Follow Red Into The Woods, If You Dare

We have all heard the tale of Little Red Riding Hood. A young girl who is off to see her grandma in the woods alone, who is stalked by the big bad wolf who wants to eat her up until the woodsman comes and saves her. We all know the legend. But where did this legend come from? Many believe that this was a story to scare young women from the dangers of going out alone, an urban legend if you will, but Hollywood has their own interpretation of those events and Red in the new film by Twilight Director Catherine Hardwicke, Red Riding Hood. Staring the "It" girl of Hollywood Amanda Seyfried who is joined by some old school classic actors in the form of Julie Christie (who I swear doesn't age) and the always fantastic Gary Oldman int his new tale. Does Hollywood's new take on the big bad wolf tale have enough bite to make an audience care? Read on and find out.

Set in medieval times, a small village is under the constant scare of the big bad wolf. Every full moon the small village is scared silly in believing that a strange force is preying on them. They sacrifice animals, they boarder up their doors and windows and hope that the wolf wont come after them. Valerie a.k.a Red Riding Hood lives in this small town where she is pre-arranged to marry Henry (Max Irons). Valerie however, is in love with another man who she has grown up with all her life and is madly taken with Peter (Shiloah Fernandez) an orphaned woodcutter. After Valerie's sister is killed by the wolf, the town's priest (Lukas Haas) calls upon Soloman (Gary Oldman) who has helped many villages in destroying these beasts. As the town searches to hunt and destroy the creature, Valerie may hold the key to finding out who the beast truly is. Throw into the mix Valerie's mother (Virginia Marsden) who has a bit of a secret of her own. A drunken father (Billy Burke) and her Grandmother (Julie Christie) who has a strange mystery about her and if you have read all this write, should add up to the elements behind the classic story.

So is the new take any good? I have to admit for the first 15 minutes I was bored. I was thinking, shit is this going to be Twilight all over again even with the star crossed lovers frolicking in stupid flower fields added into the mix. But then something happened. As soon as the wolf made it's first appearance I was hooked. The old school actors came out in full force (I'm talking about Julie Christie and Gary Oldman) who added a much needed boost to the film. Gary Oldman in my opinion can make any film great, and here he gets to steer clear of his good natured characters of late (I'm talking about the Batman films) and gets to go back to when he was dark and truly scary. Julie Christie adds old school Hollywood glamour as Grandma and gives enough style and class as well as giving us enough looks and weird gestures to make us wonder what her true nature in this film is. Amanda Seyfried is great as Valerie/Red. I was a bit torn at the start if I liked her in this movie as I hated her last film Chloe (truly one of the worst pieces of film I have ever seen) but as soon as it got going, casting her was fantastic.

A great deal of praise needs to go to Catherine Hardwicke. Before the whole Twilight craziness, Catherine was a great independent film director who could get great performances out of her young cast. Check out Thirteen and Dog Town and Z boys to truly see her talent. Here she has gone for the big large scale movie again, but this time it felt a lot more interesting. She keeps the pacing of the movie at a good speed and never lets the audience get bored. The set designs are fantastic and she uses this take on the medieval times to her advantage. As the tension builds in the film, she never eases off and never gives too much away which makes  keeps the audience interested and guessing who the big bad wolf could be. As always, she knows how to get the teen angst of love triangles through her actors and this movie is no different. There is a great chemistry between Valerie and the two men vying for her affections. If this didn't work the whole film would have been stuffed.

So did I love this movie? No. But did I like it a lot? Yes. The only thing that kept going through my head, was Jacob the wolf all along. (Everyone knows from the Twilight book Jacob is the wolf) The computer graphics were exactly the same, and I couldn't stop thinking all along that it was Jacob. But I started to get over that. The filmmakers could have easily tried for a different look, but I guess to not make it too scary, and not to alienate their target audience, a scary werewolf could have been too much and earned the film a higher rating. But oh well. This movie in my opion is a film that can take a firm proud stand next to other adaptions of the Red Riding Hood franchise. It was clever, interesting and kept me guessing to the last minute. They owe a lot to the great casting, and for me, it is about time Julie Christie came back on screen. She is one of the true Hollywood beauties that needs to do more films (FYI Julie Christie is the main lead in Dr. Zhivago). Having her and Gary Oldman raised the bar for this film, that could have easily fallen into the bargain bin. Sometimes old school Hollywood have more talent and screen presence in their little finger than any of the other highly overrated actors on screen today. 3/5