Jonah Hex

Hands up if you've heard of the DC comic book Jonah Hex by John Albano and Tony DeZuniga! No one? Yeah, thought not. Me neither, and my only knowledge of the comic book is purely from the new film adaptation directed by Jimmy Hayward. And my God, is it bloody terrible? Yes. Yes, it is.

Okay, so we've got a film based on a comic book that no one, other than chronic masturbators who live in a box in their mother's attic, has heard of. Little appeal, not many people care. And then the first trailer is released, which is abysmal and spreads an incredible amount of negative feedback across the internet. Even less appeal. And Megan Fox is in it. The film now appeals to Megan Fox, and Megan Fox only.

As you've probably assumed, the film was a gigantic flop, deservedly making only $5,378,800 on its opening weekend. Thank Christ this wasn't a success, otherwise movie studios would be dishing out more shit like this for a quick buck every chance they get. Wait, they do. But what is the film actually like? Well, what we get is a consistently stupid, mindnumbing mess of a film that lazily indulges itself for 72 minutes (seriously, it's THAT short) while the viewer screams in terror, watching as their horrified brain cells commit suicide, causing the viewer's brain to explode through their skull, after which they thank the lord for having mercy on them. That's about right.

Josh Brolin stars as Jonah Hex, a legendary bounty hunter living in John Wayne world, sometime during the American Civil War. He's a tad disgruntled after he is forced to watch his wife and child burn to death in a fire caused by Quentin Turnbull, played by John Malkovich (why, John Malkovich, why?!). Hex now wears a permanent nasty burn mark and is a bit of a Grumpy Gus.

Believing Turnbull to have died, Hex finds out that he is actually fine and dandy and the government wants the scarred outlaw to hunt down the terrorist. Turns out Turnbull is planning a massive attack on the US using advanced weaponary (Wild, Wild West much?), and Hex is told that the government will stop chasing him if he manages to thwart Turnbull's plan. And so Hex sets out to get revenge and to stop the dastardly bastard before he destroys the country.

Okay, where to start in the rant I'm about to do? Hmm, I'll begin with the characters. Every single character in this movie is a one-dimensional caricature without the slightest hint of development or believability. You find yourself not giving a damn about a single one of them, connecting with them or caring about what they do, where they go, why they do anything or how they feel. If Jonah or any other character in this shit-fest were to be continually tortured throughout its thankfully short running time, you really just would not bat an eyelid or feel a shred of pity for them. In fact, we're the ones being tortured by this pile of shit!

It's predictable as hell too, not only because it's a Western (they're all the same, aren't they?) but because it doesn't really even try to outstretch its limitations as a revenge flick. You know what's gonna happen almost every couple of minutes and the ending, well, guess which two characters have a face-off at the end?

The film hasn't even gotten its tone right, as it amateurishly shifts from over-the-top action to out-of-place supernaturalism and then to emotional drama and a cartoon at one point (not kidding), which lead me to believe that the film hasn't got the slightest clue as to what the hell it wants to be. Other than a horse's ass. It's chaotic, there's no consistency.

As for the writing, it pretty much entirely consists of pathetic one-liners popping up every two seconds, clearly intended to become catchphrases put on trailers and t-shirts and mugs or whatever. They're not funny and they're not smart, they're just there to cover up the lack of writing ability that embodies the movie. Now, to be fair, I have heard that Mark Neveldine and Brian Taylor's script was raped to death by the studios, leaving only a crumb of the chocolate buffet that may have sprouted from the imaginative minds of these two writers. As shown in Crank, they know how to make a crazy movie without it coming across as a shambles, and it would have been interesting to see them directing this or had full control of the film's content.

The action scenes are pointlessly over-the-top, not fitting in at all with the film's shaky tone. There's a horse with massive machine guns strapped on it, Jonah runs down a corridor, firing dynamite pistols and there's a point where he deliberately sets his hand on fire just to punch someone in the face. All of this just seems completely out of place, leaving me sitting in my seat, confused, wondering what the bejesus fuck I was watching.

Josh Brolin really has hit a career low with Jonah Hex. After starring in No Country For Old Men, Planet Terror and Milk, you have to question what was going through his mind when he signed on for this. You're meant to be mesmerised by his character because he's supposedly awesome and cool, but you spend the entire movie staring at the distractingly hideous scar planted on the right hand side of his face. I felt sorry for him, I really did, because his performance isn't that bad, but practically everything else about the film is.

Megan Fox drags her way through each scene she's in, which isn't many (thank God) as a prostitute, sounding as if she's reading large-lettered cue-cards written in a Southern slur so she can try and pass off the undoubtedly fake accent. Her character doesn't really serve any purpose up until the end when she gets kidnapped, so just like in Transformers 2, Fox's character wasn't even needed.

And then there's the Shakespearean, Oscar winning actor John Malkovich. I should have the same pity for him as I do for Brolin, but I don't. And the reason for this is that he looks like he's genuinely having fun, unlike the rest of the cast. His performance was the best for me, playing a typical and kinda cliched villain, but for what it is, it works.

The only truly bearable thing in the movie is the music by Marco Beltrami and the band Mastodon. It has a deliberately grungy feel to it, lots of guitars, managing to fit into each genre the film pathetically lumps itself into.

This film is horrible. Almost every aspect of it is terrible, the film itself doesn't even know what the fuck it is. It deserves every Razzie award for awfulness it can fit in its asshole and then some! In fact, don't go and waste your money on this incomprehensible mess of a film, just go buy the soundtrack instead. At least you'll get your money's worth. And you won't have to look at Josh Brolin's face.

2/10