The Legend Of The Lone Ranger (1981) Strange, but I hold no memory of ever seeing this movie, when it showed up instantly dead on arrival, vilified and mocked by critics, ignored by audiences.
No wonder. The damn thing went wrong in so many ways, it disappears in front of your eyes while you're still watching it.
The idea of rebooting the ancient western hero of radio and TV into a Big Summer Family flick came from producer Jack Wrather and his wife Bonita Granville. Wrather produced the "Lassie" TV series and once upon a time, Granville enjoyed a minor career as a 1930's movie cutie-pie.
Drooling at the profits of the 1979 "Superman", the Wrathers thought they possessed enough talent and smarts to do the same for The Lone Ranger and his faithful Indian companion, Tonto.
Talk about delusions of grandeur......
These dunces first proceeded to generate toxic publicity for themselves by forcing poor old Clayton Moore, the original Ranger, to cease and desist making costumed personal appearances as the beloved hero we boomers all grew up with. Way to go, guys.... harass our original Ranger and alienate your target audience (boomers and their kids) before you even get the film in theaters. Genius;
But wait.....the worst was yet to come. The blithering Wrathers hoped to surprise and delight the world with the equivalent of "Superman" s Christopher Reeve. For their new, young Ranger, they chose a non-acting non entity named Klinton Spilsbury. This thin side of beef was such a blank on screen, they used actor James Keach to dub him. But Keach could only deliver deadened, flat line readings match the deadened flat expressions on Spilsbury's face.
Surprise, surprise.....With his obnoxious, diva-like behavior on the set and total of acting ability, Splilsbury effectively spilsburied himself.....went off the radar, never to make another film or ever be heard from again....reducing himself to a trivia question.
Even more calamity followed. The script wasted over an hour of running time to establish the origins of The Lone Ranger. By the time he's fully outfitted with a mask and his 'Hi Yo Silver' white stallion the plot lurches into a stale re-hash of the 'Wild Wild West TV show.......with the Ranger and Tonto rescuing President Grant (a game Jason Robards) from rogue madman Butch Cavendish (Christopher Lloyd) who's setting up his own Independent Kingdom Of Texas.
(In the film's one and only clever idea, a trio of Grant's legendary pals also come charging in....no less then Wild Bill Hickock, Buffalo Bill Cody and George Armstrong Custer.....)
The film also shilled out enough cash to pay for a John Barry score, but from the sound of it, Barry dutifully threw in some generic Barry-like music, ,punched the clock and moved on. Visually, the film's a total loss. This cornball epic cried out for sharp, ripe Technicolor but it's smeared over with that soft focus, yellowish-gold veneer, usually applied to bloody 1970's revisionist westerns.
Speaking of bloody, "The Legend of The Lone Ranger", supposedly an all ages movie, freely indulges in plenty of shootout slaughters.....not to mention a explosion-laden climax that blows dozens of bad guys to kingdom come as they fly through air screaming their last screams. And yet at times the movie unashamedly resurrects antiquated scenes of the Ranger yelling 'Hi yo Silver' and away! as the clarion call of the William Tell overture erupts. Devoid of humor and wit, it's never really clear what kind of audience this film's catering to.... either the "Wild Bunch" gorehouds, or boomers steeped in 1950's nostalgia or little kids who like watching horsies go fast.
Reaping the failure it practically begged for, this 'Lone Ranger' went blowin' in the wind faster than a tumbleweed in a sandstorm.......No filmmaker would dare touch this material again until the bloated, misbegotten CGI crapfest Lone Ranger arrived in 2013 with the now cancelled Armie Hammer as L.R. and a misguided Johnny Depp as Tonto. More on that one in another post......
One shred of good news. After both Klinton Spilsbury and his Zero star (0) movie dropped out of sight forever, our good ole TV Ranger Clayton Moore went right back to appearing at State Fairs and shopping malls. Hi Yo, Clayton!
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