Open Letters Monthly: RED 2

The first RED, released in 2010, was both a surprise hit and a critical darling. Turning the action genre on its ear by taking the likes of John Malkovich and Helen Mirren, giving them guns, and allowing them to go wild. Now they're hoping that lightning strikes twice with RED 2, the flick that brings back everybody's favorite retired secret agents for a globe-trotting adventure full of twists and turns.

When retired CIA agents Frank Moses and Marvin Boggs are publicly outed as having taken part in a top-secret mission codenamed "Nightshade," both are surprised, mainly because they've never even heard of the operation. Now they've got dangerous people from around the world hunting both them and an experimental nuclear explosive that was smuggled into Russia at the height of the Cold War, piece by piece. On the run from just about every government agency on the planet and with perilously few friends, it'll take everything they've got left in the tank to stop a madman from detonating that device.

RED 2 is directed by Dean Parisot and stars Bruce Willis, John Malkovich, Mary-Louise Parker, Catherine Zeta-Jones, Byung-Hun Lee, Anthony Hopkins, Neal McDonough and Helen Mirren.

CLICK here for the full review at Open Letters Monthly.

Open Letters Monthly: Monsters University

Despite a few missteps the past few years, Pixar is still known as one of the most creative studios in Hollywood today. They just released their fourteenth feature film in Monsters University, a cross between their classic Monsters, Inc and an 80's screwball college movie. Will it be good enough to take your kids to, let alone win another Best Animated Feature award for its parent company?

Before they became the top team at power company Monsters, Inc, Mike Wazowski and James P. Sullivan were college rivals, both trying to become the top Scarers at their college, MU. But when their rivalry gets out of hand, getting them banned from following the major, the pair are forced to work together. Teaming up with a group of misfit monsters, they enter a competition to prove that they are the scariest group on campus. But will Mike and Sully stop fighting each other long enough to focus on winning and follow their dreams?

Monsters University is directed by Dan Scanlon and features the voices of Billy Crystal, John Goodman, Steve Buscemi, Joel Murray, Sean Hayes, Dave Foley, Peter Sohn, Charlie Day, Nathan Fillion and Helen Mirren.

Click here for the full review at Open Letters Monthly.

Getting Hitched

Put together a list of your Top 10 all time film directors. Don't worry, I'll be here when you get back.

Now I'll say a name I bet is on almost every one of those lists: Alfred Hitchcock. A legend of the horror and suspense genres (where legends are remarkably rare), the director is responsible for many of the greatest movies of all time; The Birds, North by Northwest, Vertigo and Rear Window are all renowned classics. But his most famous work, the one for which he is chiefly remembered, was one of his last, the 1960 horror masterpiece Psycho. In it, Hitchcock changed the faces of both horror and Hollywood and laid much of the groundwork in which his fans and contemporaries have followed in droves since its inception. Now Hollywood delves into its own dark shadows in Hitchcock, the pseudo-biographical story of Hitchcock, Psycho, and the struggle to create one of the most enduring thrillers of all time.

"Good evening."

After releasing the brilliant North By Northwest in 1959, the legendary Hitchcock (Anthony Hopkins) is going through both career and personal crises. He's sixty years old and beginning to worry if he has reached the peak of his talents, and is desperate to discover his next project, to prove to himself and studios that he can still work. He finds that inspiration in Robert Bloch's novel Psycho, itself based off of the heinous crimes of real-life killer Ed Gein. Forced to mortgage his home to self-finance the picture as major studios don't want to take a risk on it, Hitchcock also is going through a period of conflict with his wife Alma Reville (Helen Mirren), a former film editor and his biggest supporter who nevertheless aches to get back into a business that seems to respect her talents more than her husband does.

"Quick show of hands: who here did NOT work on Total Recall?"

