Review of Red Dawn (2012) by Maksim B — 31 May 2013

A pointless attempt to re-make the guilty pleasure classic from the 80s , Red Dawn is a disappointing movie, which not only fails to match the standard of the original flick, but also fails to deliver the expected classic action fun. Simple, straightforward and paying tribute to the old school actions, Red Dawn has a limited amount of "guilty pleasure" to offer and loads of absurd moments.

Immediate comparisons with the original movie from 1984 with Patrick Swayze and Charlie Sheen are inevitable and unfortunately they are all in favor of the original. The main and biggest issue of Red Dawn (2012) is that there is no relevant enemy to portray nowadays. If the 1984 classic was focused on the communist threat, which then had probably seemed possible, the decision to choose for North Korean invasion has made the whole story-line of the recent delivery simply absurd. Even if one tries to imagine a North Korean invasion, the first thing which he or she will wonder would be how is it possible for North Koreans to use Hummer military SUVs and M16 rifles in the initial stage of their invasion. For instance, a Chinese invasion would have seemed much more realistic, but the choice of the studio was obviously not to get this movie banned for release in China.

Speaking of the cinematographic qualities of Red Dawn, director Dan Bradley's debut has everything which a mindless wanna-be-a-classic-action could have: straight-forward action, shallow plot-line, characters incapable of showing any credible on-screen emotions and huge plot and logic- holes. The overall pace is satisfying; the action sequences are as well on an average level and would perfectly please those watching the movie on a late night Friday on the TV. Chris Hemsworth (Jed Eckert) is far from delivering a performance which would be positively remembered and he receives no support from the rest of the cast. Overall, there is nobody from the cast to really impress and it would not be too harsh on Josh Peck (Matt Eckert), if we say that he totally annoys in the movie. The family tension between both of them is probably the most annoying part of the whole movie and even obvious questions of pure logic (such as Toni (Adriana Palicki) running 200 meters bringing some North Korean soldiers to a trap where they get shot while nobody in the neighborhood hears the shots coming from automatic rifles), cannot irritate the audience as much as the Matt-Jed relationship.

Red Dawn may be fine for seeing it on a late night TV evening, if there is nothing else to see, but as a whole it will be remembered (actually, "forgotten" is the more correct word) as a movie which simply should not have been created. All possible wrong choices have been made for this movie and even the decent action sequences cannot bring the level of "guilty pleasure" which many of us have expected while watching the movie.