Red Riding Hood

I let my friends talk me into seeing this film with them because I think Amanda Seyfried is adorable and I had high hopes that this supposedly adult re-imagining of a children's folk tale would be entertaining in the same aspect of Tim Burton's Sleepy Hollow...how disappointed I was.

The acting was so corny and so ridiculous although I can't help but feel that it's not entirely the fault of the actors, but the director. The dialogue was so incredibly cheesy that at several points throughout the movie, groans were heard throughout the audience. Visually, the film is beautiful but the plot is choppy, the romance scenes are cringe worthy, everything about this film was just painful. Shiloh whatever his name is has a constant sneer/smirk on his face that makes his character so annoying. And the other love interest was just plain dull. Seyfried is a perfect Red Riding Hood but she brings nothing to the film other than her constantly doe eyed, surprised expression.

Do not waste your money on this crap.

I wasn't sure whether I wanted to see this movie. I am not a fan of the Twilight movies(the first of which Catherine Hardwicke also directed) and it didn't look like my kind of film. But I saw it for the wonderful Gary Oldman.

I wasn't expecting much, and I didn't get much. Red Riding Hood(not the fairytale by the way) does try hard to be a lot of things, including introducing a number of horror, fantasy and mystery elements. But due to the sluggish pace and disjointed story structure(that is full of overlong filler, particularly the celebration scene, and the dream sequence was very awkwardly placed) the film fails at pretty much all these elements.

The script is very clunky, underdeveloped and banal as well. A lot of it did not keep my attention and I found myself chuckling into my coke at any unintentionally funny bits. The CGI is quite poor here, with the wolf looking as though it was done in a hurry. Hardwicke's direction never rises above mediocre, the editing is unfocused and frenzied and the three titular characters are incredibly dull and uninteresting with the romantic elements between them poorly written and directed.

The acting doesn't fare much better. Amanda Seyfried is pretty but bland in the title role and shows little or no chemistry with her co-stars, while Max Irons(son of Jeremy), Lukas Haas and Shiloh Fernandez show good looks but awkward line delivery. Virginia Madsen and Billy Burke are both wasted, both over-doing it in a valiant attempt to elevate their weak material(these two actors probably had the worst of the dialogue next to the leads actually). And the climax is little more than a mangled mess and devoid of depth.

Despite these many cons, there are some decent assets. The score is atmospheric enough and the costume and set design are spot on. Plus there are two good performances, Gary Oldman and Julie Christie. Oldman does chew the scenery, but he looks as though he's having a ball, while Christie is very enchanting.

Overall, not terrible, but deeply flawed and over-ambitious. 4/10 Bethany Cox

This certainly isn't the best werewolf movie you're ever going to come across (not by a longshot) but I thought it was better than you'd imagine from some of the responses the movie is getting. It's very loosely based on the old folktale of Little Red Riding Hood (which, by the way, goes back far into European history long before the now famous version by the Brothers Grimm; the first print edition of the tale dating to the late 17th century) and it also has one scene (really just one line) that for some reason chooses to pay homage to the story of The Three Little Pigs ("I'll huff and I'll puff and I'll blow your house down" cries out one young man as others fall down around him.) Although you can't avoid those connections (and are probably intended to make the connection) it's probably best that you try not to, and watch the story in its own right.

It's the story of a small village that has arranged a truce of sorts with a local werewolf. Every full moon, they put out livestock for the beast to devour and in return the beast leaves the people alone. For some reason, though, the beast breaks the pact and people begin to die. The mystery revolves around the identity of the werewolf, once a werewolf-hunting priest (Gary Oldman) shows up in town and warns the people that the werewolf is one of them. The question becomes "who is it?" and the mystery is pretty decent. There are any number of reasons to suspect any number of people of being the beast, and the ultimate revelation of the werewolf's identity surprised me a bit - it was not my first choice.

I thought director Catherine Hardwicke made pretty good use of the setting of a small, isolated town deep in the mountains, and Amanda Seyfried was excellent in the role of Valerie (the Red Riding Hood character.) The movie also provides a pretty good depiction of paranoia and the ultimate consequences that paranoia can have, even (and perhaps especially) on people who know each other as well as the residents of this town obviously did.

This isn't really (in my opinion at least) a horror movie. It's more of a mystery, and as a mystery I thought it worked pretty well. I certainly think it deserves to be rated more highly than it is. (7/10)

I went to the cinema today with two good friends to see this film. I had seen the trailer and got worked up that this would be a good film. However, it is not as good as it could have been. Don't get me wrong, I did enjoy some of the film. Amanda Seyfried, Shiloh Fernandez, Max Irons and the excellent Gary Oldman acted brilliantly in the film, and the effects for the Werewolf were pretty fantastic as well. However, the rest of the cast let this film down and although it is classed as a "horror" movie, there is only really one jump-worthy moment. I don't want to give away the secret of the wolf, but if you listen closely, you can easily tell who it is...

There is a bit of gore, but if you are into some of the supernatural stuff (especially Twilight, even though I'm not a fan), you should give it a shot and might like this... but horror-lovers, keep well away, you might end up feeling a bit ripped-off...

Is this movie corny? Yes. Are there cliches? Of course. Is it also entertaining, sexy, and fun? 100%. I watched this movie in late high school and now in my mid-20s I still love it. It's a dark take on a classic fairy tale and is entertaining all the way through. The twist in the end took me by surprise, but I am someone who hardly ever sees twists coming, so take that with a grain of salt. This movie is worth a watch. It's not a masterpiece but it is enjoyable if you don't expect anything earth shattering from it.