Action-comedy about ex-CIA agents who ditch their quiet, retired lives and get back in the game. Stellar cast includes Bruce Willis, Helen Mirren, John Malkovich, Morgan Freeman and Kiwi Karl Urban.
Willis is Frank, who despite being out the game for some time, finds himself the target of a high-tech assassin. With his life, identity and lady friend (Mary-Louise Parker) in danger, Frank reassembles his old team in a last ditch effort to survive.
Based on a three part comic book mini-series by Warren Ellis and Cully Hamner.
With a cast to die for, who wouldn't expect big things from Red (Retired Extremely Dangerous)? Watching Dame Helen Mirren fire a bazooka while maintaining her queenly disposition is worth paying the admission fee, and Kiwi star Karl Urban is suitably stony as Bruce Willis' nemesis.
But this comedy-action flick has little else going for it than its red-hot leads. The film tries a bit too hard to be irreverent as it sends some of Hollywood's elder statesmen and women into the firing line, with scant regard for story. Usually that doesn't matter too much in a film that blows up half of its props but, here, it feels like a long-winded excuse for a back-patting exercise. The film's two romances are implausible, the dialogue is drawn out with geriatric pauses and the constant funk soundtrack does little to make sense of a plot more disjointed than Brian Cox's knees.
Even the characters know the stakes just ain't that high. They've done their dash as CIA agents, which means they have nothing to lose but it also means no-one cares if Morgan Freeman walks out alive.
Red is not without its charms – John Malkovich's turn as the too-quirky-not-to-have-been-wiped-out-by-now victim of extreme paranoia is endearingly mad, and Mary-Louise Parker seems still to be on Weeds – but it seems to think it's funnier than it really is.
By Rebecca Barry Hill, Flicks.co.nz
What the hell are Bruce Willis, Helen Mirren, John Malkovich, Morgan Freeman, Mary-Louise Parker, Karl Urban, Richard Dreyfuss and Brian Cox doing in this?! Did they read the paycheque instead of the script? Well, yuh, duh! Just plain dull. Sad to so so many fine actors wasting their time. Mind you - my 5 year old loved it, so 1 star from him! If you liked Transformers 3 or The A Team - you'll likely like RED... If you like Citizen Kane and The Godfather, I think there's some paint drying in Parnell you might prefer to see...
I enjoyed this movie. The cast is great and what was nice with so many big names is they didn't appear to try and grab centre stage. This isn't a "great" movie but I gave it 4 stars because you won't be sorry you saw it.
fun action flick with a bit of humour
Thought it was fun but dont expect much. I love bruce Willis as his ages he is action/cop/genre hes brilliant. Its not exactly daring but super cast, some good 1 liners, extreme gun scenes.
The title says it all. Love Bruce Willis
Red is neither a good movie nor a bad one. It features actors we like doing things we wish were more interesting.
Sometimes the delight you take in a movie isn't from the fact that it's particularly moving, or clever, or even a great film.
Good fun, and though it breathes hard in the second half, the ensemble has charisma to spare.
Even the more cartoonish performances, like John Malkovich's acid-damaged paranoiac, fit the movie's vision of the vanished, wild-and-woolly heyday of spycraft.
Red can't stop itself from trying too hard to be hip. It's not that it doesn't have effective moments, it's that it doesn't have as many as it thinks it does. The film's inescapable air of glib self-satisfaction is not only largely unearned, it's downright irritating.
We've been told the NZ release date for this flick is Thursday, 28th Oct 2010.
Release date: October 28th 2010.
We haven't received times for this movie in this location yet. However these are updated as cinemas announce them, so check back soon. Hopefully the lovely cinemas in your location will choose to play it shortly. ~Ed.
