just by Ford but by Sergio Leone's spaghetti westerns. Also: Not an overabundance of CGI. Those are real trains and horses, people.The movie runs a bit long, but it's a feast for all that. There's adventure, humor, a touch of the gruesome, some intense action, and heart and spirit to spare here. Do yourself a favor and see it.

Though it was the Lone Ranger-like goofiness, it still took on a huge and most often unspoken theme when it comes to Westerns and Indians. Often times movies that deal with this era and Indians, simply deal with the tragedy of slaughtering tribes and/or removing them off their lands, omitting the real motive of why it happened. Which by leaving the real motive out of it, Indians always are portrayed as having some of the guilt for violent confrontation, like they were misunderstood or it was total misunderstanding between the two parties. Though they may share part of the responsibility for confrontations, the fault of the other party is often looked over and, perhaps, forgiven for few reasons: 1. The motive is not discussed; therefore, it is not rooted into critical thinking, which this motive would have a great impact on it. 2. The other party, the U.S. government/army, is often looked on as a "mistake" or a separated tragedy for each incident, but were still right to having to fight. 3. The U.S. government/army won so they get to write the history. 4. The U.S. Army, as an organization, still lives today so they can preserve the "taught" history if only out of automatic acceptance by people.[Warning: Spoilers beyond this point]This movie, though it may not be anti-government, viewed the U.S. Army as incompetent and down right nefarious. As the Captain, who resembled Col. Custer, in a scene found out that he was raiding (slaughtering) women and children because the Comanche was setup. He was persuaded to join the bad guys because he didn't want to look like he was incompetent. The movie, however, made the point that incompetence does not override the evil that can be espoused by an individual, nor is ignorance an excuse from the consequences of violating higher law. In another scene with the Captain, he pointed his guns at a defenseless boy, and he was willing and about to shoot before the hero rescued the child. The Captain was worried about looking good in history and to his superiors, but wasn't concern about the evil he was espousing whether he was incompetent or not. Everybody has choices. The Captain along with his men made the choice of slaughtering defenseless people for a cause that they did not envisioned themselves.The main bad guy kept saying themes like vision and progress. What he was getting at was Manifest Destiny. Basically, it is where colonists of America believe that they were to make this land (America) a holy land and they were destined for it because God decreed it. Also, they believed (or believe) that they are to rid the land of the evil within it. This is displayed in movie as prayers and having Christians traveling on the train going out west. This was their vision. Their progress was to take land from others forcefully. This is only an illusion since the vision and progress is simply theft and murder. This was displayed in fractal manner with the main bad guy. He couldn't get a wife or have kids of his own so he had to murder the father/husband of a family and attempt to take them as his own in order to setup a neat picturesque lifestyle when there was no love involved.However, Manifest Destiny, when it comes down to it, was nothing but greed fueled by lust. It used religion, love, and "progress" to run over and destroy everybody that was in their way. Instead of being just upright by trading and negotiating and not trying to take it all by force and cheating, they slaughtered innocents, then rewrote history to deviate the truth. The movie used a railroad and trains as a metaphor to demonstrate this. All of today's reverence for the Christian themed history and United Nation means nothing if we ignore these facts. It wasn't Christianity or for a "uniting a nation" the reason for these events so folks who say it was for patriotic reasons is only believing a lie. This isn't to include a large portion of the travelers in history, but mainly the more celebrated events in history.The crux of the movie, which revolved around the hero, the Lone Ranger, being a law man and believing in justice. However, at the end of the movie, the railroad company invited him to be their lawman. That is, to have an officer of the law represent not the people of the state but men who was rich enough to control the government and implement Manifest Destiny. One of the rich railroad men told him to take off the mask as to show his identity and to become one of them. The Lone Ranger said no. This to keep his anonymity and his individuality. He remained as the Lone Ranger and sought true justice. A justice that goes both ways. Justice doesn't solely belong to the powerful nor should they have a monopoly conducting it, but that justice is the responsibility of every individual.And, there is a bit of sci-fi in this movie if you can spot it. Hint: It's in the cave.

