[Films] RED 2

It's another Warwick Student Cinema film catch-up review. This time around I'll be taking a look at RED 2.

I watched RED on one of the postgraduate film nights that we used to hold in the Astronomy group up in St Andrews. It was surprisingly entertaining, and really rather funny. I wasn't expecting a sequel to be made, but was pleasantly surprised when I saw that there was one. It wasn't top of my list of films to see, so much like After Earth I didn't make too much of an effort to go to a "proper" cinema to see it, but when it was on at the student cinema I thought 'why not?'

What a cast! For this kind of film you wouldn't expect it to work necessarily, but somehow it does. (Credit: joblo.com)

First of all, this film is funny. I mean (frequently) laugh out loud funny, with several great recurring jokes. The three main characters are picture perfect, and the interplay between is so incredibly natural that it doesn't really feel like a film sometimes. They're nuanced, subtle character studies, and played wonderfully by Bruce Willis, Mary-Louise Parker, and John Malkovich. The supporting cast are also great, particularly Helen Mirren and Anthony Hopkins. The sight of Helen Mirren with a massive gun should be jarring, but it just works so well.

Malkovich and Hopkins are the two stand outs for me. Malkovich is hilarious, partly because of his character, and partly because of his delivery. He gets all of the best lines, not to mention the physical comedy that he gets to partake of as well. It's brilliant, and even better than his amazing performance from the first film. He's criminally underrated in my opinion. Hopkins, on the the other hand, is a crazy person. Or at least that's how he appears, and he seems to be having a lot of fun playing the nutcase. He's a great absent-minded scientist, but the occasional bits of scary dialogue just pop out of his mouth mid stream-of-consciousness. The juxtaposition is great, and the twist in the film when you realise that actually he's the bad guy is very well done.

These three are amazing. The combination of their characters is brilliant, and John Malkovich in particular

is absolutely hilarious. (Credit: metro.us)

I think that that's what makes the film so good actually. It doesn't take itself too seriously, and the actors all clearly had great fun making the film. The return of the car stunt is welcome, but on the whole the action is fairly low-key. This is a film all about, and completely driven by, the characters; the fact that they happen to be mostly hardened spies and soldiers is just gravy.