Saturday, March 12, 2011

Review: Red Riding Hood

Apparently, over-the-top, stylized adaptations of classic fairytales have become the latest vogue. 


On the edge of a dark forest lies a small town. Nobody knows this town by name, they only hear about the horrible things that happen there... Yes, this is acutally a narrative line from the movie. Catherine Hardwicke, who brought us the first Twilight film, directs this unintentionally hilarious, glamorized, horror flick. Amanda Syfried plays Valerie, a young girl who gets caught up in a triangle of forbidden love. Sound familiar?

Max Irons and Shiloh Fernandez play the two love interests who must put their differences aside in order to save Valerie from the big, bad wolf. Julie Christie plays the creepiest grandmother in cinema history who only wants the best for her granddaughter and the only slightly redeeming factor of this movie is Gary Oldman's performance as Solomon, a soulless werewolf hunter who is called in to save the town.

What feels like Twilight meets The Village, Red Riding Hood plays around with an unforgivably cliche script and predictable plot. At one point one chracter says "If you really love her, you'll let her go" and "I'll wait for you". Those are the kinds of lines that take away from the seriousness of the film and, I am not kidding, this movie is filled with them.

Another thing, everybody seems as if they've stepped right out of a Abercrombie and Fitch catalogue; they've all got nice skin and hair and their oufits are surprisingly fashionable for living in a midieval village terrorized by a werewolf.

The relentless, soaring camera shots did nothing but give me a headache and help support my thesis that Catherine Hardwicke has a thing for treetops.

Hardwicke must have taken a few classes at the Michael Bay School of Film because she likes to sacrifice talent in the name of aesthetics and dress her movies up in hopes that we don't see just how horrible her films really are.

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