Painfully slow

Is there anyone in the world who doesn't love Johnny Depp? I, for one, am a huge fan, which makes this very hard to say ... I hated this film.

What makes Depp such a treat to watch is that whatever role he plays he interjects his own style and gives it a unique, albeit often unorthodox slant. However, with Rango, even Depp's voice, charm and talent cannot detract from the slow-moving pace of the movie.

Rango is playing homage to a lost genre, the spaghetti western, but there is a reason it's forgotten ... because it's not very good.

The animation is the film's saving grace, it is original and eye-catching. However, even that is not enough to make it worth watching.

The plot is relatively simple because it is a movie for kids after all. A pet chameleon is stranded in the dessert after his tank falls off a moving car. After meeting a half-dead armadillo in the middle of the highway (ironically, named road-kill) he begins a trek across the desert to try and find civilisation and water.

As Rango is sent hurdling from his owner's car, he hits the windscreen of another car driven by Depp's character from Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas, which I must admit, brought a brief smile to my face.

The scene will certainly go over the heads of the young audience, but to the 'Depp-a-holics' it provides a burst of fun in an otherwise over-hyped production.

As Rango wanders aimlessly through the desert he meets an iguana named Beans who luckily gives him a ride to the place she calls home, a beautiful sounding town called Dirt.

Dirt is a strange place, filled with strange folks and Rango does his best to blend in, although this proves no easy task. Since I am a big fan of irony, I think that it was clever to have the main character as a chameleon who doesn't blend in, but that was as far as my adoration goes.

Rango enters a saloon looking for a refreshing drink but learns that the town is facing a series of troubles including a water shortage. He is met with prying eyes who don't take to kindly to strangers in their town, but being something of an actor, he reinvents himself as a tough guy and quickly winds up in a shoot-out with the town bad-boy.

This battle is short lived as a troublesome hawk arrives looking for a meal (Rango is on the menu). Through pure luck, Rango manages to kill the bird of prey and instantly becomes the town's new hero ... and the mayor appoints him as sheriff.

Less than a minute into his new job, Beans asks Rango to investigate the water shortage which is made worse when a group of crafty moles break into the bank and steal the dying town's only reserve.

After finding the moles and bringing them back to Dirt for trial, a new mystery presents itself. It seems the mayor is the one who has been deceiving the townsfolk and using the water for his own selfish means.

There is some betrayal, some humiliation and then a hefty dose of animated action that sets up the movie for a painfully predictable ending.

It amazes me that other film critics around the world have given this film such glowing reviews. A reader once wrote to GulfWeekly and said that I have a tendency to disagree with people just for the sake of it ... I disagree!

I call it how I see it and I take no pleasure in telling you that this film was slower than my 65-year-old mum trying to send a text message on an iPhone ... and only half as entertaining.

Showing in Cineco, Seef II and Saar Cineplex