Directed by Gore Verbinski
Starring Armie Hammer, Johnny Depp, William Fichtner, Ruth Wilson, Helena Bonham Carter, Tom Wilkinson, James Badge Dale, Barry Pepper, Mason Cook
Action, Adventure, Western
149 Mins
PG-13
One of the many problems The Lone Ranger faces is that it doesn't feel modern. The Wild West that audiences have begun to again embrace with films like True Grit and Django Unchained thrive not because of their niche western setting but because of their steadily unique voice. In a genre where everything has been done before, they divided and conquered simply by doing something audiences haven't seen before.
In The Lone Ranger, everything feels retread, tired, and ready to boot. As a winking tribute of sorts, it works to an extent, but tonally it's stretched like an old rubber band ready to snap. The souring riff on the noble savage, played with tone-deaf readiness by Hollywood's favorite eccentric, Johnny Depp, is off-putting, head-scratching, mildly offensive and entirely dated. The kitschy elements of the 1930s icon could have been celebrated and preserved, even in light of a modernized overhaul, but instead director Gore Verbinski and go-to cohort Johnny Depp have gone for broke and come up with bags of sand.
