The strangest Western film in Hollywood history
(Image source: Far Out / Walt Disney Pictures)
There are absolutely no circumstances under which the West would need to cost a quarter of a billion dollars to produce it. It is madness, it is insanity, it is capitalism gone wild, it is excessive to the point of self-indulgence. Funnily enough, these are all terms applied to the Disney-backed Gore Verbinski debacle The only knight.
It’s impossible to say that the adaptation of the beloved TV series isn’t one of the biggest financial busts in Hollywood history because that’s exactly what it is. However, it felt like the end of an era in some ways, as the Mouse House gradually abandoned the idea of giving featured auteurs huge budgets to inject their own sensibilities into their films in favor of identical Marvel Cinematic Universe films. star Wars Sequels and spin-offs, live-action remakes of animated classics, and general cuteness.
Arguably, Verbinski pioneered this short-lived craze at first Pirates of the Caribbean consequences Dead Man’s Chest And At the end of the world They are very strange films. Sure, they made a lot of money, but there are countless scenes that are so outlandish, clumsy, and outlandish that it seems great that they got past the Disney executives and got on screen in the first place. Unfortunately, The only knight He wasn’t so lucky.
Along with Andrew Stanton John CarterJoseph Kosinski TRON: LegacyBrad Bird TomorrowlandAnd Ava DuVernay Wrinkles in time, The only knight It lost an absolute fortune despite boasting so much visual prowess, dazzling spectacle and character. These three things have been completely missing from Disney’s blockbuster productions ever since, and it’s no coincidence that being average and successful became more important to the studio than being ambitious and unsuccessful.
this does not mean The only knight It is a misunderstood classic, but it is nonetheless the product of a filmmaker’s creative vision and unrestrained budget. If you take the shackles off someone like Verbinski, things are never going to be clear, and that feeling oozes from every frame of the mammoth 149-minute epic.
This is a film where the villains are an unscrupulous railroad tycoon and a bloodthirsty gang of troublemakers, and it’s very clear on at least one occasion that William Fichtner’s Butch Cavendish is a cannibal who kills people and eats their hearts. Since this is still a Disney movie, there’s also a horse sidekick used for comedic relief and poop jokes galore.
“The first 45 minutes are excellent. Then comes the train scene – unbelievable! “When I watched it, I kept thinking: ‘What, this is the movie that everyone says is rubbish? Seriously?’” Who Talked About The Lone Ranger in such glowing terms while also calling it one of his favorite films of 2013?Why, it was Quentin Tarantino.
However, Tarantino has pointed out the absurd color imbalance that mars the film from scene to scene. “I still have a small problem with the movie. I like Tonto’s backstory, but the massacre of the tribe with cavalry fire left a bitter taste in my mouth. The Indians were already victims of genocide. So slaughtering them again in an entertaining movie, Buster Keaton style, spoiled the fun a little For me.
Tarantino is absolutely right, too, because between his allusions to cannibalism and gags about horse defecation, The only knight He also decides that pitting two strange friends with plenty of heavy slapstick elements against the slaughter of innocents, the industrialization of America, and the nefarious means by which many locals and immigrants have been dispersed and destroyed, is the right way to go, story-wise. It’s bold, it’s crazy, it’s weird, but in terms of pure spectacle, it’s also very beautiful.
Without a hint of exaggeration, the opening and closing set pieces deserve to be among the greatest action sequences the 21st century has to offer, a climatic showdown inside, above, around, and under a speeding train. Do Mad Max: Fury Road Every part as George Miller did, even before he did it.
Even the framing device—which tells the story from the perspective of an elderly Johnny Depp, Tonto, 64 years after the fact—can be plausibly interpreted as a deconstruction of the myths surrounding the American West, in which untrustworthy narrators retell history to suit the victors. This is insanely devastating for a big-budget Disney blockbuster and reason enough to give it a go The only knight Second chance. It will never go down as one of the greatest films of all time, but there’s nothing else quite like it.
