DVD: Jonah Hex (15)

Hex is an attempt to transfer the dark, revenge-fuelled DC comic series to film.

The opening line, "War and me took to each other real well," delivered by Jonah Hex, a back-from-the-dead Civil War scarface played by Josh Brolin, sets the tone for what should be a thrilling showdown with a Confederate slimeball (John Malkovich). But the rest of the film bites the dust, with jumbled scripting and ditzy direction (by the Pixar graduate Jimmy Hayward) failing to enliven a dreary and clichéd narrative. The only saving grace is Hex's mildly amusing talent for briefly reviving the dead so as to interrogate them. Otherwise, it's just a subtle-as-a-sledgehammer sensory assault.