What perhaps surprised me most about Hitchcock was how well rookie director Sacha Gervasi balanced two disparate conflicts: that between the director and the studios who did not want to make his next movie, and he and his wife Alma. You certainly get the idea how Hitchcock was a trouble-making individual, with obsessive tendencies that often made him appear standoffish or aloof, and he always liked to do whatever he thought he could get away with. An unhealthy fixation with his leading ladies also raises the stress levels between the embittered director and his wife, whose own forays into screenwriting for old friend Whitfield Cook (Danny Huston) manage to raise his own suspicions. Hopkins and Mirren are both top-notch performers, and their interactions (or lack thereof) make for some wonderful storytelling, as each tries to dominate the scene and manage to settle into a contested draw. Hopkins will of course garner most of the attention thanks to his pitch-perfect mimicry of Hitchcock and his perfectly-shaped fat suit, but Mirren is of course the sum of her multiple talents. She manages to take a generally unknown woman from Hollywood's past and turn her into the perfect embodiment of what it takes to be Alfred Hitchcock's better half.

"Cut here, and here... oh, and a little exercise wouldn't kill you."

Unfortunately, I could have used a little more on the filmmaking aspect of the movie, which Gervasi steps away from to give more attention to the interactions between his stars. Though the director takes pains to show Hitchcock acting like "a perfect gentleman" towards leading lady Janet Leigh (Scarlet Johanssen), I would have loved more than the occasional behind-the-scenes drama, especially with the snubbed Vera Miles (a surprisingly underused Jessica Biel), the timid Anthony Perkins (James D'Arcy) and a bevy of actors that includes Toni Collette and Michael Stuhlbarg fighting for screen time. Little and less are said about Hitchcock's crew, with the one exception of the man who engineered the shower scene music. One question I had was whether Hitchcock truly imagined killer Ed Gein as his spirit guide (a perfectly creepy Michael Wincott), and whether he was ever haunted by his subject matter in the past. It certainly would have explained his personality and his manic obsession for getting Psycho onto the big screen.

The scene 14-year-old boys have been waiting for.

But despite any seemingly lost information, this is a movie that benefits greatly from it's leading pair. Hopkins and Mirren are fantastically well-suited to one another, the screenplay rife with fun and funny bits that will draw you deep and deeper into the world of Hollywood filmmaking. While I wish they had done less whitewashing in painting the famed director in a good light (he had a history of sexual harassment and other difficulties on the set), it doesn't hurt the film as a whole. You can point to Gervasi's experienced crew as a sign for why the whole thing turned out so well, as Jeff Cronenweth's (The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo) cinematography, Pamela Martin's (Ruby Sparks, The Fighter) film editing and Danny Elfman's music play a huge part in the final product. But it's still Gervasi's show, and he proves that he can make an entertaining movie when given the chance. Not just a lead actor/actress love-fest, this is definitely a movie you should be watching in preparation for the upcoming awards season.

A Debt Replayed

For so many people who claim that remakes are inherently a bad idea, many have no idea what they are talking about. Forget about all the films that are obviously remakes, films sharing their origins' titles of The Fly, Ocean's 11, True Grit or The Thing. Not only are the remakes of these classics all quality films, but some would argue better than the originals. However, remakes aren't always named after their inspirations. Arnold Schwarzeneggar and Jaime Lee Curtis lit up the screen in 1994's spy film True Lies, based on the French comedy La Totale! Classic westerns A Fistful of Dollars and The Magnificent Seven were originally acclaimed filmmaker Akira Kurosawa samurai dramas. And the Martin Scorsese Irish gangster movie The Departed, which won the director his coveted Academy Award, was a remake of the 2002 Hong Kong film Internal Affairs. My point is that people put this catch-all negative statement on remakes when more than half the time they don't know one when it's staring at them from the big screen. For instance, you probably didn't realize that the recent film by John Madden, The Debt, was originally an Israeli film of the same name released in 2007. That film was never released in the United States, making it ripe for Hollywood to pounce on and make into their own. The only question was upon which side of the quality line it would eventually fall: on the side of obvious charlatanism and inferiority, or into the realm of quality film-making no matter the source.

