Jane Got a Gun (2016)

Bill Hammond arrives home to his New Mexico ranch with multiple bullet wounds and a grim warning for his wife, Jane: The Bishop Boys are coming.

Alarmed, Jane scoops up her young daughter and leaves her in the care of a friend, visits an old lover named Dan Frost to ask for assistance and, once rebuffed, returns to help her husband and defend her home.

Before the Civil War, Jane (Natalie Portman) and Dan (Joel Edgerton) were lovers, engaged to be married. Then Dan marched off to war. Years later, having heard nothing from him, Jane presumes he has been killed.

Left with his young daughter Mary to care for, she decides to join a wagon train bound for Rafael, New Mexico. It’s led by John Bishop (Ewan McGregor) with the promise of a wonderful new life and a land rich in silver at the end of the journey.

In truth, Bishop is tricking young women in a future life of slavery working in the cathouse he intends to establish in Rafael. Bill Hammond (Noah Emmerich) falls for Jane and rescues her from the Bishops, but not before killing some of his men in the process.

Years later, the Bishops are still out for revenge. They’ve even put a price on Hammond’s head. And when Dan shows up in New Mexico looking for Jane, they try to recruit him to their cause. Instead, the former war hero decides Jane is worth fighting alongside, married or not.

Review:

Western fans will want to catch this film because it’s one of several released to DVD in 2016 that benefitted from a far bigger budget than normal for a 21st century film of the genre.

As a result, we get a great looking movie, a plot more original than most and solid performances from Natalie Portman, Joel Edgerton and Ewan McGregor in the only three roles that demand much from their characters.

Just please don’t think about the story for too long. If you do, it will unravel. Let’s see, Dan Frost arrives in New Mexico and has no problem locating Jane and her husband. When Jane needs to fortify for the assault on her ranch, she heads to Rafael. But the Bishop Boys, with all their dastardly means, can’t locate the Hammonds?
And while the final showdown at Jane’s ranch is certainly intense in its violence, it’s rather awkwardly scripted as well. Oh and there’s a very stylish ending – so stylish it seems out of character with the rest of the film.

Then again, if you consider the film’s troubled past, it didn’t turn out all that badly. Two leads – Michael Fassbender and Jude Law – bailed on the project before filming began. So did original director Lynne Ramsey. Add a bankrupt distributor to the mix, and a film shot in 2013 didn’t make it to the big screen until early 2016.

Portman, McGregor and Edgerton previously starred together in “Stars Wars” episodes II and III.

Directed by:
Gavin O’Connor

Cast:
Natalie Portman … Jane Hammond
Joel Edgerton … Dan Frost
Ewan McGregor … John Bishop
Noah Emmerich … Bill Hammond
Boyd Holbrook … Vic
Rodrigo Santoro … Fitchum
James Burnett … Cunny Charlie
Sam Quinn … Slow Jeremiah
Maisie McMaster … Kate
Piper Sheets … Mary

Runtime: 98 min.

End song: “Perdition” performed by JD & the Straight Shot

Memorable lines:

Kate: “Do good people turn bad in the upside down tree?”
Jane: “No. Good people never turn bad.”

John Bishop: “We will turn over every rock until that snake slithers out into sight.”

Dan to Jane after she demonstrates her lack of skill with a six-gun: “Let’s hope the Bishop boys are all big and fat.”

Jane: “You know what, Dan? You might want to see a day where the sun don’t just shine on your story. Cause there’s a whole world out there of other people’s tales. You just caren’t listen.”
Dan: “Well, we get through this, you can tell me all about it, Jane. Right now, I’m busy diggin’. Probably our graves.”

Jane to Dan, about their missing daughter, presumed dead: “Life stopped being something you live after that day – just something you endure.”