THE LONE RANGER
BLU-RAY
***
Makes a better Wild West travelogue than movie.
film: This movie is going to turn into a guilty pleasure for some, like John Carter. For others, it is just never going to work.
Trying to smoosh three very distinct storylines into this film really does the whole concept of the Lone Ranger a disservice, but that is what happened and now you have the dvd to prove it.
There’s the origins story of the Lone Ranger (Armie Hammer), the story of the downward slide of the Comanche people as a metaphor for the Native Americans and then the story of how the West was tamed by the introduction of railroads, and the concomitant corruption of the businessmen.
Too much.
Repeat viewing will bring home that it is beautifully filmed – the vistas are gorgeous, the action sequences are well thought out – but the bloated plot just keeps on sidetracking your attention.
SPECIAL FEATURES: Bloopers and storyboard deleted scenes, yes, we know we’ll get that in a Disney movie.
The features on Hammer’s Western Road Trip and boot- camp for actors, though, that’s more like it.
All the scenery in the film is real and just waiting to be explored – and it turns out the guy who played the Lone Ranger loves road trips, so his enthusiasm is infectious.
The feature on how they built the kilometres of railroad for the set from scratch introduces the concept that those extras building the railways actually do this on movie sets for a living. – Theresa Smith