Helen Mirren makes scars sexy

In the 1960's, the Isreaeli intelligence agency Mossad sent a cell of young operatives into Nazi-occupied West Berlin on a secret mission. Rachel Singer (Jessica Chastain), David Peretz (Sam Worthington) and Stefan Gold (Marton Csokas) are on the search for Nazi war criminal Dieter Vogel (Jesper Christensen), the legendary "Surgeon of Birkenau", who performed experiments on Jewish prisoners during the Second World War. The mission ended in success, and though Vogel was never properly extracted from the city, Mossad was happy with the man meeting his end in the streets of West Berlin. Thirty years later, the exploits of the cell has been popularized in a book written by Rachel Singer's (Helen Mirren) daughter, and the three live apart from one another as national heroes, never talking about their mission. At least that is until Stefan (Tom Wilkinson) presents Rachel with some disturbing information. A secret they have kept hidden for thirty years has against all odds reared its head, forcing her to confront a truth the three had kept hidden from everyone, even those they loved.

The Debt takes a hard line against its critical dissenters

As you can gather, the cat-and-mouse spy story is the meat and potatoes of the film's level of quality. It is a well-paced, character-driven tale that takes you from beginning to end and beyond, with clues left in plain sight to allow anyone to follow along with ease. Unfortunately, this also cuts both ways, as there are no "OMG" twists to make the relatively slow pace more rewarding to the audience. You can pretty much guess what the big secret is before it hits, making sitting through waiting a bit like waiting for Gallagher to bust out with his watermelon; you know it's coming and making you wait for it is just pissing you off. Still, this is only a minor criticism, as the basics of the story are flawless and well built, creating a largely enjoyable atmosphere for the viewer.

Young Sam Worthington... handsome... pretty, almost

That atmosphere is helped by an acting core that really reach for higher levels with this film, especially the cast of the 1960's. Jessica Chastain has really taken off in her career, appearing in six films released or scheduled for release in 2011. I've seen three now, and between this, The Help and The Tree of Life, I've really become entranced by her talent and awestruck as to how she's come out of seemingly nowhere to become one of Hollywood's most sought-after stars. She's proving herself to be a serious artist, and more roles like this will get her some true recognition in the future, if not sooner. Sam Worthington is a surprise, an acclaimed Australian actor who wowed some with his role in Terminator: Salvation but otherwise hasn't been a major force since breaking through, especially with his somewhat bland performance in Avatar. The Debt allows him to show off in a legitimate acting role and show what his doubters have decried as not being there. And Marton Csokas ties the trio together, his arrogant and serious cell leader playing beautifully off of Worthington's humble and driven operative and Chastain's brilliant but emotionally-starved intelligence officer. And Jesper Christensen is also brilliant with the material he's given, playing smart doctor and smarmy villain with equal precision. He's the unspoken hero of The Debt, at least on the performance side of the equation.

...and Sam Worthington in 30 years? Scary

Unfortunately, I was somewhat underwhelmed with the way the story worked in the current day, and the quality of the story given the actors. Most of the film takes place in the sixties, and that's where the best moments and story sequences take place. In the present day there are some good moments, but in comparison it pales noticeably. Helen Mirren is of course amazing, but that comes as no surprise to anyone who has EVER seen her perform. As someone with a wide range of talents ranging from drama to comedy, Mirren can do just about anything, and look good doing it. Less impressive are Tom Wilkinson and Ciaran Hinds as the current day Stefan and David. It's not that they're BAD, only that they don't distinguish themselves from what we usually expect of them. In the current-day storyline, only Mirren stands out, and despite her best efforts, it's not enough that even she can make up.

Future Academy Award winner?

As a modern spy drama, however, The Debt is a great performer that could have been an excellent one but stutters a bit too much at the end. It does work as a character driven thriller, especially with the acting talents of Mirren, Chastain et al. While the theaters are packed with big name films flexing box office muscle, explosions and laughs, The Debt is a world away as a subtle, clever remake that introduces a unique story to an American audience that didn't get the chance to see in the original. As remakes go, it's one of the good ones, coming in at #10 for 2011. Maybe not a must-see for the genre, it's still a "should-see" as it's difficult find a title so well story-driven in this age of CGI, 3D, and action sequences that exist in a realm completely outside the real world.

