Dwayne Johnson’s Joyless Dud is an epic Christmas that takes itself very seriously

It might not be the holidays yet, but Amazon MGM wants you to hang up your stockings early to Red
the high-concept adventure starring Dwayne Johnson, Chris Evans and JK Simmons. Johnson plays the role he was born to play: a burly security chief for Simmons’ Santa Claus who is disillusioned by humanity’s lack of kindness and one day retired.

As Jumanji: Welcome to the Junglewith which Johnson collaborated Red From director Jake Kasdan, the festive adventure aims for action comedy. When Santa Claus is kidnapped, Johnson’s inexplicably immortal Callum Drift teams up with Level 4 Naughty Lister Jack O’Malley (Evans), who is a master thief, hacker, and somehow has the superpower of being able to find people or things from childhood. Don’t worry, this isn’t important enough to explain other than to help the plot move forward.

Red is a good analogy for a bad Christmas: it’s excessive, there are some unwanted guests, and it’s not as fun as it seems from the outside. And I’m no Grinch: I’m an early adopter of the festive spirit every year, and I have great affection for many Christmas films — including some universally panned ones. I regularly watch Hallmark Christmas movies on purpose. But I’m sorry to say that Red it’s a slog that lacks the charm that could have saved it.

The things that really work at Red One

Credit where it’s due, The Christmas Actioner Nails Spectacle And Lore

Frustratingly, Redthe world building is very good and zoomed out a bit, there are things to enjoy. As with JumanjiJake Kasdan creates a rich mythology for this strange Christmas world, to the point where you get the feeling that it was designed like a Dungeons & Dragons world. In this regard, the director (and the creative team in general) deserves credit: there’s an ingenious reworking of Christmas traditions that feels like it’s been carefully crafted.

The problem, however, is that Redanchor of the real world – particularly in your Arthur Natal-like the insistence on explaining magic with ultramodern technology – disappoints. What leads to the kind of identity crisis that smarter occult world films like Harry Potter avoid by simply making the time setting vague. The dual world concept is an interesting one and is broken down by both being too separate (by tone) and not separate enough (as Rowlings’ Wizarding World has always felt).

That being said, this part should be about the elements worthy of praise, and there will be enough criticism to come. The artistic design on display and the costumes – especially the monsters and magical settings – are legitimately award-worthy. The sets are imaginative and impressively realized, the effects work mostly stand-up, and if you’re looking for a film that has a very high frequency of wire-assisted stunts being launched through the air, then Red it’s for you.

Red’it’s actually cast hides its best performance, which belongs to Kristofer Hivju like a new version of Krampus, which was brilliant casting. He plays the monster with just the right touch of his Game of Thrones character Tormund Giantsbane, a lecherous and hedonistic rogue, who loves chaos. This dark charm suits Hivju, even if her ability to emote is robbed by an impressive but very heavy full-body prosthetic suit.

Who is Red for? I’m not sure if you really know

There’s something of an identity crisis at play here

RedThe most difficult demand from the public is to explain who it is really intended for. Normally I try to avoid letting it explicitly affect my viewing experience and set it aside for later if it’s relevant, but I was repeatedly sucked into the issue by the film’s absurdly wandering tone. There are moments that suggest Kasdan wanted to do something more adult, with jokes and subtle winks that are completely inappropriate for children, but there’s also an obvious play for 10-year-old boys.

In the end, I reached the Christmas epiphany that Red basically aims Fortnite players who wouldn’t be seen dead enjoying a typical Christmas movie. The settings play like disparate levels in a video game – a narrative style that really worked for Jumanji (given, you know, the fact that it’s a video game movie) – impressive in its own right, but not in service of the larger story. So while there is a careful eye for spectacle and an obvious adoption of the comic book filmmaking style, it isn’t entirely successful because someone seems to have forgotten to make it all fun.

What parallel to comic book movies is pertinent, given the obvious cost on display. Red was initially planned to be released on Amazon Prime, but delays thanks to Hollywood strikes in 2023 and the apparent promise of early test results led to a theatrical lurch. It also feels grand enough to be a theatrical film, because there are so many creative decisions that are soaked in money that it’s no wonder the budget is reported to be between $200 million and $250 million.

Unlike some inflated budgets, you can see where all that money went. Leaving aside the undoubtedly expensive main cast, there’s a huge amount of effects work, lots of prosthetics for various background characters, huge sets, and a commitment to wonder that I wish had been translated into more emotional substance. As it is, I couldn’t help but feel the oppressive weight of the cost when entirely CG characters (like the polar bear often used in marketing) can’t justify their inclusion.

I don’t envy this film’s budget – why should I? It’s not my money – but the excess does not match the substance, and I wish more of the cost had been invested in developing a story that matched the production valuesor a script with memorable moments besides The Rock saying “idiot” once.

Red One’s cast is an uneven mix

No one but Hivju stands out in this particular festive spread

Rock’s performance is curiously sadas if he took the character’s notes of a cynical, circumstantial smile too literally. Annoyingly, there was a lot of promise here. Red is essentially a crime film, as already mentioned, but it is so aware of tropes and so full of clichés that it would have been better to lean into the meta-narrative, as Jumanji he did. The Rock’s Cal would have worked wonderfully against Evans’ misfit if he had been played like a Shane Black character, self-consciously, comically stoic rather than accidentally bland.

This means that certain setups that could have paid comedic dividends, like Cal’s power to shrink at will during fight sequences, would have had more magic. Instead, you’re left wondering why everything is so terribly serious. Frankly, that’s the case with the entire film: it’s almost entirely devoid of feeling. The worldview is cynical (by definition) but then simply forgets to present the necessary arguments for humanity before the point of no return. So when the only flourish of poignancy comes at the very end, it rings a little hollow.

Chris Evans does a good job filling in for the audience, perpetually perplexed by everything they encounter and a little lost with the story’s various developments. He plays a charismatic rogue very well, even if his character appears to be dressing up as Ryan Reynolds, but the script lets him down badly. The most fatal thing is that at no point does he really gain the emotional pivot at the end.

Elsewhere, there’s a cameo from Nick Kroll, a rather pointless supporting role for Bonnie Hunt as Mrs. Claus, a disconcertingly underused Lucy Liu, and Kiernan Shipka as the villain, Grýla, the Christmas witch, who the film tries to turn you into gas. believing is as much a part of the collective Christmas consciousness as Krampus. She is not, and Shipka interprets her as a Buffy villain of the week.

JK Simmons is a comparative success as the titular “Red One”: An athletic, bunny version of Santa’s gym with more than a touch of big-city hipster. He is literally left out of much of the film, as a kidnapping victim by Grýla’s army of personalityless henchmen, so this counts against him and the film. Watching him magically deliver the gifts is a rare moment of fun, that’s for sure.

Final thoughts on red

The snowman isn’t the only thing icy

Where were the laughs? Where was the fun? A Christmas movie can get by on a lot less than most movies (as evidenced by the success of movies like Netflix Christmas Chronicles), but Red borders on being insipid. It’s like a big Christmas dinner planned by committee but not prepared for flavor. There are a lot of bells and whistles, but in trying to deconstruct and reconstruct the Christmas spirit there is never enough charm to perform the spell.

Maybe it’s true that Red Would it have gone down better on streaming? This might be even more true if it were released a month later, when the festive spirit makes us a little more open to ridicule. But here and now, I’m left with the prevailing feeling that the film’s opening commentary on the commercialization and commodification of Christmas was a rather frightening premonition.

Red opens in theaters on November 13th.