Jonah Hex (film)

from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Movie
German title Jonah Hex
Original title Jonah Hex
Country of production United States
original language English
Publishing year 2010
length 82 minutes
Age rating FSK 16
Rod
Director Jimmy Hayward
script Mark Neveldine ,
Brian Taylor ,
William Farmer
production Akiva Goldsman ,
Andrew Lazar
music Marco Beltrami ,
mastodon
camera Mitchell Amundsen
cut Kent Beyda ,
Daniel P. Hanley ,
Tom Lewis ,
Fernando Villena
occupation

Jonah Hex is an American anti-hero - Western from 2010, based on the same DC - comic book series .

action

As a war refugee from the Civil War , Jonah Hex is captured by Quentin Turnbull. Turnbull ties Hex to a cross in front of his house, forcing him to watch Turnbull and his men set Hex's house on fire and lock his wife and son in the burning house. They also burn one time in his face, which disfigures him. After they leave him behind, he almost dies after a few days before he is rescued and cared for by the Crowindians . In doing so, he acquires the ability to speak to the dead, which he uses from then on to kill Turnbull driven by his revenge for the death of his family. But he allegedly dies in a hotel fire, so Hex has no choice but to work as a bounty hunter .

But Turnbull only pretended to be dead, because after a few years he plans to build a super weapon, the so-called "Nation Killer" by Eli Whitney , to attack the United States on July 4th 1876 on its first centenary. And to do this, he has to steal individual components from different parts of the country. So he has a secret train ambushed, where he has the necessary parts brought to safety, but has soldiers and civilians from Burke and his dynamite blown up in cold blood. President Ulysses S. Grant is immediately worried, knowing that there are only ten days until the big celebration to stop Turnbull, so he immediately sends his men out to recruit Hex. They catch him after a night of love with the prostitute Lilah, which Hex doesn't like at all. But before killing the twelve armed men, he hears that Turnbull is still alive and accepts to work for the President of the United States of America.

While Turnbull is in Charleston, South Carolina to get more parts for his super weapon, Hex rides to a military camp where, after talking to a dead man, he learns that Slocum Turnbulls is opening the grave of Jeb Turnbull, Quentin Turnbull's son, who reveals to him that his father is in Fort Resurrection . So Hex rides there and fights his way into the fort and manages that Turnbull can escape from him. But after Hex kills several of his men, he too finds himself surrounded by Burke and his men, so that after he got two loads of shot in his chest, he also has to flee. In the wilderness he collapses after a long ride, so that he almost dies of his wounds, until he is found again by the Crowindians, who once again save him and nurse him back to health.

In a strengthened condition, Hex then lets the president know that he is on his way to stop Turnbull, who wants to start from Independence Harbor , and to stop his weapon for the centenary. So Hex rides to the harbor and shoots his way to the ship towards Turnbull. But here, too, Burke stands in his way again and after a long fight, Hex manages to kill him and partly get his revenge on his family. And now only Turnbull is missing. But this is not so easy to kill, because he has now taken Lilah hostage and gives Hex the choice of making a sacrifice or surrendering himself. Hex cannot sacrifice Lilah, so he surrenders and is locked away with her. But they flee and while Turnbull is killing the first opponents with his "nation killer", Hex and Lilah shoot their way free. After a long fight, they kill Turnbull and the ship blows up while the guests cheer for the centenary. Hex then receives his fee, full reprieve and an offer to work as a sheriff. But he refuses to work for the state because he would rather be his own master.

criticism

Brolin, Fox and Fassbender during the promotion of the film at the 2009 San Diego Comic-Con International

The film received very bad reviews. The Rotten Tomatoes website counted 17 positive reviews of 142 professional reviews, which corresponds to a value of 12%. Furthermore, the film was received very poorly by the general public, because at the same time only 24% of 164,235 users rated the film positively. This in turn is confirmed by the online film archive IMDb , another platform on which normal users can submit their film reviews, because there almost 50,000 users gave the film an average of 4.7 out of 10 possible points. (As of June 12, 2018)

Since the clues of a film that has been heavily reworked in the editing room can already be seen on the basis of the "poor running time, incoherent narrative style and castrated violence", according to the opinion of renowned film critic James Berardinelli it would have been better to publish the film as direct-to-video . However, the "story with its bizarre undertakings [...] is never boring". It is only a problem if, despite Brolin's performance, who presents “his one-liners with serenity”, “the villain is more interesting and charismatic than the hero” through Malkovich's performance.

In Jonah Hex , renowned film critic Roger Ebert of the Chicago Sun-Times saw less of a " graphic novel than a graphic anthology full of strange occult ideas". In addition, the film is "not precise, [...] erratic in its story [and] confused".

In the entire film there is "no shortage of firepower," said Michael Rechtsshaffen of the Hollywood Reporter , but otherwise the film would be so missing that it would be "dangerously close to the wild wild west misfire ". And Megan Fox also contributes to this with her portrayal of her character Lilah, "in which she fails to let the sparks fly."