Arthur's Reign

For as long as I can remember, my father has maintained this opinion regarding film remakes: the original is always better. Just about anyone can finger dozens of films that prove this, from Psycho to Planet of the Apes, The Wicker Man.to Flight of the Phoenix, Godzilla to Poseidon. It's far too mundane pointing out these obvious atrocities however, with such obviousness do they make themselves. It's true that Hollywood too often gets lazy when it comes to these titles, thinking all that's needed to appeal to both an existing audience and a young, fresh one is a tried and true story with name-brand stars and CGI. And yet for all the times my father was automatically right, I've seen several films that throw his timeless theory out into the streets. True Grit. The Ring. 3:10 to Yuma. Dawn of the Dead. The Thing. Many people don't know it, but Martin Scorcese's Oscar-winning The Departed was actually a remake of the Hong Kong thriller Internal Affairs. When done right, a remake might be even better than the original, even if the chances of that are fairly remote. And so that brings me to this day's review. Arthur is a remake of the 1981 film that starred Dudley Moore as spoiled, drunken billionaire who learns the true values of life and love. Arthur was nominated for four Oscars, won two, and is to this day considered among the best comedies of all time. Though a remake featuring British comedian Russell Brand would at first seem to land nowhere close to the level of quality put forth by the original, there was still some chance that the film might actually be pretty good, most notably in the castings of Helen Mirren and Jennifer Garner to back up Brand. And so I chose it this past weekend over Your Highness and Soul Surfer, the best of the rest from last week's new releases (of course having already seen the amazing Hanna), hoping for the best.

...And this is largely how Brand won his Arthur role...

Arthur (Brand) is a the fun-loving heir to the Bach mogul empire who finds himself in a fix when his disruptive and media-drawing escapades get him in deep water with his estate, most notably his mother (Geraldine James), who has never paid much attention to him and placed him in the care of Hobson (Mirren), his nanny since childhood. Embarrassed by his antics and knowing the distrust others place on the future of her company thanks to them, threatens to cut off his inheritance if he doesn't stop his childish ways. To that end, she arranges his marriage to Susan Johnson (Garner), a smart businesswoman in her own right who has interest in Arthur, though he really can't stand her. Instead, he randomly falls for tour guide/children's book author Naomi (Greta Gerwig), and the two begin a wonderful friendship. Soon, Arthur must choose whether to accept the marriage and with it his inheritance, or risk loving Naomi in poverty.

...And then he convinced Helen Mirren the film would be a good idea...

Every film director has to start somewhere, and this time it was Jason Winer's turn to make a dreadful debut. Winer comes in as one of TV's better talents, probably best known as one of the directors of the Emmy-winning series Modern Family. I don't watch the show regularly, but every time I do I can't help but love it. The show often weaves hilarity with heart, not an easy thing to do on a regular basis. Unfortunately, what works for a half-hour comedy show doesn't seem to work itself out over a nearly two-hour film. To be frank, Arthur is not humorous. All the funny stuff (if you can call it that) appears in the trailers or commercials you've already seen, and there's not one bit apart that seems even slightly entertaining. Winer shares in some of the blame, but even devoted Brand enthusiasts would be stretched to find anything to latch onto, unless you were as drunk as the the eponymous hero of the film while watching. With the exception of a few instances, there's remarkably little to laugh at, and Arthur often tries to establish itself as a serious narrative, despite featuring Brand on its poster.

You can just see Garner plotting her prison break

Perhaps the film's biggest obstacle is that in this day and age, billionaires just aren't as likable as they used to be. Long ago were the days of Little Orphan Annie and other stories in which rich folk were portrayed as benevolent and whimsical, almost like they were too good to be true. Unfortunately, in recent years we as a nation have been witness to Bernie Madoff and multiple other high-profile magnates, many who made their money by cheating the underclasses out of hard-earned dough. Even lesser-known moguls worldwide are often given lesser sentences for the heinous crimes they commit, further exacerbating the problem. Working class people have become so cynical that they simply don't trust the ruling classes, and so asking them to see a film featuring one, even a supposedly fun one like Arthur Bach, is as tough a sell as you can make.

