MOVIE REVIEW - The Lone Ranger

On the surface, The Lone Ranger seems like a very good idea for 2013 movie making.  And the casting of Johnny Depp seem like a natural as Tonto also seems perfect.  But this movie may be the biggest opportunity missed in a long time.

Depp stars as Tonto, Armie Hammer as The Lone Ranger and a nice supporting cast, star as the iconic and legendary characters from the old days of radio, and early television.   This is told from Tonto's perspective, as Depp is actually the star of this movie.  This feels like the first of a few of these as it is set up for more.  This story chronicles how our title character, and Tonto come together to be the duo that has been played out for generations.   Good guys, turned bad guys, but for he common good.

First off, there are many fun moments in this movie, and some of this is really enjoyable. Some is even in style, a throwback to old school movie making.  There is some great humor, and some terrific action sequences that are fun to watch, and some stunts actually astounding to see.   But sadly, there are far too few moments like this in this 2 hour and 30 minute film.   And that is the first real trouble here. This is entirely too long.  This could and should be 30 minutes shorter.

The real problem with this is the writing.   This may be he most violent PG-13 movie I have ever seen.   The reason it can keep this rating is that there is no sex, nudity, and almost no bad language at all.   But the violence was staggering for a movie with this rating.   This move can't decide what kind of move it wants to be, so it decides to be every kind of movie and that slows it down.  Is it a comedy, or action, or a socially aware flick?  Yes....it tries for all three and many more.

This story leaves the premise behind of the Ranger and Tonto for about an hour or more, and becomes an indictment of 19th century expansion and greed.  The railroad is expanding from coast to coast, and destroying  the treaties with the Native Americans.   We all know about the terrible wars that did happen in this highly violent time, and that is well told in history and in other movies.  Telling it here graphically here I think was a horrible decision.  This movie loses its focus totally to make its elongated statement, and show the terrible slaughter of hundreds of Indians by the U.S. Army and Railroad executives.  I thought this was The Lone Ranger!

Oh yeah.  He and Tonto are in this too.   The set up at the beginning of this movie and some of the fun action near the end is very fun, an skillfully done.   Depp is well cast as Tonto, but at times, I think we are seeing Jack Sparrow from the Pirates series, and not Tonto.   When Depp is deep in the Tonto character, I thought he was really good, but the writing prevents this all the way through. Hammer is fine as The Ranger, but again questionable writing handcuffs him for much of this.  The writers you can tell as well, think they are really funny writers and inject far too much humor here, and it becomes stale after a while.

In the end, there is just too much going on here to be great.   But there is enough right to be simply good  - at times.  But again I have to say, this is highly violent complete with stunning and bloody massacre scenes, cannibalism, and tons of gratuitous killing. This really is not very appropriate for kids and that's a shame.

The Lone Ranger.  Some to like and enjoy, but a huge opportunity missed.