Love Johnny Depp as Tonto...I grew up on watching the original and while this story line was different, I think it was good storyline for today's generations.

I can't be the only person out there who avoided The Long Ranger due to bad word of mouth? I mean, the movie was given such heavy negative press that it just seemed like it was an utter disaster. That was nearly ten years ago now and I've grown up since then. I've grown to understand that people's opinions are not fact and for two pounds, I may as well try the movie out for myself.The Lone Ranger was originally released in 2013 by Walt Disney Studios. At the helm was director Gore Verbinski and produced by Jerry Bruckheimer. The film stars Armie Hammer as the legendary Ranger and Johnny Depp as his trusty side kick Tonto. The movie failed at the box-office and did it so impressively, it was recognised as one of the biggest box office flops of all time. Looking back at it now, it may have been a bit harsh as I found out, I quite like this movie.For those who don't know, Gore Verbinski gave us the excellent Pirates of the Caribbean film. The director took that same approach and applied it The Lone Ranger. The movie has the same dark, filthy and twisted vibe the Pirates movies gave us. All the bad guys have filthy clothes, rotten teeth, tangled greasy hair and the world is a vicious horrible place full of many dangers. This style means there's a lot of detail to look at and this Bluray disc certainly brings out those details. It's a fantastic movie visually.I quite enjoyed the story in its simplicity. A group of Texas rangers go on the hunt for Butch Cavendish and his gang. They end up in an ambush that cost the lives of all but one, John Reid. With the help of a spirit animal, Reid is resurrected and in his determination to seek vengeance, evolves into the Lone Ranger character. I felt the movie was a smidgen too long in places but the character interactions and over all acting really held the film together. The chemistry between Armie and Depp is pretty good, providing many great laughs. As an actor, I quite liked Armie as the Lone Ranger but Depp as Tonto was a bit weird at first glance. After a while I thought he brought a bit fun to the character, we just needed to not see Jack Sparrow in the role. William Fichtner is suitably evil and great as our villain. I didn't recognise him at first but he definitely looks the part.The audio for the film is worth mentioning. The action set pieces in this film are remarkably silly but still great fun and it's really heightened by the excellent sound design. The use of sound with the runaway trains, gun fire, explosions etc is quite impressive and possibly one of the best I have. It's a great sounding film and definitely worth cranking up in a home theatre system.I paid £2 for this movie and to be honest, I feel I underpaid by a lot. I really enjoyed this film and would love to know what people don't like about it. It's got some great gags, fantastic action and a great cast. What's not to love?

Never listen to critic's, this film is fantastic, all what you expect from a Western and more besides . Never a dull moment and the humour just rounds it off. Great pairing of Johnny Depp, ( a master of disguise ) and Arnie Hammer. Highly recommend and judge for yourselves , can't understand it's failure at the box office, but then if you listen to critic's!!!!

A very enjoyable film, good laugh out loud moments mixed in with just how poorly the native Americans were treated by "civilized people" Its not a moral - we did a bad thing- story but it has its moments there, overall though its an action comedy that works very well.If you like the pirates films I'm pretty sure you would very much like this one. Very easy to watch and enjoy over and over.Fun film that had easily scope for a follow up but its seems this was not received well by American cinema critics, guess no one likes to be reminded of the sins of their grandfathers.

Utterly brilliant and fabulously hilarious. A wacky take on an old TV series along the lines of Blazing saddles, but way better.Keeps faithful to the opening TV sequence but a much deeper and more politically cultural aware story.I have no idea why this film didn't do so well but it really is a story that will either go over people's heads or was portrayed in a comedic form that many didn't expect.I loved it and Depp is 1st class.

Now this might have been my mistake, or not, I certainly don’t remember reading that it was a French copy.Anyway, it played perfectly, but you had to select English language from the menu, otherwise it auto starts with the French version.Was offered a full refund, so great customer service.I’d recommend this seller, as I have bought a lot from them in the past.