Film Review: Cowboys and Aliens

When I think of cowboys, two things come to my mind: the image of the young Lito Lapid riding a horse and firing at his enemies in his movies in the 80’s, and the movie, Brokeback Mountain, that made me cry a bucket. This time around, I am adding another association for cowboy movies -- that is having aliens as their enemies.

Cowboys and Aliens (2011) stars Daniel Craig, Harrison Ford and Olivia Wilde. The film was based on the 2006 graphic novel of the same title created by Scott Mitchell Rosenberg, and was directed by Jon Favreau.

In the film, aliens were abducting humans to experiment on them, and were mining gold to power their machine. The cowboys, united by one common goal, to reclaim their loved ones, planned out their attack on the aliens’ hideout. But how can the cowboys beat the aliens just with their guns and horses?

In the beginning of the film, Craig woke up alone in the dessert with a strange metal band on his wrist, and without a clue where he came from and what happened to him. Going back to the plot of the movie Aliens, I thought Craig must be a host of an alien inside of him :-)  Later in the film, he slowly remembered that he was abducted, too, by aliens, and the strange metal band was actually a weapon that accidentally wrapped itself to his wrist when he fought an alien and fled the aliens’ hideout. In short, that weapon was used to destroy the aliens and their ship/ machine laboratory.

Not that I hate happy endings with some guy winning the battle, and in the end still getting the girl, but I think that this is a good exception.

Ford’s character was a fierce cowboy, who had his son abducted by aliens, too, and so he joined hands with Craig in hunting the aliens. Wilde’s character had a twist for being an alien, too, but from another planet that was earlier destroyed by the marauding aliens. She came to help because she knew how to destroy the aliens.

Cowboys & Aliens: A Graphic Novel

At some point, I got bored with the film, especially when they were already fighting with the aliens. I felt like here we go again, of course, they’re going to win. And yes, things went well for the cowboys, except Wilde had to sacrifice herself to get into the heart of the machine and destroy the aliens. At least, she did not return because if she did, I would really be disappointed. Not that I hate happy endings with some guy winning the battle, and in the end still getting the girl, but I think that this is a good exception. Besides, they fought with aliens, not your normal battle, and the girl was an alien, too, not your ordinary girl.

Overall the film was good. It was action-packed, but not the kind that will move you in your seat because you felt it was you fighting the aliens. Or perhaps I just set my expectations too high.

* Nuffnang Philippines and Pizza Hut sponsored the movie block screening of Cowboys and Aliens last August 10, 2011 at the Gateway Cinema, Quezon City for Nuffnang bloggers.