Review Tuesday [In The Cinema] - The Lone Ranger

When I first heard about THE LONE RANGER being in production I asked myself, like I always do, do we really need a remake of this? The production shots of a very odd looking Johnny Depp as Tanto started showing up and made me wonder what sort of train wreck will this be. However, when the most recent trailers hit I felt a strange stirring within me that made me WANT to see this movie, and we did so on opening night.

• After a group of lawmen are massacred by the Butch Cavendish gang, the surviving Lone Ranger, along with his sidekick Tanto, endeavor to bring the evildoers to justice.

I remember the Lone Ranger from my childhood only vaguely. There was a movie in 1981. I was around ten at the time and STAR WARS already had it's impact on my life. I am now more disappointed in my myself for NOT embracing the Westerns and pirates and war movies of the previous generations. For me it was sci-fi or forget about it. More recently I have felt a rousing interest in the sorts of movies I missed out on in my younger days. Perhaps it was just that feeling made me want to see this THE LONE RANGER on opening night.

THE LONE RANGER is a PG-13 Disney action movie. It's a lot of fun, has a great cast, has and easy enough plot to follow, good good-guys, terrible villains, action, soul and A LOT OF FUN. I know I said it twice.

You would assume that it would be more like Pirates of the Caribbean in the Wild West. In some ways, that assessment could seem correct. There are the wild chases, the odd adventures, and tales from the past that hold this story together. Also, the tremendous cast does an amaszing job. I really liked the way the movie was depicted from Tanto's view, as he tells a child about his adventure with The Lone Ranger.

Some of the reviews have had various issues with this flick so I'll try to address some of them.

• Who the hell is this lead guy ARMIE HAMMER? Armand Douglas Hammer (yes his name is ARMAND HAMMER, Arm And Hammer) has a good sized resume on IMDB, but this is his first major role. Regardless, he's great as John Reid / The Lone Ranger.
• Johnny Depp is a ridiculous Tanto. He was also a ridiculous swashbuckling pirate but his Captain Jack Sparrow was embraced and endeared. The only thing over the top about Depp's Tanto was the bird on his head, and they had a perfectly acceptable explanation for it that is firmly embedded in the story.
• The movie is goofy. Indeed it is at parts. It IS a Disney movie, isn't it?
• Why do we need a remake / reinvention of The Lone Ranger? I believe that once a generation the imaginations of the young should become acquainted with the pureness of heart of The Lone Ranger and should feel the surge of adrenaline when the William Tell Overture comes on and the hero with the white hat unveils his trap to foil the evildoers.

At the point that I am writing this, things don't look too good for this film. At the beginning of the weekend they were predicting a $70 million weekend for THE LONE RANGER, but today they downgraded it to half that. Looks like Disney will have to keep looking for a blockbuster series to replace the Pirates of the Caribbean.

I don't think this movie deserved the thrashing it got in the reviews from the media.It is what it is, The Lone Ranger. Since his inception as a radio serial decades ago, the Lone Ranger has always been a character who is justice incarnate and designed to entertain the masses. This movie hits both notes well. I highly recommend seeing it on the bog screen while you can. It got killed on ticket sales (when I saw it they were expecting a $70 million weekend, but by the time I was writing this they downgraded it to half that!) and there's lots of summer blockbuster season left, so the screen space is at a premium. Have some fun and watch THE LONE RANGER! (Don't forget to sit through the credits. There's an extra scene, but you only need to sit through a couple seconds of it. It goes nowhere.)

More on IMDB:

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1210819/?ref_=hm_inth_t1