FILM REVIEW: COWBOYS & ALIENS

Jake Lonergran (Daniel Craig) in Cowboys & Aliens.

Chumps and the Other

By John Esther

Directed by Jon Favreau and based on a story and script with far too many non-committal voices attached, Cowboys & Aliens offers a masturbatory referential game to numerous paradigmatic films (i.e. Raiders of the Lost Ark, Alien, True Grit, The Searchers) patriarchal, bourgeois critics refer to as leaders of the “Western” or “Sci-fi” genre, including the spastically delusional ones confronting how the west was won.

Tellingly enough, Jake Lonergran (Daniel Craig) wakes up in the middle of the desert with a scientifically anachronistic brace around his wrist. Like Jason Bourne (Matt Damon), Jake has no idea who he is or how he got there, but he can sure take care of himself when he is accosted.

Eventually making his way into town, it does not take long before the latest incarnation of the Malpaso Man finds himself in the middle of trouble when alien forces swoop down and kidnap the town folk – the same aliens who absconded and incinerated his wife (Spencer Alice) before his eyes.

Thanks to Ella (Olivia Wilde), the only “woman” with any identity other than someone’s wife in the film (eventually explained during the hackneyed movie’s most idiotic moment), we learn the illegal aliens have invaded and are now occupying post-Columbus/post-Civil War America because gold (not black gold) is as precious to them as it is to us. Why, we do not know. Is it currency? Fuel? After all, gold in its essential form is useless. Only its perceived value has meaning. In other words, gold is essentially worthless (if not negative – given its natural weight) unless you can buy something with it.

The typical bourgeois incarnation of the antihero -- where we never have a second to dislike him on camera (his bad ways are explained through exposition) -- Jake is forced to reconcile with his violent, gangster past through heroic salvation by using his Spiderman-ish wrist weapon. Of course Jake will need help. The help mostly comes from his nemesis, Woodrow Dolarhyde (Harrison Ford), the local rich tough son of a bitch, but there are a few others like Natives, a few outlaws and others to help. Everyone can aid in the defense of the land, but that incompetent entity known as government.

It would hardly be giving anything of note or surprise to say who wins in the end. A few sacrifices of the poor, the female and the non-whites will be necessary, but hey, this is “liberal Hollywood” and they are just as class conscious as the intended audiences of this film are not.

Literally and metaphorically, Cowboys & Aliens displays a vision essentially uncomfortable yet ultimately assured in America’s acquisition of its natural resources from foreign hands.