Jan Kounen’s adaptation of Jean Giraud (Moebius)’s comic is a peculiar film whose success depends largely on how you regard the status of the film. As adaptation of the comics, the film falls flat. It does not take any of the stories from the comics, nor does it do a lot of justice to the characters, themes or concerns of the comic. Viewed in the light of other of Giraud’s work, it does come quite close at times, mostly in the spirit-sequences. As a film in its own right, the spiritual, Indian side of it never really integrates with the Western genre in any useful way.
Vincent Cassel’s performance as Blueberry has a lot to do with this, since it moves between the acceptable, the virtuous and sometimes cutting very close to pastiche. I cannot decide if it is because of his French accent or if it is a deliberate choice, but when he says archetypal things like ’sonofabitch’ or similar, it never really sounds convincing, instead it sounds like him impersonating John Wayne and Clint Eastwood at the same time.
The spiritual sequences where computer graphics represent the supernatural side of Indian life are very well made and it is a nice touch that Kounen decided to visualize them this way. However, it gives the film a strange bent which is perhaps only comparable to 2001 and this is just not that type of film. With the ending being as Hollywood as could possibly be, the supernatural images seem rather like something which should be overcome and passed, instead of carrying the narrative further. These images never get the symbolic impact that they have in 2001 and because of that, they fail. They simply end up as a stand-in for an action-filled climax more than a truly necessary sequence.
The film is definitely passable, and some of the Western conventions are carried out quite well, as are some of the Indian elements, though it is becoming a bit too clichéd that Indians are always more insightful than the white man.