Gerwig unveils her newest invention: the smoking children's book

To that end it's difficult to tell if Brand's performance is the worst I've seen this year or actually pretty good. Playing to the hilt the "spoiled rich boy" image, he really doesn't do anything differently than you've seen before, even in 2010's Shakespeare adaptation The Tempest. Brand's strength is not in acting; he's a comedian, and from what some have told me, a damned good one. He's certainly got a memorable image, and a public persona that demands attention. All the roles he's played up to this point have capitalized on that and only that aspect of his celebrity, and therefore barely qualify as characters and more as caricatures of the actor involved. Arthur is to a degree likable, but not so much that you can understand the attraction he presents to not one but two female leads. Helen Mirren is possibly the standout of the crowd, not surprising to anyone who's seen her perform. Taking a gender-bender with the role that netted actor John Gielgud an Academy Award in the original film, Mirren is amusing and inspiring, even when she's not actually in the scene. Sure, it's a step down, but she's still Helen freakin' Mirren! Yet it's Greta Gerwig with whom I found myself smiling more when the young actress was on screen. As the young, smart Naomi, Gerwig plays to the blue collars in the audience, working wonders in the process. She also has great scenes with Brand, and those bits with the two together are among the title's best. I was actually disappointed with Jennifer Garner. The actress, whose disappointing career showed a much higher ceiling with her guest-starring role in 2007's Juno, is pure movie villain through and through. Using the arranged marriage as a stepping stone to fame and fortune, Garner's character is so unlikable to the audience that it's implausible that she could at all be appealing to her fellow characters. Minor roles by Geraldine James (in another gender-swap), Luis Guzman and Nick Nolte are fine enough, but nothing to write home about.

Arthur's opening night audience

Arthur might have had the potential to be among the year's biggest surprises, but will end the year struggling to not be among its worst films. Failing to crack the Top 10 right now is not the kiss of death it was in March, but to do so on such an epic scale is disappointing to say the least. I definitely would not recommend it to you, fair readers, as while this month would seem to be a weak one for film releases overall, that's still not excuse enough to spend your money on this turd. If you have to see one movie this weekend in the theaters, I can name a dozen movies off the top of my head, including Hanna, Win Win, The Adjustment Bureau, Jane Eyre and Insidious. There's simply no reason to let Arthur get anywhere near that list.

A Bard's Tale

I was first introduced to Shakespeare in the seventh grade. Well, that not be entirely true. Even by that point I was aware of the enormous impact the writer had made upon not only the the literary world, but the English language as a whole. But for all intents and purposes I first read his work while at school here in Boston, and to some extent I took to it right away. The Bard is not exactly 'light reading', and many passages might have been all but unreadable to someone my age without the teacher able to explain certain convoluted passages. Shakespeare wasn't meant to be simply read: he was a playwright whose true popularity didn't come until long after his death, and the books we read growing up were always meant to be seen on stage, in performance, and there have also been numerous film adaptations of his works directed by the likes of Kenneth Branagh, Peter Hall, and Baz Luhrmann. So with this latest adaptation by stage and screen director Julia Taymor (that I saw last week alongside my friend The Opinioness) it is funny that the title is both the first of Shakespeare's plays to which I was introduced while also considered the last of the plays that he alone wrote.

See how moody we can make this?

The Tempest begins with exactly that, as the sorceress Prospera (Helen Mirren) summons a storm to sink a ship with the King of Naples Alonzo (David Strathairn) and his subjects aboard and wash them ashore. There, she plans to extract her revenge for being usurped by her brother Antonio (Chris Cooper) when he accused her of using witchcraft to kill her husband, the Duke of Milan. Having been stranded on an enchanted isle for the past 12 years, Prospera has raised her daughter (Felicity Jones) alone, with only the slave Caliban (Djimon Hounsou) and the mischievous spirit Ariel (Ben Whishaw) as company, Prospera is taking this opportunity of all her enemies being  in one place to teach them a lesson they won't soon forget.

