Jake Lonergan wakes up in the middle of the Arizona desert in 1873 with no memory and no clue to his identity. He is the secret weapon the local Apache Indians and Western settlers must work with to fight an alien invasion.
Cowboys and Aliens has drawn a comparison with From Dusk ‘Till Dawn, and while it may not be on the same par, it does have several similarities. As Dusk started out as a road trip movie featuring kidnapping criminals and ends up being about vampires, so C&A starts off being a western and ends up being an alien invasion film. There seem to have been an overabundance of alien invasion films recently with the likes of Skyline, Monsters and Battle: Los Angeles to name just a few, so the cowboy twist is a nice departure from Iron Man I and II director Jon Favreau and marks C&A out from the crowd.
I’m not Daniel Craig’s biggest fan, but he doesn’t have to talk much in C&A, mostly he just stands around looking moody and silently brooding, which he actually pulls off quite convincingly. And the action sequences are entertaining and enjoyable with some nice CGI. The places C&A falls down are the parts which require a departure from either of these. There are places where silent and brooding or blowing stuff up is insufficient and some acting is required, and this is where the performance is found wanting.
