Bruce
Willis. John Malkovich. Helen Mirren. Anthony Hopkins. Catherine Zeta-Jones.
That’s a lot
of A-List firepower for any film to assemble. You would think any film with
such a cast would have to be good. You would think that but you would be wrong. Such is the
case for Red 2. Not much time is wasted putting the retired, yet extremely
dangerous band back together in order to save themselves and the world from certain
destruction.
The story
begins with Frank (Bruce Willis) and Sarah, played again by the charming
Mary-Louise Parker, trying to adjust to everyday life after the events of the
first film. Obviously, that is not going to last long and before we know it we
are being systematically lead from one excuse for an action scene to the next
with little attempt to engage the audience with anything that resembles a
clever plot. The few interesting things that could have been explored are
instead ignored as we are ushered to the next vanilla action sequence. Nothing
to think about here. Please move along.
There was
potential for a fun movie here, Helen Mirren is a bright spot as she steals
nearly every scene she's in. Anthony Hopkins does a nice job as well,
considering what material he's given to work with. Also, of worthy mention is Byung-Hun
Lee who delivers some pretty kick ass martial arts fight scenes.
-guest post by Brian Rohe