Ned Kelly

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source: Ned Kelly

What most of the comments here are missing is the simple fact that 'Ned Kelly' is boring, and not just a little boring. I mean, sleep-inducing, prop-your-eyelids-open-with-toothpicks-to-stay-awake boring. It's a curiosity, nothing more. "Hey, Mick Jagger starred in a western, wonder what it's like?" And like most curiosities that weren't popular in their initial release, it hasn't improved with age. As wonderful as he is in stage performances, Jagger just doesn't have much screen presence. Certainly not enough to overcome his celebrity; you don't for one moment forget you're watching Mick Jagger. He had the same problem in 'Freejack' as I recall. I haven't seen his last film, 'The Man from Elysian Fields,' but I would imagine he's gotten at least somewhat better with age.

This film probably is a far from accurate depiction of the Ned Kelly story, and it no doubt outraged some Aussies at the time, but it is nearly not as bad as one might think for such a little known or seen film. It definitely has a non Australian feel to it what with Waylon Jennings' excellent ballad score and Mick Jagger in the title role. Though probably the wrong choice to portray Kelly, Jagger nevertheless possesses a certain amount of youthful charisma here which somehow just demands you watch him. An interesting and decidedly obscure entry in the downbeat anti-western genre of the 60's and 70's. Shades of Peckinpah. If you're a fan of Pat Garrett and Billy The Kid, you may find this one worth seeing.

Irish-Australian 'bush ranger' Edward "Ned" Kelly, a resistance fighter of the British ruling class in the 1870s, was considered by many to be a heartless killer after clashes with police at Glenrowan left three men dead, but director Tony Richardson instead presents Kelly's story as a languid folk tale. Kelly and his brothers, born into a criminal family, were arrested on various charges throughout their young lives, and eventually turned to bank robbery in New South Wales, but Richardson is more tuned-in to the familial relationships of the clan rather than to their exploits. The picture has a tableau feel, spattered with mud and spit, that is often striking visually, with a folk-music underscoring performed by country balladeers. Unfortunately, Mick Jagger is not well-cast in the lead; his failure to adequately project is topped only by his continually awkward reading of the lines--however, the dialogue in Richardson's and Ian Jones' screenplay is so stunted, it's unlikely that any trained actor could get by with it. Other movie versions go back as far as 1906 with Australia's "The Story of the Kelly Gang"; Heath Ledger played the lead in 2003's "Ned Kelly". *1/2 from ****

Only being passingly familiar with the story of Ned Kelly, I can say that, on a cinematic basis, this is a pretty good movie. The locations, cinematography and supporting actors are all grittily realistic, in the way that only '60s-'70s- era movies could be. Of course, that still leaves the woefully miscast Jagger. As the larger-than-life rough- hewn bushman Kelly, Mick doesn't come close to cutting it. As an actor, he doesn't cut it. The scene in which he fights off five gaol guards (with a hangover) is silly. And yeah, his beard's silly. The Waylon Jennings soundtrack (and, in response to a previous poster, this was before Pat Garrett and Billy the Kid) is interesting, but inappropriate.

This one kind of clops along like an average B movie is expected to. This may be a cult classic in Australia, but I just don't dig it. Exploitation of Mick Jagger? Your guess is good as mine. Jagger plays Ned Kelley Australia's most notorious outlaw. Director Tony Richardson dramatizes the life of this bad man and his family of horse thieves. The meat of the movie is the big man hunt that results in a lot of gun fire and death and the eventual capture and execution of the legendary 19th-century outlaw. Jagger is as sluggish as the movie itself and his attempt to sound Australian comes out sounding more Irish. Good to watch if you are a follower of the Rock 'n' Roll bad boy. Also in the cast are Geoff Gilmour, Allen Bickford and Clarissa Kaye-Mason.

Ned came from the same time as the american outlaw, but this irish man was a wee bit smarter then the american outlaw, He made a steel helmet and chest plates to stop the bullets he was unstoppable.

This is a cult movie alright, although I'm pretty alone being a cultist here, this movie has all the elements of an ugly movie of the 70s (though i hear its huge in Australia). First of, trying to learn about Ned Kelly from watching this movie is just impossible, the story trail is as lose as the one in Dune and it jumps so fast from scene to scene that is unbelievable. In one scene a police officer swears not to tell the authorities that the he had an accident with the Kellys in which he was wounded, he was pretty happy and swearers not to tell, 1 second into the next scene Ma Kelly is standing for trial. What??, so he told them?, he what??. No one knows. the movie does those jump cuts a lot. and not only that, but you get to see some really weird scenes on the movie (such in the ending when both Kelly's brothers kill themselves in a rather artistic way). It all in the end gets explained if we consider that probably the entire cast and crew was on drugs, and not only them, but the caterers and the cleaning guys also. But that of course is not the main strenght of the movie, the main thing that this movie's got going-on is of course the horrible performance of Mick Jagger, who doesn't really act whatsoever if we consider it, but rather just stands around being the lead singer of the Rolling Stones than Ned Kelly. We get to see Mick: -as a drinker. -as a singer. -as a ladies man. -as a street fighting man. so we pretty much just see him being him, not one line is delivered correctly, but always as if Kelly was really angry because he ordered a latte and not a cappuccino or with a huge hangover from partying all night. The movie ends with Ned on his armor getting shot by the Brits, which is one of the memorable scenes of the movie, mainly because it actually seems to had been taken from a serious movie instead of a generic 70s movie. See this movie, its the funky version of Ned Kelly, but of course as all of them are Brits you just get to see a white cast. Kinda like the Stones music if we think about it.

When I saw this film in Sydney when it first came out I thought it was a mini-masterpiece. Always a big fan of Tony Richardson and surprised by Jagger's brilliant interpretation of an Aussie legend. It came across as very 'real', almost a Gothic riff on an enigmatic criminal who created his own metal armor to ward off bullets. The soundtrack was quiet, haunting. but when I rented it in NYC to turn some friends on to it, I found that the film was spoiled by a dopey country and western soundtrack, (ned was from Ireland not the Midwest United States) awful garbage by Waylon Jennings. Dear Mr Jennings, I'll pay you twice what the U.S. distributors paid you to take your hideous noise off this (originally superb) film.