Caliban is what they would call a "happy drunk"

While the language doesn't always survive intact, this IS still Shakespeare. That means that there are constantly more words than necessarily needed to describe a scene we can already can see with perfect clarity. Of course, Shakespeare HAD to overly describe the scenes for the audience since his performers were usually on stages devoid of all visual descriptors. While some passages and lines are cut, the presence of his words remain and in a way Shakespeare is the film's main character, as he's always at the forefront of the story; Even while watching you often overlook the acting of Mirren or the direction of Taymor and think, "This is Shakespeare," so obvious is his verbiage.

How utterly unimpressive

Sadly, this is one of the film's main faults. Despite the performers' best efforts, they are often overshadowed by the words they are speaking, when they're not being overshadowed by flies buzzing in the background. I'll see Mirren in just about anything. Possessing a powerful voice, she can make just about anything interesting, and she had the best performance in this cast. The problem is her character. Prospera (adapted from the Duke Prospero in the original Shakespeare) has a revenge plan for those that wronged her, but she doesn't seem much more sympathetic than any of the other characters, even the undoubtedly bad guys like Antonio or Caliban. Taymor tries to imply a bit of feminism in the role by indicating that she was banished because she was a woman, but it doesn't come off as legitimate here, and there's really not much difference between her and the original Prospero. At least she's better than Felicity Jones, who plays daughter Miranda, and Reeve Carney, who plays Alonzo's son Ferdinand. Both are cringe-worthy actors, and when Ferdinand sings a Shakespeare poem as a love song to Miranda, we want to cover our ears because he CAN'T SING, which is hilarious since Carney is currently the lead on Taymor's stillborn stage show Spider-Man: Turn off the Dark. Perhaps it's just not his singing style on display here, but his scenes with Jones are boring and trite, reveling in the worst of Shakespeare's literary work.

Prepare to be bored to tears by Jones

The rest of the cast are mostly hard-working actors and many of them have done Shakespeare before, though some were odd selections to say the least. Djimon Hounsou is fairly powerful as the angry slave Caliban, but the truth is that he could have probably played just about any character in the film better than it's existing occupant, possibly including Mirren. So why does the film's only black actor play the trod-upon slave? I'll let that one hang, though the way his character is treated does speak volumes to issues of colonialism and slavery, as pointed out in a review by The Opinioness here. David Strathairn is an actor I love, but he seems to be mailing it in as King Alonzo. In truth, he doesn't have much to work with (I don't remember if that was the same in the play) but his performance seems surprisingly uninspired for an actor of his caliber. Tom Conti is great as the the noble Gonzalo, and Alan Cumming is well cast is not necessarily the best for the role of the King's ambitious brother Sebastian. Alfred Molina is hilarious as the drunkard Stephano (who was one of my favorites when I first read the play) and appears in some of the film's best (and, sadly, worst) scenes. Ben Whishaw plays the spirit Ariel to good effect, though I had issues with thew character that I'll get into later.

The setting and language are beautiful... Everything else, not so much

The two characters oddly cast were those of Prospera's brother Antonio and the jester Trinculo. Chris Cooper seems more at home playing modern-day blue collar characters, but he surprising comes off as effective as Prospera's loathsome brother. He's not the best, though this might be due to poor direction rather than his acting abilities. But the other odd casting choice was that of comedian Russell Brand as Trinculo. Though Brand might at first seem the right type to play the fool, he can't escape the fact that this is a work Shakespeare, and his line deliveries are often too whimsical or too often place heavy emphasis on certain words that sometimes comes with inexperienced actors tackling works like these. Brand is on occasion funny, but too often the best he could illicit from me was a  raised eyebrow and a question of when the scene would be over.

