Red Riding Hood

Ahh...Assonitis. Just when you thought the producer of fine Italian independent films such as Tentacels, The Visitor, and Beyond The Door was maybe retired or deceased. No, not yet. He's back with another classic (without John Huston) that proves he still has what it takes to produce the worst looking films ever to come out of Italy. I assume that's because he fires anybody with talent about halfway through the production as with James Cameron on Pirahna 2 or Lucio Fulci's great D.P. Sergio Salvati on this picture. Poor Salvati probably said "look here Assonitis! every shot hand-held no good." And i bet Assonitis said "you fired! hand-hold OK because we shoot in video!" Seriously, he should have just called this Beyond The Door 4 because if you've seen those sequels it makes all the sense in the world.

I liked this film, with no apologies. I bought it. It's twisted, warped, off kilter with enough loose ends to keep any critic's bazooka going full time. But it nearly touched something, nearly. It strived so hard and, for much of the film, had what it wanted contained and captured but - yes - what it sought to grasp finally withered loose and … I don't know… scampered and skittered in all directions so beginning never connected to end, or vice versa. I'm bad about sentimentalism for a near miss. It caught me up in something they-who-built-it wanted to do. I got in their van on a dark street and rode with them for a while. Never made the destination but I don't regret the ride. Jenny is scary as hell. The blend of Jenny, George and music (that music … it empowered the crucial scenes with its here-I-come tempo in time with those swinging red boots - oh, those red boots). Ah, well. Most will turn up noses, shake heads and turn their backs on this tiny flick. And, they are probably correct. For me and my ilk, however, it nearly touched something and I don't know if it fell short of touching "it" or if I jerked "it" away at the last moment. "Nice shot, George".

I can certainly see the point of people ripping on this film. Susanna Satta doesn't set herself up for future stardom but she certainly doesn't hurt her career. The writers had something in mind here and my guess is the director screwed it up. There are some ridiculous parts to the film, but taken in the context of a twelve-year-old girl's mind, they actually make sense.

Don't get me wrong, I'm not going to give too much credit to the filmmakers because a lot of the good elements of the film probably happened on accident.

I didn't feel like I wasted my money renting this, but I probably would rent it with a bunch of friends over.

This movie is plain and simple an "okay" movie. It's nothing special, but nothing terrible, furthermore it succeeds in places, and drastically fails in others. For starters I'll talk about the main character "Jenny". I could easily see from the beginning of the movie, what the desired effect for the character was, it was the clichéd innocent little girl with an evil twist. And to be honest I got bored with it. I can't tell whether the girls acting was terrible or whether it was the character. I felt no emotion towards any other characters and it can be seen that little time was spent on creating them. The character of Jennys tutor, "Tom" was played by a relatively unknown actor and wasn't that bad, just too simplistic. The grandmother was the only good acting in the film to be honest. Don't even get me started on the character of "George". George is a six foot tall monster that follows Jenny as she does her duty. I think George was created to add some form of horror and mystery into an otherwise dull plot. The morals shown by the main protagonist are so corrupt and predictable, it made me ask the question. "If this girl is so intelligent and all knowing why does she succumb to the things she does?" It made no sense, the director obviously just wanted to add some moral value into the flick, trying to get a reaction, which failed. Is this movie a black comedy, well, it tries to be. One good thing Is the placement of the repetitive music, yes some music was played over and over, but they were used brilliantly. The direction wasn't terrible either. It could have been something great with a better lead actor, and better scriptwriting. All in all 6/10.

Well this is one movie that I definitely judged by the cover. I guess I was hoping that I'd find some sort of hidden treasure or something, I mean it wasn't a movie that I'd ever heard of and the cover looked interesting (even if the tag line was a little cheesy) but I was utterly disappointed by it in the end. seemed low budget, the sketchy camera work at times is forgivable, but I don't get why the voices seemed to raise and lower from here to there. I was hoping it would be more philosophical considering the protagonists actions and motives, but it wasn't. and there were many parts of the movie that just give you bad feelings, never quite sure who to root for... I might not have finished it if not for the fact that I knew it'd nag at me about not knowing how it ended. I guess now that I've seen it I've got it out of my system. although I will be all the more weary from now on whenever I rent a little known about movie again...