Cowboys & Aliens

From the man who brought us Iron Man and Iron Man 2, comes another alien flick with a twist. There are cowboys in 1873 Arizona defending themselves against a force unbeknown to them. Spaceships and space invaders.

Director Jon Faveau keeps the action moving as in the opening scene with a stranger named Jake Lonergan (Daniel Craig) wakes up smack dab in the middle of nowhere with a partially cauterized knife wound to his lower right abdomen and a large bracelet attached to his left wrist.

As quick as he is trying to sort out the puzzle, a trio of armed men come riding along and ask him a series of questions, of which he has no answers to. They think he might have a bounty on his head and finger him as an outlaw due to his wound that assume is from a gunshot, plus the shackle on his wrist.

It only takes this mean hombre seconds to get the gang neutralized. He takes one of the horses, rides into the town of Absolution. A town that don’t take kindly to strangers. But when he sees the town bully Nat, shooting the town and then asking for denominations, and quickly puts his knee to Nat’s groin. That ends that, until his past comes back to haunt him.

He is wanted, supposedly, on robbery, and murder of his wife and his amnesia isn’t helping his case any. Enter Woodrow Dolarhyde (a rugged looking Harrison Ford) who is a lawman and Nat’s paw. They both get shackled together to be transported to a more secure place when a bright light appears from the sky. Just as that ks happening, Jake’s wrist band signals present danger and opens up as a defense weapon-cannon style.

Jake realizes he has a purpose but still can’t remember shit. This is when an elusive stranger, Ella Swenson (Olivia Wilde) strays into town and has a mysterious past of her own. She helps him slowly recover his memory as we are shown through flashbacks.

These aliens swoop down from the sky and start snatching people and gold items. So man your posses we are going on an alien hunt but not Star Wars style. Cowboys and Apache Indian style. These aliens, it comes to find out, are taking over the Earth starting out west. And what are they after? Well, there’s gold in them there hills.

They feed on gold jewelry, gold teeth, all gold, which ties into Jake’s past. They go after the mama ship by trailing a wounded alien. They have claws of steel and arms that extend from their inner chest, plus their fangs. All enemies of the town join forces with guns, bow and arrow and spears as the not so cool looking spaceship is invaded for destruction by those who dare. A good third of the ship is basemented deep in the ground and proves difficult to access. Again, leave it to bad ass Jake with backup from Ella and Walthough.

Although this is another alien flick like” Super 8″ was, it’s cool because it is.

Now, if there is anything a hustler hates worse than being hustled, is to be hustled by a gold digging alien. I mean there were Dean Martin and the Gold Diggers, then in abundant supply, are two legged gold diggers. But gold digger aliens I can’t stand.

The movie also stars Sam Rockwell as the doc, Abigail Spencer as Alice, Paul Dano as Percy, Buck Taylor (from Gunsmoke) as sherrif Wes Claiborne and Keith Carradine.

The film runs 2 hours, is not in 3D, and opened in theaters last week against The Smurfs and barely edged it out but has not made a huge “killing” at the box office. This week it will have more competition with “Rise of the Planet of the Apes” and “The Change-Up”. It is rated PG13.

By Hustlin Bob Higgins 3 1/2 stars