Red One
Starring: Dwayne Johnson, Chris Evans, J.K. Simmons, Lucy Liu
Directed By: Jake Kasdan
Are you looking for a great Christmas movie to watch this holiday season? Might I suggest The Holdovers? It’s an excellent film for the holidays! Oh right, I’m writing about Red One, which is being marketed as a Christmas movie for some reason.
Where to begin. First, I have to link this clip which is my favorite thing to come out of this movie. I am very obsessed with The Rock’s delusional confidence and wish I had a bit more of it myself. I didn’t see Red One in IMAX, so I cannot say if it is officially, “Game Over,” as Mr. Dwayne The Rock claims. However, I did see it at the theater and I genuinely don’t know who this movie is for. Let me explain further.
Red One follows Callum Drift (Dwayne Johnson) an E.L.F. operative who has to go an a mission to save Santa after he is kidnapped from the North Pole. Callum can’t do it alone, so he teams up with Jack O’Malley (Chris Evans), a skilled hacker coasting from job to job. Can the two find Santa? Will this journey help them find the true meaning of Christmas?
This plot summary brings me back to my question…Who is Red One for?
Possibility 1: It’s for people who love Christmas! Wrong. I am a Christmas connoisseur. I am a Molly Shannon in Santa Clause 2-level Christmas enthusiast. I will watch any Christmas movie. Red One puts a beard on J.K. Simmons, calls him Santa Claus and dares to label itself a holiday classic. This does not a Christmas movie make.
Possibility 2: It’s for kids! (And I should stop taking it so seriously.) Wrong again. This movie is PG-13, so it alienated the majority of its audience in its theatrical run. Also, I think it will terrify a lot of children. There are 12-foot-tall demon snowmen and monsters lurking throughout half the movie. They turned Sally Draper from Mad Men into a witch who wants to trap everyone in a snow globe. Betty Draper would never approve of such behavior. My point being, if I saw this movie as a kid, I would not sleep for a very long time.
Possibility 3: It’s for people who wish there was a knockoff Marvel Christmas movie? This is about all I can come up with. Red One feels like a Marvel knockoff in every possible way. The buddy cop team up. The attempted humor with sci-fi elements. The jokes that don’t land half of the time. Don’t get me wrong, in its heyday Marvel was firing out some great movies. The days since Endgame are another story.
Considering I can’t pinpoint who this movie is for, it’s not a shock that it bombed at the box office. Red One cost $250 million to make. Pause for a moment. Can we acknowledge how insane that is? The budget for Barbie was $145 million. The budget for Oppenheimer was $100 million. I need a Red One budget breakdown. Something isn’t adding up. Anyways, the movie has made $176 million since release, which is not what the studio wants to see.
Red One is a movie with lazy jokes, poor effects, and a strange plot that never really finds its footing. Half of the movie is just mythological lore about Krampus and a witch who used to be in love. That’s some exciting Christmas content! Hallmark, start updating your scripts for the Krampus/Witch storylines!
The actors try. I cannot fault them for doing their best with the script. Surprisingly, this movie attracts a lot of talent including The Rock, Chris Evans, J.K. Simmons, Bonnie Hunt, and Lucy Liu. To their agents, I would ask why? But again I will mention, I did not see this in IMAX so I probably didn’t get it.
Ok, I won’t be a total Grinch through this whole review. Since I’ve been negative about most aspects of Red One, I’ll talk about something positive. The heart of the film has a message of changing for the better and turning your life around. It specifically surrounds Jack’s character as he learns to be a better parent to his son. It’s a nice sentiment and something that I can acknowledge is a positive theme through the movie.
Besides that, I didn’t find much to enjoy in this odd and overstuffed mess. I would not recommend Red One this holiday season. Unfortunately, it is neither festive nor fun. It is game over though, so that counts for something.
My Rating: 4/10