MovieChat Forums > Jane Got a Gun (2016) Discussion > Ultimately fails in key scenes

Ultimately fails in key scenes

posted 8 years ago by Amishelvis1
3 replies | jump to latest

"Jane Got a Gun" is at times a decent western, but ultimately fails in the key scenes. Natalie Portman plays a wife of an outlaw, and he returns home shot up by an evil group of "brothers", a bunch of neer-do-wells themselves. There are good subplots involving her daughters, but the long winded scenes between Portman, and her ex-boyfriend fighting off the other bad guys left me unsatisfied. It took place in the dark of night and you just cannot follow the action as well as you would like. This also stars Ewan McGregor. I know there are not many westerns out there, but I still cannot recommend viewing this, not even when it comes out on disc. This earns a subpar * 1/2 out of 4 stars.

[–] black_dodo_b 8 years ago

It's quite sad. The story had a lot of potential, the script was good, the cast was great and some scenes were handled really great.

But you are right, as much as some scenes were great, others just didn't work. The same script with the same cast could have benn great with a different director, would be my bet.

PS: 1/2 star out of 4 is still pretty harsh. It wasn't that bad.

[–] snakeye808 8 years ago

I agree with both of you, especially regarding the potential. I have no doubt this movie would be very highly rated had it put forth the effort to develop the characters more and take advantage of the missed opportunities to include action scenes. For example, I believe we should have been shown why the Bishop Boys gang was after Hammond instead of simply having him ride up to the house with bullet wounds and say they're coming. They missed an opportunity to show viewers an exciting shootout as well as develop Hammond's character (so we might actually care when he dies later on) and to introduce the gang. Also, we are supposed to believe Colin McCann is an evil badass but we only see him acting this way in his opening scene for ~30 seconds, and we are supposed to believe Dan Frost is a great gunslinger but we never see him in action until the end.

[–] atg_commish 8 years ago

it's called anticipation