We finally have a trailer for “Jane Got A Gun,” the Natalie Portman-led Western that’s been mired in controversy for years. The film has been making headlines since its original director, Lynne Ramsay (“We Need to Talk About Kevin”), was either fired or quit the morning production was scheduled to begin in 2013.
The Portman-produced picture managed to get made despite all of the backstage drama — which included multiple last-minute recasts — and now we can finally start talking about the movie itself, rather than all of the theatrics surrounding its making. “Jane Got a Gun” is a rare case of a Western starring a woman. Portman plays the titular Jane with a gun, and as the trailer demonstrates, the firearm isn’t for show. Jane gets a gun and uses it to shoot, first at targets in training, and later at men who refuse to reveal the whereabouts of her kidnapped daughter.
Jane ends up with the weapon after seeking help from a former lover she hasn’t seen in years (Joel Edgerton, “Black Mass”). She needs support and advice to keep her ailing husband (Noah Emmerich, “The Americans”), a purported criminal, safe from a gang who want him dead.
“Jane Got a Gun” opens in France on November 25 (this trailer has French subtitles) and in the U.S. in February 2016. In the meantime, you can still catch “The Keeping Room” in theaters, another Western with female protagonists.