Thankfully not shown: Ariel's man-boobs

It's obvious the $20 million spent on the film's budget wasn't for special effects. Though filming around the volcanic areas of Hawaii provided scenery as beautiful as anything you've seen before, the few scenes were digital effects are used look horrid and detract from the film's natural elegance. Scenes especially with Ariel flying around at his mistress' bidding look ugly, and a recounting of him causing the tempest to sink the ship looks overly-stylized, And let's not forget his distracting man-boobs, which like a highway pileup I couldn't draw my eyes from no matter how hard I tried. The film then apparently ran out of money, as there are many more scenes that might have benefited from a digital make-over but come off more as stage tricks than cinema magic, especially towards the film's conclusion. Speaking of the film's conclusion, while I was glad to see it come I was startled by how swiftly it came, as while Taymor seems to anticipate that Shakespeare buffs appreciate the film's final act, it comes off as merely swift and a "well, that's done" attitude before the final credits.

Ah, the old "ring of fire" routine, an old favorite

Despite some interesting bits, I found myself epically bored by this version of The Tempest. I'm not sure how this happened, as you can't simply say that Taymor didn't understand what she was doing with the Bard's work. After all, she's directed Shakespeare on stage and screen before, most notably with Titus in 1999. Though her films have usually gotten mixed reviews in the past, boring is the one thing they've never before been described as. It's not too often that you can get a cast together with this much talent and fail miserably, but kudos to Taymor for doing it in style. Now Spider-Man: Turn off the Dark won't her only missed shot of 2010.

Got Some Red on Me

So last week I took the opportunity to catch Red in the theater. Loosely based on the three-issue comic series by DC comics, the action/comedy proved to have an entertaining trailer, and with such a cast as Willis, Freeman, Mirren and Malkovich it seemed to be one of the "can't-miss" films of the year. But would seeing Red make you see red?

The story apparently has little to do with that of the original comic series (which is fine, since I never read it) but centers around a group of retired former wetworks operatives codenamed RED (Retired, Extremely Dangerous) who are temporarily brought out of their relatively listless lives due to C.I.A. hit squads suddenly try to take out retired operative Frank Moses (Bruce Willis), and not in the date sense. In questing to find out why he's being targeted for death, Willis is joined by his former mentor Joe (Morgan Freeman), madman Marvin (John Malkovich), successfully retired S.A.S. agent Victoria (Helen Mirren), and Sarah (Mary-Louise Parker), a benefits worker who Frank has taken a liking to and is therefore also being targeted. The mission takes them to locales around the United States and proves that these folks can still perform like spring chickens when they need to.

Season's greetings!

The story here is a slightly unrealistic one involving conspiracy theories, government cover-ups, unlikely coincidences and unlikely romances. So it has to be held together by a band of characters and actors who can center the attention of the audience on themselves and make the story more palatable than it is. To that effort, it's commendable that this is in fact an amazing cast who work well together, from the big name stars to the lower tiered yet no less talented performers. Willis is usually not known for his pleasant demeanor on-screen. In fact, he does get his "yippie-ki-yay" game face on for much of the film. I don't know if it stems from working with older actors, however, but Willis somehow in Red gains something I've not seen from him in many of his performances: an almost boy-like wonder, especially when he's in scenes with his character's crush, Sarah. For once, he's not the top dog, at least not in all things, and it makes his character and his acting all the better. Malkovich is a hoot as a partially-psychotic former agent first seen hiding out in the Louisiana bayou. The part of Marvin was originally to be played by John C. Reilly, and while I've liked Reilly and can see him being successful in this type of role, he's simply outclassed by Malkovich in all aspects. Playing Marvin as defiant, schizophrenic, and, of course, paranoid of any number of possible conspiracies, Malkovich puts on one of his more memorable performances, certainly a step up from his last major role in the seriously underperforming Changeling. Of course, just because you're paranoid doesn't mean people aren't out to get you, and so his character turns out to at times be more insightful than he would be otherwise. I simply can't imagine anyone but Malkovich in that role. Mirren is fantastic, with looks that could kill (sorry, I couldn't resist) and the demeanor you would expect from a true secret agent. She really takes to the somewhat humorous role with the same professionalism as she has in her multiple-nominated roles in the films The Queen and The Last Station, not to mention dozens of other similarly-lauded roles over the course of her career. Both the irony of seeing such a serious actress wielding high-caliber machine guns and the perfection of seeing the same thing lend a lot of credence to her ability as an actress. Of the main four, only Morgan Freeman disappoints, as there's simply not enough for him to do with his role, with all the best bits belonging to Willis, Malkovich and Mirren.

