Western Wednesdays: Jane Got a Gun

When Jane Got a Gun was released in theaters earlier this year I was mildly interested in seeing it. When it got mediocre reviews it faded into the woodwork and (almost) out of my interest. Then Stephen King made a tweet in February praising it which stoked my interest once again. Finally, when it was added to Netflix last month, I decided to watch it one night on a whim...

     Jane Got a Gun is directed by Gavin O'Connor. It tells the story of Jane Hammond (Natalia Portman), who must defend her home from a gang of criminals (led by Ewan McGregor's John Bishop) who are after her husband, Bill (Noah Emmerich). After taking her daughter to a neighbor's house for safe keeping she goes to an old friend, Dan Frost (Joel Edgerton), for help. As they wait for the bandits to arrive tensions run high and the details of their past are revealed.

     What I like about this film is that it's surprisingly old school. It's fairly slow paced and uses more longer takes and wide shots than most contemporary films do. It also has a fairly straight-forward story. As a result of this it's rather predictable. I wouldn't mind this so much except for the fact that much of the story is told in flashbacks. Because these flashbacks don't reveal anything that I can't infer myself they become rather dull and uninteresting. I would have much preferred for the film to give me less explicit information and instead focus on the here and now of the story and the relationships between the characters. In addition, the ending of the film feels really trite, especially considering how dark the film is up to that point.

     This film had a very troubled production history. It was originally going to be directed by Lynne Ramsey (We Need to Talk About Kevin) but she left after a disagreement with the producer. Gavin O'Conner was then brought on to replace her and Edgerton (who was originally slated to play the villain) worked on revising the as-yet unfinished script. The film release was subsequently delayed by 3 years. Whether or not Ramsey would have made a better film is something we'll never know but she almost certainly would have made a more interesting one. In the end though, Jane Got a Gun is, at least, a serviceable western, if not particularly remarkable one. Considering the current dearth of films in the genre of late that's good enough for me.

Score: 7/10