Calamity Jane

It started out good and went south from there.

These Writers don't no anything about Calamity Jane or the wild west. The producers are sadly off base and the casting, was Lame as hell. Well not much more to say about this except I have to post 600 words to be able to post it. Yeah it is that bad a film. Too bad because Calamity Jane was a colorful character to say the least in real life. Perhaps the producers should go visit Deadwood or read a book or two and get some better actors. And what was up with Abagail? Braces were hard to come by in the 1800 out west, unless you were a rich eastern era.

When I stumbled upon the 2024 Western movie "Calamity Jane", from writers Leon Langford and Collin Watts, I had never heard about it. But I opted to watch it on account of it being a movie that I had never seen or heard about. And I figured that since the movie had Tim Rozon on the cast list, then chances would be that the movie would actually be worthwhile watching.

Right, well within the first minutes of the movie, the F-word was used two times, and that pretty much put a dampener on the movie for me. While I am not a prude, then I just don't think that language is suitable in a Western movie. And it continued on throughout the course of the movie, and I have to say that it definitely took away something from the overall enjoyment of the movie for me. Writers Leon Langford and Collin Watts really dropped the ball with the excessive swearing dialogue here.

The storyline in the movie was fairly good, as it proved to be entertaining and straightforward. However, the movie is hardly one that warrants more than a single viewing, as there just simply isn't sufficient contents to the storyline to support multiple viewings.

I was only familiar with actors Tim Rozon and Mike Dopud of the entire cast ensemble in the movie, and they were indeed nice additions to the movie. I will say that they had a good cast ensemble, and the acting performances in the movie were good.

Director Terry Miles's 2024 movie "Calamity Jane" looks and felt like a proper Western movie, which was nice. They had definitely stepped all the way in here and made it rather presentable. I liked that about the movie.

Watchable, for sure, but the excessive foul language sort of ruined the movie for me.

My rating of director Terry Miles's 2024 movie "Calamity Jane" lands on a five out of ten stars.

Overall, this film just "feels" sort of odd.... like it's unpolished. There are just minor nuances that work against any "suspension of disbelief". Things like someone speaking one sentence in *too* perfect English. I.e. ".. that is how things are meant to be" as opposed to "...that's how things're meant ta be". Or one person looks sparkling clean when everyone else looks dusty and worn. Or.. the long hair wigs on the male actors just look unrealistic (if not reused between actors - seriously looks like the same long hair wig on several different actors).

There's FAR too much attempt at some sort of emotional pull for Jane.. but there's ZERO character development for her. This is NOT a story about how Jane got her nickname. Not even close. It STARTS with Jane already having her nickname and apparently some sort of reputation. It's not even a story about Jane really.... it's a story that *happens* to have Jane, Buffalo Bill, etc. In it - that's all. There's no reason all the character names couldn't have been changed to completely unrecognizable names, the film would have been the same.

Honestly, I didn't care about any of the characters - but it was CLEAR that was the intent of some scenes. It was clearly striving to be some sort of "emotional western". But came across as just formulaic and cliché.

Overall, this film has an air of a "made for TV" film.. that same melodramatic acting and soundtrack.. and storyline. LITTERED with clichés in scenes, characters, settings, and dialog.

This film is not really horrible, but it is exceptionally unremarkable and forgettable.

Some foul language, western violence. (shooting, etc). No sex or nudity or adult content (might have been a kiss at most).

A nice mumbo jumbo of a "Western" , having unlikely and unrealistic characters, spearheaded by Calamity Jane, though ironically and convincingly played by the multifaceted actress that Emily Bett Rickards is. It is mindlessly enjoyable and believe me or not, would have made a nice 6 to 8 parts mini-series.

Hope Stephen Amell does more quality productions, series and movies alike, clean-shaves more and would make a nice operative. If Henry Cavill can do it, he sure as hell can too.

• Screenplay/storyline/plots: 4
• Production value/impact: 2
• Development: 6
• Realism: 2.5
• Entertainment: 4.5
• Acting/self: 5.5
• Filming/photography/cinematography: 7
• VFX: 7.5
• Music/score/sound: 6
• Depth: 3
• Logic: 3
• Flow: 5.5
• Western: 4
• Ending: 2.5.

Poor acting and direction is what putting me off. Not sure why the first review had it as 10? Perhaps their relative who enjoyed the family show. There are plenty of actions and kilings just like typical western movies. I suggest the old western movies had alot better actors then this film has. It is like watching C Grade western movie with students from drama school. They definitely need a far better director who can able to see what the audience can see. Nah, it was a waste of time for me. If you don't mind poor acting and enjoy watching them like on stage, then this will be you. I give a three.