REVIEW - Jonah Hex

It's been hard to avoid the negative critical reaction to Jonah Hex since its US release in June, with the film garnering some of the lowest scores in recent memories. Now we finally get a chance to see this box office bomb in Irish cinemas.

It's immediately apparent from the first frames that Jonah Hex's journey to the big screen was a tortured one. The opening animated exposition has the instantly recognisable odour of a desperate attempt by a studio to make sense of a damaged project, making the bizarre decision to skip Hex's origin story and suggest that his main enemy (John Malkovich) is already dead. The animation is shoddy, the voice over vague and it leaves the audience more unsure than they would have been without.

Things do improve marginally when Brolin takes to the screen in his extremely uncomfortable looking make-up and the opening action scene is watchable (wasting no time in whipping out those horse-mounted chain guns) but viewers should note that Hex seems incapable of leaving a building or location without it burning to the ground behind him. You half suspect him to leave an explosive behind when he visits an outhouse. From there, Malkovich's Turnbull resurfaces with a doomsday plot to destroy the United States and Hex shuffles along in his wake, shooting stuff and grimacing while paying occasional visits to unnecessary side-kick Megan Fox. Who actually looks decent with a gun, take note casting directors.

It's all pointlessly convoluted, mixing Wild West action with a never explained supernatural side-story that ramps up to a symbolic fight between Turnbull and Hex in the desert, intercut with a distinctly uninteresting boat-based finale. Only Michael Fassbender makes an impression on the acting front, while an impressively mis-cast Will Arnett struggles to be taken seriously and Aiden Quinn looks positively embarrassed. Brolin seems oddly committed to the role, amid rumours that he fiddled extensively with the crass and ultraviolent script by Crank creators Neveldine and Taylor - which would have been preferable to this limp pseudo Western. Jonah Hex is far from being the worst film ever made but instead wastes a fun concept with shoddy action, terrible dialogue and a backstory that robs the film of most of its drama.

1/5