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In the interest of full disclosure, I haven’t read a single panel of the three-issue comic book mini-series that the film RED was adapted from. Thanks to the all-knowing Wikipedia and comments made by series co-creator Warren Ellis however, I was well aware that the movie version of RED veered quite a bit from the serious tone of its comic book counterpart. And that’s a shame, because I have a feeling that these changes could cause many fans to pass the film off as another Hollywood pilfering of a beloved property and keep them from fun — if not flawed — action-comedy.
RED opens with Frank Moses (Bruce Willis), an ex-CIA operative living out a quiet and rather mundane retirement in Cleveland, Ohio. Frank has become smitten with Sarah Ross (Mary-Louise Parker), a bored government employee working in the pensions department who reads trashy romance novels and dreams of living the exciting life she imagines Frank once had. Frank has taken to ripping up his pension checks upon their arrival as an excuse to call Sarah’s office and talk to her again. Shortly after making plans to finally meet Sarah face-to-face, Frank is ambushed by a hit squad at…
In the interest of full disclosure, I haven’t read a single panel of the three-issue comic book mini-series that the film RED was adapted from. Thanks to the all-knowing Wikipedia and comments made by series co-creator Warren Ellis however, I was well aware that the movie version of RED veered quite a bit from the serious tone of its comic book counterpart. And that’s a shame, because I have a feeling that these changes could cause many fans to pass the film off as another Hollywood pilfering of a beloved property and keep them from fun — if not flawed — action-comedy.
RED opens with Frank Moses (Bruce Willis), an ex-CIA operative living out a quiet and rather mundane retirement in Cleveland, Ohio. Frank has become smitten with Sarah Ross (Mary-Louise Parker), a bored government employee working in the pensions department who reads trashy romance novels and dreams of living the exciting life she imagines Frank once had. Frank has taken to ripping up his pension checks upon their arrival as an excuse to call Sarah’s office and talk to her again. Shortly after making plans to finally meet Sarah face-to-face, Frank is ambushed by a hit squad at his home. He survives the encounter, but fearing that Sarah’s life may also be in danger, he grabs a gun and a couple of falsified passports and heads to Sarah’s home in Kansas City.
It’s here that RED begins to move at break-neck speed. Frank and Sarah hit the road searching for answers as well as Frank’s former CIA compatriots, who are all being targeted to cover up the details of a mission they worked on together in the early 1980s. The film doesn’t waste time getting the duo from one explosion to the next, forgoing time-chewing driving scenes for transitions to the skyline of the next location, complete with a postcard-style overlay. It’s a technique used to wonderful effect here, but simultaneously contributes to major pacing issues. RED’s betrayed-CIA-agent-on-a-quest-for-revenge backbone isn’t something moviegoers are unfamiliar with, and there are times where the movie comes to a screeching halt at the behest of its exposition. Willis and company spend so much time shooting their way into and out of trouble early in the film, you’ll find you really don’t care about who did what, where and how when they finally get around to spelling it all out for you in the latter parts of the film. Still, the action in RED is exhilarating and super stylized — one set piece in particular gave me a definite Ocean’s Eleven heist sequence sort of vibe, except with lots of gunfire and explosions.
Of course, you can’t talk about RED without talking about its incredible cast. Starting with Frank’s old black-ops pals, you have the excruciatingly likeable Morgan Freeman as Joe Matheson, 80-years-young and slowly dying from liver cancer in a retirement home. John Malkovich turns in a scene-stealing performance as Marvin Boggs, a paranoid ex-agent who has become a bit unhinged thanks to eleven years of daily doses of LSD doled out to him in secret by the CIA. Rounding out Frank’s team is Victoria, a semi-retired hitwoman who just really likes to shoot people. Throughout the film they’re pursued by hot-shot CIA field agent William Cooper, played with precision by the criminally underrated Karl Urban. Since the cast just wasn’t awesome enough yet, director Robert Schwentke went ahead and brought Brian Cox, Richard Dreyfuss, and Earnest Borgnine on to lend their talents to the picture. It’s ultimately this cast that truly allows RED to rise above typical genre fare.
Overall Score: 7.70 – Good (7s are good, but not great. These films often have a stereotypical plot or are great movies that have a few minor flaws. Fans of this movie’s genre might love it, but others will still enjoy seeing it in theaters.)
RED is just a damn fun movie. Maybe it was seeing John Malkovich hold a gun to an airport patron he believed to be a spy, or maybe it was seeing Queen Elizabeth II herself, Helen Mirren, taking out dudes with a machine gun, but either way I had a smile on my face the whole time.
