139, Cowboys & Aliens

What a better premise!  James Bond and Indiana Jones in a Western, battling Aliens with Olivia Wilde along for the ride, could a description get any better?

When this trailer first hit the screens nearly 6 months ago everyone chuckled, it looked like a joke.  But with some real actors and some pretty cool Alien effects it soon became clear that the dodgy title was backed up with a pretty gritty movie that covered the best bits of yesterdays Wild West with the Sci-Fi World of tomorrow and the excitement started to grow.

The movie starts pretty fast with Daniel Craig dumped in the desert with no knowledge or recollection of who or where he is.  As the story plays out we discover our leading man is "wanted" with a pretty bounty on his head and local hard man and renown bad-ass Harrison Ford is the one wanting to collect!

It does take a while for things to get going but in this movie you need it, you need to get to know the characters, plot and back stories otherwise Aliens just popping up would look slightly odd and the regular flash backs and memory lapses are enough to let you gradually into whats happening before the Aliens rock up and take it to the Cowboys.

The special effects are pretty cool with a grappling hook style way of capturing humans (quite fitting as a space-age hog tie) and its also amusing to see Smith & Western 6 shooters playing off against space aged lasers but as expected, Bond has a special weapon on his side that Q-Branch would be proud of and how he obtained it also get explained so don't panic!

Ford and Craig are brilliant in quite different roles and the leading lady, Wilde is her stunning self as she was in House MD & Tron Legacy and shows no signs of sitting back and relaxing with 8 more movies in production between now and 2013 - Lucky us!

The remaining Cowboys are actually easily forgettable with a slightly annoying presence playing Fords wayward son and some pretty stereotypical hairy, smelly brutes with less teeth than a new born baby who are quickly picked off by the Aliens.

The Aliens themselves are actually quite scary with Piranha style faces and teeth, the agility of and strength of a 10 foot walking He-Man and an "inner" set of hands that vaguely reminded me of an uglier version of Quato from Total Recall! (The original Arnie one - not the 2012 re-make)

So, its an easy decision, Who would not love Cowboys and Aliens?  Well, if Sci-Fi and Westerns don't make you smile then probably quite a lot but if you are normal, then its all smiles!