Review: Rango

Johnny Depp is the hapless lost titular drifter and kind-of jerk chameleon who after an unfortunate run-in with Hunter S. Thompson in the desert finds himself the sheriff of a dirt town with a water problem. It's got jots of Chinatown, tots of Leone's widescreen western epics, of McCabe and Mrs. Miller in its assortment of broken down wretches and willingness to subvert expectations. 

The film's strength is in its voice talent, its cast is a literal embarrassment of riches featuring Ned Beatty, Alfred Molina, Ray Winstone, Harry Dean Stanton and the show-stealing Timothy Olyphant doing Clint as the peyote-esque Spirit of the West. Character designs are dark and violent - the furry/feathered cast are distinguishable by their myriad mutilations - and the film is as well-lit as any western in history. There's an early scene in a bar that boasts cinematography that literally startles: it looks in its brilliant rays of sun and dust and deep inky shadows, like the ur-western, simultaneously perfect and completely impossible. It's a technical marvel, glossy and sparkling, propulsive and serenely, dirtily pretty, but that's not what makes it great. 

Rango is weird and dark and a completely unexpected pleasure, a big-budget film that's risky and doesn't seem to have been created by demographers in an era marked by studios obsessed with playing it safe. It's a nasty introduction for 10 year olds to the acid-western genre, a drugged-out and scary joke ride for smart kids and savvy dads that's willing to occasionally be baffling - it's awesome. 8/10. 

 

- the Berg-Man