Review of The Lone Ranger (1956) by Paul R — 17 Feb 2014

Coming off from the heels of a stupendous venture that was "Rango," you'd feel Verbinski had nothing more else to say when concerning the Western genre. Well, as it turns out, he has more to say, and boy howdy, is this a bloated doozy if there ever was one.

The problem doesn't lie with just the hack written script, but more with Hollywood cynicism once again trying to cash in on the crowd of people that now regret for ever paying to see any of the "Pirates of the Carribean" films, and now have to endure for what is hopefully the only installment in yet another franchise money-maker.

The film tries to be playful and fun for the little kiddies, but when you have people eating hearts out or the titular character himself trying to figure out who he is, I would be hard pressed to find anyone into this elongated two-and-a-half hour train wreck.

Whenever Depp isn't mugging for the camera, the Lone Ranger himself is such a doofus, dopey character for which the film has nothing but mockery for, it's hard to be enthralled by anything. The more interesting character is a horse -- one that apparently adopted the Depp mannerisms on being quirky.

The only thing of any worth is when after two hours of trudging and slogging, we have good ol' Rossini injecting life into what is a staleness creation. But by that point, it's too little and too late to save this overly produced garbage.