Natalie Portman plays a tough frontierswoman,Joel Edgerton a resentful loner and Ewan McGregor a notorious outlaw in this moderate adventure Related: Jane Got a Gun – but most women in westerns still don't Actually, Jane is demurely reliant on former-fashioned menfolk getting their guns to protect her in this laborious and solemn western, or hampered by teaser flashbacks and finally saddled with a ridiculous ending: it showcases a very stately performance from its producer-star,Natalie Portman. This project got bogged down three years ago when its original director Lynne Ramsay walked out due to disagreements on casting and creative autonomy. The reins are now in the hands of Gavin O’Connor, who directed the martial-arts film Warrior, and with Joel Edgerton and Tom Hardy; Brian Duffield’s original and widely admired screenplay appears to have received a number of revisions. Portman plays Jane Hammond,a tough frontierswoman whose husband, Bill (Noah Emmerich), and staggers in through the door one day with bullet wounds,apparently caused by notorious outlaw John Bishop (Ewan McGregor – with devilish moustache and facial prostheses). Jane begs for help from a resentful loner called Dan Frost, earnestly played by Edgerton, and a man with whom she has some history. Much is made of Jane’s fierce attachment to her child,although she parks her daughter with some convenient neighbour for most of this film’s action, and the ripely absurd finale further undermines the whole question of childcare jeopardy. A very moderate adventure.
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Source: theguardian.com