Since moving to our current location, Isabel and I average about one movie theater experience a year.
Sad, isn't it?
We used to be pretty avid movie goers back in the day, especially when she used to live across the street from an AMC. My Movie Watcher card was practically worn out back then.
Nowadays, it is rare for one of us to want to see a movie enough to warrant a half-hour drive to the theater. This summer, Isabel had her heart set on Cowboys and Aliens. I think she was hoping for Harrison Ford to redeem himself from Indiana Jones IV. I'm not quite sure he did, but this was, by far, a better movie.
There is almost nothing original in Cowboys and Aliens. You can predict pretty much everything that happens in the movie, as it follows every cliche Western and sci-fi plot device in the book. And it really isn't even that much of a mash-up. We've seen westerns set in space for years now...this is just the first time a major production has brought space to the western.
Perhaps the movie's most provocative element (for me at least) was that it took a surprisingly earnest and sincere look at faith and possibly even Christianity through the (also cliche) figure of the gun-toting preacher who keeps assuring other characters of the existence of free will, grace, forgiveness, and God. I'm not sure that the movie itself sides with the preacher in the end, at least on the God part, but he at least comes off as a virile, strong, masculine, character. More importantly, he doesn't come off as naive or an innocent lost in the woods. He comes off as a character who has seen a lot and been through a lot, but still chooses to believe despite the hardships of the Wild West...and despite the appearance of man-eating aliens.
On a more secular note, try not to think too hard if you see this movie. Most of the plot development depends more on the necessities of genre than a logical unity of action. Isabel made the comment that she felt as though there were scenes missing: she thought perhaps she had missed an explanation or rationale for characters to make certain choices. Instead, it was more tautological: the sheriff does X because that's what sheriffs in Westerns do.
When the movie does attempt to explain itself, the experience is painful. Why are the aliens abducting people? We learn that aliens are abducting people so that the aliens can perform experiments on them and learn their weaknesses. Really? Because it was pretty evident to me that 19th-Century humanity's greatest weakness was being shot with a laser beam...just sayin'.
I also found it frustrating that whenever humans managed to kill an alien, they never tried to steal its weapons and use them. Even the Ewoks figured out how to use Imperial blasters.
Most confusing, the film proposed an absurd plot contrivance to establish the stakes. Conveniently, the aliens that have arrived are a scouting party. The aliens, using alien logic, will never attempt to take over a planet where the scouting party is lost. Apparently, they don't even send rescue teams or call for backup. Maybe this is some kind of warrior code or something. I didn't get it.
Also, we noticed that when the humans are abducted, they are apparently sent to the Guardians of Ga'Hoole movie: (the human prisoners are all hypnotized by a giant-glowing structure in the ceiling that is right out of that snoozer owl movie).
Back on the positive side, though, the movie was a kind of Anti-Avatar. Indeed, Cameron's Avatar and Cowboys and Aliens are almost identical in plot...only, in this case, the humans are the victims rather than the victimizers.
Comments