Jonah Hex

As long as Brolin spouts his dry catchphrases, you’ll be thinking this is going to be one of those films that try to be genius with their goofiness. However, the undernourished script by Mark Neveldine and Brian Taylor starts to pile up after half an hour, and a desperate Hayward has to repeat some scenes three times to even reach the minimum yardage. The expected result from the trailer (unfortunately?) came true. (05.10.2010)

A reckless without morals, unsympathetic prostitute, and senile villain. From a very promising action western, it turned into an unwatchable boredom and possibly the shortest film I've ever seen, where illogical actions of characters or flashy transitions even in slow passages are the least of the problems. Crows as deus ex machina or atomic bullets in the wild west are a whole different level. (08.10.2010)

Jonah Hex is exactly the kind of film that confirms long-held stereotypes about comics being entertainment for early teenagers and desperate people who have mentally regressed to being 15-year-old adolescents in adulthood. It is simply and truly foolish, shallow, and dull to the point that not even the casting of several known and acclaimed actors can save it. The prologue saturated with the scent of gunpowder and uncompromising war may entice, but then an unstoppable downward spiral follows, and to our misfortune, it is not foolish enough to be entertaining on the other hand. Overall impression: 25%. (25.03.2011)

With this cast, it could have been at least one level better. Brolin is just perfect for the role of Hex and here and there he has some great one-liners. But the screenplay is a little unbalanced and has nothing to say and it barely resembles the comic book. (17.07.2018)

Nach drei Jahren habe ich Jonah Hex eine zweite Chance gegeben… Und auf einmal war es nicht mehr so schlimm. Der Film ist zwar nicht besser oder schlauer geworden, ich fand ihn aber irgendwie unterhaltsamer. Josh Brolin ist für die Rolle von Jonah Hex perfekt. Die Stimmung ist manchmal wirklich gut, was auch für Malkovichs Schuft und seinen amüsanten Gehilfen Fassbender (dessen Potenzial nicht ausreichend genutzt wurde) gilt. Das ändert aber nichts daran, dass es in dem Film viele dumme Sachen gibt. Am unverständlichsten war für mich Folgendes: Die Schufte haben eine riesige Superwaffe und beschießen die Stadt zuerst mit gewöhnlichen Kanonenkugeln, die keinen Schaden anrichten. Erst zum Schluss greifen sie zu einer speziellen, die alles blitzschnell vernichtet. Na ja. Danke für Beltramis Musik und die Szenen mit dem Erwachen der Toten, die wahrscheinlich das Allerbeste sind, was Jonah Hex zu bieten hat. Ein durchschnittlicher Streifen. Mit einem unterhaltsameren Drehbuch hätte es ein guter Western mit einer Hellboy-Stimmung sein können. So wie die Comic-Vorlage. (06.12.2010)

Interesting case. A clearly wobbly and brutally uneven film that could have been very good, but the fear of bombing made them bet mostly on effect and the film still bombed at the box office. Poor Brolin, who was almost born for the role (and he hates the result himself), he stumbles around in a shallow and hollow story that can barely cover its runtime, and you can clearly see that many things were left out. Perhaps, nothing else could have been expected from the creators of Speed, but the potential was there, and I’m not even speaking about the star-studded cast, where only Brolin stands out (Malkovich is an awful caricature and Megan shows her pretty face very few times). Jonah Hex deserves a proper limited series and not this frantic monstrosity. (15.01.2021)