Despite the “bad word of mouth [and] the strange and somewhat confusing” cast, Manohla Dargis said in the liberal New York Times , the film was “better, livelier and more varied than, for example, more recent action films like The A-Team - The Movie ".

production

As early as 2000 Akiva Goldsman and Robert Zappia developed a one-hour adaptation of the comic character Jonah Hex for television, which never went into production. In July 2007, Warner Bros. received the filming rights and hired Goldsman again, this time, however, together with producer Andrew Lazar and the two screenwriters Mark Neveldine and Brian Taylor to combine a western with supernatural elements. Josh Brolin was cast as Jonah Hex in October 2008, and Neveldine and Taylor have been confirmed as directors. But already in November 2008 both resigned as directors because of "artistic differences with the studio". After the studio tried to direct either McG or Andy Fickman , Jimmy Hayward was announced as the new and final director in January 2009 . In February 2009, it was announced that Legendary Pictures would be co-funding the film and that John Malkovich would play Quentin Turnbull , so that shooting could begin in Louisiana in April 2009 .

Even before Josh Brolin was introduced as Jonah Hex, Thomas Jane asked the studio to play the role itself. And even though he hired a makeup artist to do the look and feel of Hex, he wasn't cast. However, he was allowed to lend Hex his voice in the short animation film DC Showcase: Jonah Hex .

Soundtrack

Jonah Hex: Revenge Gets Ugly EP
Soundtrack from Mastodon

Publication
(s)

June 29, 2010

Label (s) Reprise Records

Format (s)

CD

Genre (s)

Progressive metal

Title (number)

6th

running time

32 min 46 s

Track list

  1. Death March - 8:52
  2. Clayton Boys - 3:12
  3. Indian Theme - 4:10
  4. Train Assault - 4:13
  5. Death March (alternate version)  - 9:07
  6. Clayton Boys (alternate version)  - 3:12

In September 2009 it was announced that Mastodon had been hired for the soundtrack of Jonah Hex . While Jimmy Hayward was writing the script, he was heavily inspired by Mastodon's 2006 studio album Blood Mountain , so he called the band personally and asked them to do the film score. Since the budget was relatively limited and several filmmakers had to accept some cuts in their salaries, Mastodon took over the work for "basically nothing".

Awards (selection)

publication

Jonah Hex started in US cinemas on June 17, 2010 and was able to reap only 5 million US dollars of its 47 million US dollar production costs on the opening weekend, making him the second best newcomer in the cinema charts at number 7, behind Toy Story 3 , which started at number one. Overall, the film only grossed 10.5 million US dollars and, after the film did extremely poorly at the box offices abroad, was only sold on DVD in the remaining countries. In Germany, too, the film was only released on DVD on February 4, 2011.

The major failure is attributed to the trimmed cut version, so it was hoped that an extended version would appear on DVD. However, this is not yet planned.

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Jonah Hex (2010). rottentomatoes.com, accessed August 20, 2011 .
  2. ↑ James Berardinelli : Jonah Hex on reelviews.com from June 17, 2010 (English), accessed October 7, 2011
  3. ↑ Roger Ebert : Jonah Hex (PG-13) on suntimes.com from June 16, 2010 (English), accessed October 7, 2011
  4. ↑ Michael Rechtsshaffen: Jonah Hex - Film Review on hollywoodreporter.com from October 14, 2010 (English), accessed October 7, 2011
  5. ↑ Manohla Dargis : Tale of a Bounty Hunter on nytimes.com from June 18, 2010 (English), accessed October 7, 2011
  6. ↑ Beth Laski: DeVito has a 'Revelation' on crowded Canton slate . In: The Hollywood Reporter . January 20, 2000.
  7. ↑ Borys Kit: Warners puts 'Hex' on comic . In: The Hollywood Reporter . July 24, 2007.
  8. ↑ a b Bory's Kit: 'Horton' helmer has 'Hex' next . In: The Hollywood Reporter . January 6, 2009.
  9. ↑ Michael Fleming: Josh Brolin eyes WB's 'Jonah Hex' . In: Variety . October 9, 2008. Retrieved October 7, 2011.
  10. ↑ Michael Fleming: Neveldine, Taylor leave 'Jonah Hex' . In: Variety . November 19, 2008. Retrieved October 7, 2011.
  11. ↑ Michael Fleming, Dave McNary: Malkovich, Brolin set for 'Hex' . In: Variety . February 11, 2009. Retrieved October 7, 2011.
  12. ↑ Bory's Kit: Will Arnett joins 'Jonah Hex' . In: The Hollywood Reporter . March 31, 2009. Retrieved October 7, 2011.
  13. ↑ George 'El Guapo' Roush: Interview: Josh Brolin, Megan Fox and Jimmy Hayward Talk About Jonah Hex. Latino Review, June 15, 2010, archived from the original on July 24, 2010 ; accessed on February 22, 2014 (English).
  14. ↑ Michael Saba: "Mastodon to Score Jonah Hex Movie" on pastemagazine.com from September 3, 2009 (English), accessed on October 7, 2011
  15. ↑ Justin Jacobs: Mastodon Talks Jonah Hex Score . In: paste . October 23, 2009. Retrieved October 7, 2010.
  16. ↑ June 18-20, 2010 at boxofficemojo.com (English), accessed October 7, 2011
  17. ↑ Jonah Hex at boxofficemojo.com (English), accessed October 7, 2011
  18. ↑ Jonah Hex - For the time being no extended version on schnittberichte.com from August 13, 2010, accessed on October 7, 2011