Review of The Green Hornet (2011) by Jack V — 19 May 2014

Britt Reid (Seth Rogen) is the irresponsible, 28-year-old slacker son of widower James Reid (Tom Wilkinson), publisher of the Daily Sentinel, a Los Angeles newspaper. Britt's attitude changes when James is found dead from an allergic reaction to a bee sting. After the funeral, Britt fires the staff aside from his maid, but later re-hires Kato (Jay Chou), James's mechanic and a skilled martial artist. Britt and Kato get drunk together and, upon agreeing that they both hated James, visit the graveyard to cut the head off James's memorial statue. After they succeed, they rescue a nearby couple being mugged. When police mistake Britt and Kato themselves for criminals, Kato evades them in a car chase as he and Britt return to the mansion. Britt convinces Kato they should become crime-fighters who pose as criminals in order to infiltrate real criminals, and to prevent enemies from using innocents against them. Britt then develops his crime fighting alter ego The Green Hornet. Kato develops a car outfitted with several gadgets and weapons, which they call the Black Beauty. Britt plans to capture Benjamin Chudnofsky (Christoph Waltz), a Russian mobster uniting the criminal families of Los Angeles under his command, and whom his father was trying to expose. To get Chudnofsky's attention, Britt uses Daily Sentinel as a vehicle to publish articles about the masked "high-profile criminal" The Green Hornet...

"The Green Hornet" was originally a radio show, first broadcast in 1936 and running to 1952. Although there were two serials in 1940 (The Green Hornet (1940) with 13 chapters and The Green Hornet Strikes Again! (1940) with 15 chapters), the last six chapters of the first one re-edited into a 100-minute feature and several episodes of The Green Hornet (1966) were edited together into a pair of 90-minute films, this is the first original feature-length Hollywood treatment of the costumed hero. Most well known is however the television series that aired for the 1966-1967 season and starred Van Williams as both the Green Hornet and Britt Reid, and Bruce Lee as Kato. In these days when everything superhero character like is brought to the big screen, it´s no wonder that "The Green Hornet" ended up there as well.

However, this adaptation suffers from one gigantic flaw and that is Seth Rogen. He is so miscasted (he put himself there...) it hurts in both your brain and eyes. His "stoner" acting and big kid like presence ruins the character Britt Reid/The Green Hornet. Lou Lumenick of the New York Post found it "an overblown, interminable and unfunny update (in badly added 3-D)", and called star Rogen "miscast". Almost everything is disappointing in the movie. The Hollywoodized direction from Michel Gondry, the miscasting of several roles, the unfunny script and the overblown belief in putting someone like Rogen in the driver´s seat and that sort of role. Roger Ebert gave it one star and called it "an almost unendurable demonstration of a movie with nothing to be about. Although it follows the rough storyline of previous versions of the title, it neglects the construction of a plot engine to pull us through." Christoph Waltz has some moments and to be honest the only scene that is good in the whole movie is the one where Chudnofsky confronts James Franco´s gangster Danny Crystal Cleer. And yes the updated Black Beauty is nice, but this is hardly enough. Go to Youtube and watch the 1966-1967 tv show with Van Williams and Bruce Lee and see how The Green Hornet should be portrayed.