Not sure what to make of this scene

I was prepared to dislike Parker in this. Obviously most people know the actress as Nancy Botwin on Showtime's Weeds, but it's easy to forget that she has a long career in film and television preceding this, as I did. Frankly, the only film I've seen her in was Red Dragon, and her role was so small that I had completely forgotten about her not long after the fact. However, she shines here as an initially reluctant sidekick to Frank who gradually gets more and more excited as the terror and thrill of sneaking around and blowing stuff up puts a heavy emphasis on how dull and boring her regular life is. Parker is funny both physically and in her verbal delivery, a dual trait not many can claim to master. Also good though underutilized is Karl Urban as a C.I.A. agent tasked with taking out Frank. Urban has long been under-appreciated by Hollywood, with last year's Star Trek being his biggest and best opportunity to showcase his talents, and damned if he didn't make the best Doc McCoy since Deforest Kelly. Hopefully his role in Red is simply a gateway to bigger things and not a return to more of the same because he's far too talented to keep perpetually on the shelf. Brian Cox makes a surprise appearance as a former Russian agent who Frank goes to for help. I didn't even recognize Cox at first, his transformation so complete that it took me nearly half the film before it struck me who was uttering his lines, and his ability to meld into his part - as well as his charismatic interaction with the other characters, especially Mirren - makes for a great performance. Ernest Borgnine is simply wonderful as a records-keeper at the Agency, and Richard Dreyfus does a good if hammy job in a small but important role as a weapons' dealer and smuggler who is somehow involved with the conspiracy. These supporting performances, in conjunction with the larger star-held roles, mean that there are no weak moments with less-interesting characters pitted throughout the film, and the enjoyment level never dips because of that.

"He's dead, Jim. I killed him."

But great characters can't entirely keep together a plot secured by duct tape and staples. While interesting, the story is barely able to keep momentum throughout the film, and truly falters in the final act, when humor alone seems to be sustaining the plot threads, not suspense or drama, or even suspension of disbelief. We're never under the assumption that Frank and his team won't achieve their objective (though they never really GET an objective until near the end of the film) and that, unfortunately, makes the final payoff much less than it could have been. Also, the humor involving young upstarts calling members of the team "old man" or "grandpa" get old after a few turns, though the heroes' humorous (and often quite violent) responses make up for a lackluster effort by the screenwriters to get a cheap laugh at an older character's expense. It's a shame, but when your director's previous work was the same one who made The Time Traveler's Wife (Robert Schwentke), you have to expect that things won't be as good as you want them to be.

So THAT'S what John Malkovich looks like!

For it's sake, I wish Red had been released earlier this year. If it had, I would have grouped it with several action or comedic films I'd seen this year that rated favorably on my 2010 Top 10 List such as Alice in Wonderland, The Losers, and Date Night, all of which at one point dotted the list. However, all those titles were eventually knocked off the list by better films, and so Red, though it compares favorably with all those films, is denied a it's chance in the sun. It has great characters, and I wouldn't be surprised to see Malkovich get a Golden Globe nom for his performance (though I'd never expect him to win it), but the plot is simply too jumpy and the story poorly told and filled with extremely silly bits. Is it funny? Yes. Did I enjoy it? Indeed. Can I recommend it to people who want a cheap and silly film to see? Sure. Is it one of the best films of the year? A "can't miss"?

Sorry, machine-gun Mirren, no.