Despite its sci-fi trappings, ‘Cowboys & Aliens’ remains grounded in reality

Saddle up -- and blast off.

That's the ticket for "Cowboys & Aliens," a rip-snortin' sci-fi Western that recalls those thrilling days of yesteryear, when Hollywood hit the trail with reassuring regularity.

And make no mistake -- despite its high-tech trappings, "Cowboys & Aliens" is first and foremost a Western.

Not one of those serious, portentous (and occasionally pretentious) Oscar-bait oaters, either.

It's an action-packed adventure that plays to the genre's strengths, from its stark good guys-vs.-bad guys conflict to its willingness to make room for character development amid all the special effects.

"Cowboys & Aliens" begins, as so many Westerns do, with a mysterious stranger.

He's played by the reigning James Bond, Daniel Craig. But he bears more of a resemblance to another secret agent, Jason Bourne, because he can't remember who he is, where he -- or why he's so handy with his fists.

Another thing this man with no name can't figure out: the strange shackle clamped to his wrist.

But he'll find out -- and so will we -- once he rides into the isolated Southwest town of Absolution.

Upon arrival, he encounters a veritable roundup of essential Western characters.

There's autocratic cattle baron Col. Woodrow Dolarhyde (Harrison Ford), his unruly son Percy (a nicely petulant Paul Dano) and the true-blue foreman (earnest Adam Beach) who's like a son to Dolarhyde -- or would be, if the ornery cuss would ever acknowledge him.

Mild-mannered hotelier Doc (Sam Rockwell) and practical preacher Meacham ("Carnivale's" rugged Clancy Brown) try to bring a bit of civilization to the raw outpost. And Sheriff John Taggart (Keith Carradine) not only knows his duty, he does it -- even if it means triggering Dolarhyde's fury by throwing his troublemaker son in jail.

He's joined there by notorious outlaw Jake Lonergan -- alias our mysterious stranger.

One of them, anyway; there's also a new-to-town belle named Emma (a beautiful but blank Olivia Wilde), who may have some idea what happened to Jake.

Good thing she does, because everybody's going to need him -- and that weird wrist shackle -- when unidentified flying objects appear above Absolution, attack and abduct many of the townsfolk. (Including, inevitably, Dolarhyde's good-for-nothing offspring.)

Clearly, it's time for everyone who's left to set aside their differences and ride to the rescue, from members of Jake's old outlaw gang to the last of the Apaches roaming the territory.

That list also includes "Cowboys & Aliens" director Jon Favreau, who demonstrates -- as he did with 2008's "Iron Man" -- that comic-book movies can be character-driven movies, too.

"Cowboys & Aliens" may not boast a conventional superhero, but it is a comic-book movie, inspired by Scott Mitchell Rosenberg's graphic novel.

Despite the presence of five screenwriters (the "Star Trek"/"Transformers" team of Roberto Orci and Alex Kurtzman , the "Iron Man" team of Mark Fergus and Hawk Ostby and "Lost's" Damon Lindelof ), Favreau manages to lasso the script's disparate elements together. And while the result isn't exactly flawless, at least it never degenerates into utter absurdity.

Considering the movie's "Predator"-on-the-prairie premise, that ranks as a definite achievement.

By sticking to his guns and maintaining the movie's integrity as a Western despite its sci-fi trappings, Favreau keeps the movie grounded in reality.

Four or five decades ago, the Western elements would be old hat to audiences; these days, the space-invaders details seem routine, making the tale's frontier aspects feel even fresher by contrast.

Favreau paces "Cowboys & Aliens" accordingly, taking time to set up -- and deliver on -- the kind of dimensional storytelling most sci-fi movies blast past without a thought.

Consequently, it's the cowboys of "Cowboys & Aliens" who -- not surprisingly -- register most strongly. (Especially because the aliens are such faceless, albeit vicious, villains.)

Standing tall in the movie's strong supporting cast, Rockwell invests Doc with a voice-of-reason authority that recalls James Stewart's frontier lawyer in John Ford's 1962 classic "The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance." And it's impossible (for those of us who remember, anyway) to watch Carradine's stalwart sheriff without thinking of his father John, a Western regular in everything from Ford's 1939 classic "Stagecoach" to such TV favorites as "Have Gun Will Travel." (To say nothing of Keith himself, alongside brother Robert and half-brother David Carradine, in director Walter Hill's 1980 outlaw saga "The Long Riders.")

Craig captures some of the cool, coiled-spring intensity he brings to his interpretation of James Bond, but he's a bit too contemporary a presence to fit seamlessly into the movie's old West setting.

Ford, by contrast, has no such problem making himself at home on the range. Dolarhyde fits snugly into his recent string of grouchy-curmudgeon roles ("Extraordinary Measures' " dogged medical researcher, "Morning Glory's" arrogant TV anchorman), but Ford builds on his character's take-charge toughness as the movie progresses; eventually, you understand how, and why, Dolarhyde came to be who he is.

It's that kind of character detail that makes "Cowboys & Aliens" more than just another summer popcorn-movie romp. Indeed, the "Cowboys" half -- make that two-thirds -- of the movie is strong enough to make you wish the aliens had stayed on whatever planet they call home.

Contact movie critic Carol Cling at ccling@reviewjournal.com or 702-383-0272.