The Lone Ranger is, frankly, a Lone Ranger movie. It is fun, pretty dumb, but not horrible. This movie is a retelling of the lone ranger's origin story. All the elements are there. The idealistic John Reid (played by Armie Hammer), whose brother Dan, who is the town marshal, is gunned down by the dastardly Butch Cavendish and his gang in a bushwhacking ambush. This prompts our hero to don a mask made from his brother's vest and become an outlaw for justice who wears a badge. We have his sidekick, Tonto (played surprisingly low-key by the film's executive producer Johnny Depp for those of you who have been living under a rock). We have Silver. We even have The William Tell Overture. After that, it becomes a convoluted mess. The story holds together if you don't think about it too much. Exposition was apparently verboten in this film, with characters and events flitting in and out of the story with little or no motivation or explanation.
Apparently, the trans-continental railroad is being built and finished somewhere in the mountainous, butte-filled flatlands of west Texas. The movie flits from the desert of West Texas, to the mesas of New Mexico, to the Rockies in Wyoming in a flash. The railroad's man from Colby, Texas, a Mr. Colby (played by Tom Wilkinson, the go-to British bad guy in films today), who is planning to start a war with the restless Comanches using an unwitting cavalry officer, so he can send the railroad through Comanche land. Apparently, the dearly departed Dan Reid knew about this and was trying to stop it, which led to his death. Then there is Dan Reid's widow and orphaned son, whom our hero loves (we think, but can never tell, the movie won't tell us), whose principle roles in this film are to continually be in danger for our hero to save. There is the whorehouse madam (Helena Bonham Carter), whose ivory leg has the power to drive every man into a fetishist frenzy when they see it, who hates Butch, but we don't know why because the movie doesn't tell us, who becomes an important part of the final scene. Again, we don't know why or when this happened because the movie won't tell us. Tonto hates the railroad man and Butch (at least we think so, the movie won't tell us. But in this case, it hints at it through a really long flashback scene), and decides to help the Lone Ranger. We have the obligatory cavalry slaughtering the Indians scene, of course. We have to show that horrible things happened in the West. This is the only scene a little out of place. Up to this point, the movie was a Disneyized version of the West. Hookers don't hook. People who have been in love for years only kiss. There is no dirt, little blood, and the good guy only shoots the guns out of the bad guys' hands. Perfectly acceptable children's fare. Then we have an extended scene of Indians being gunned down in a fruitless attack. An odd choice. The movie gets real for just a moment, then it's back to stupid CGI stunt work. If this is reading like a convoluted mess, you are beginning to get the idea of the experience of watching the film.
A quick word on Depp's playing Tonto. Why? Obviously, it's because he's the producer and can play what he wants. And if there is any illusion as to who is the star of this movie, just check the attached movie poster, with the Lone Ranger cut half out of the picture and Tonto almost in the center. Despite the protestations on the press junket that Depp is one eight Cherokee on his mother's side by marriage second cousin twice removed, there are REAL native-Americans who CAN act who would probably have killed for such a juicy role. We know this because there ARE Indians in the picture. And while Tonto's tribe affiliation as always been a tad murky, in this movie he is Comanche. We still have real Comanches alive today and have a pretty good idea what they looked like and what they wore in 1873. Depp looks like an Indian who came out of the Amazon and not the Southwest. (Oops, West Texas). I say all this because I think it is a tad insulting to cast a white man in one of the seminal roles for native-Americans.
In the end, the movie is perfectly acceptable family entertainment. I like the new look of The Lone Ranger. The movie is trying to update this very American hero while keeping as much of the original appeal intact. It's fine for kids who want a sugar-rush of adrenaline, but not much else.
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