Review of Red State (2011) by Ken S — 21 Jan 2015
Kevin Smith makes this horror film based on Fred Phelps and the creeps of the Westboro Baptist Church. The church, for the record, is filled with hateful wrongheaded people (mostly members of Phelps family) who protest funerals of gay people and dead soldiers to claim that God Hates Gay people and get away with their invasion of privacy and respect for other human beings by hiding behind the first amendment.
I'm all for freedom of speech, but I also believe in respecting other people, and acting like an asshole to family members of the recently deceased is fucked up. Smith's film is pretty decent.
It isn't his best work, but at least he wrote this, and at least he tried something different. I love Michael Parks, and he is quite good as the villain in this. The cast is pretty great, and for the most part Smith avoided casting many of his regulars.
He also made it without Scott Mosier, without funding or distribution by the Weinsteins, and not under his usual View Askew banner - but under a new SModcast Pictures. It is a departure for Smith, and I think it paid off a little.
I don't think he has a future in horror (hell he seems to be retiring altogether after his next film so I doubt he has much of a future in film at all), but I thought this film worked pretty well.
This review of Red State (2011) was written by Ken S on 21 Jan 2015.
Red State has generally received mixed reviews.
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