Right, well needless to say that I had never actually heard about this 2022 Western titled "Jesse James: Unchained" prior to sitting down to watch it. All I knew about the movie was that it was a Western and apparently about the iconic Jesse James person.
Writer John Oak Dalton didn't exactly manage to put together a particularly riveting storyline here. In fact, it was a rather dull and monotonous attempt at writing a script for a Western. And it never took off, much less actually ever got to the starting position.
Director Henrique Couto didn't have anything to work with in terms of script and storyline, and it was showing on the screen. Oh dear lord, how it was showing on the screen. And that made for a very unbearable movie experience.
Needless to say that I wasn't familiar with the cast ensemble in the movie. And that is usually something I enjoy when I watch a movie, as there are no associations to previously portrayed characters from other movies. But the actors and actresses in this movie were struggling, as they had nothing to work with in terms of script, character gallery and dialogue.
"Jesse James: Unchained" didn't look or feel like a Western movie. It looked and felt like something you would come across when walking in the local forest and seeing a handful of people in Halloween cowboy costumes and brandishing a digital video camera. Yeah, this movie felt like it was shot right out in the backyard.
And the costumes were so difficult to take serious. First of all, the colors, way too polished and bright to pass as something that would have been seen in the late 1800s. And the fact that all the clothing was spotless of dirt and so shiny you could almost use it a mirror, just didn't work at all. It felt like they had rented the costumes at a store somewhere, and had to ensure not to get them dirty, as it would negate whatever deposit they had to put down on renting the costumes.
If you enjoy Western movies, you need to save your self the anguish of wasting 75 minutes on "Jesse James: Unchained". It just simply isn't worth the effort. Some of us suffered through this ordeal, this mockery of a Western movie, so you don't have to.
My rating of "Jesse James: Unchained" lands on a two out of ten stars.