You Fucked With the Wrong Family.
I was feeling lucky today. I had been so lucky recently with remakes of cheesy old movies that I decided it couldn’t possibly hurt to give another one a shot. The first two were remakes of Total Recall and Judge Dredd that both had some camp appeal back in the day, but were not what I wanted them to be. The remakes were badass and exactly what I wanted them to be. So obviously this third movie would be in the same boat, right? It too is a remake of a cheesy 80’s movie that a lot of people show a lot more respect than I feel it deserves, but I still needed to see how this remake would go. And that’s how I finally relented and rented the remake of Red Dawn, written by Carl Ellsworth and Jeremy Passmore, directed by Dan Bradley, and starring Chris Hemsworth, Josh Peck, Will Yun Lee, Brett Cullen, Josh Hutcherson, Connor Cruise, Steve Lenz, Adrianne Palicki, Isabel Lucas, Edwin Hodge, Alyssa Diaz, Jeffrey Dean Morgan, Kenneth Choi, Matt Gerald, and Michael Beach.
A North Korean battalion lead by Captain Cho (Will Yun Lee) invades Spokane, Washington, probably assuming that it was Washington D.C. and would thusly be the best place to strike at America. I know it’s a stereotype, but those Asians really need to pay better attention in school, am I right? Racism aside … A Marine named Jed Eckert (Chris Hemsworth) is here on leave, visiting his father Police Sergeant Tom Eckert (Brett Cullen) and brother Matt Eckert (Josh Peck), and manages to get his brother and a few other people – Robert Kitner (Josh Hutcherson), Daryl Jenkins (Connor Cruise), and Pete (Steve Lenz) – to the safety of their cabin in the woods, even though Hemsworth has had bad luck with one of those in the past. A few of their classmates meet them up there. Pete betrays the group for some stupid reason and that leads to daddy Eckert getting killed. This puts this ragtag group of kids on the warpath against trained military soldiers in a war the Koreans can’t possibly win. AMERICA!!
This feels like it certainly has to be a shorter review because I didn’t even realize I was watching the movie for the most part. I often write these reviews while watching or playing something else that I’m writing a review for, and apparently typing my own words for Game of Thrones was much more enthralling to me than this movie was. I’m sure you all feel the same. Unlike all of you, I am often fairly bored by my own words and will often dedicate a lot more of my attention to the thing I’m experiencing for the first time than to my reviews. This was not the case for this movie. It was on, and I knew it was on, but I could give a shit less. And I went into this movie thinking it was impossible to make a movie less interesting than the first Red Dawn. At least that movie was easily mocked in its stupidity. This movie was just boring. It was like they weren’t even trying. I don’t think they even wanted to release this movie, but they threw it out there because they thought they could make a few bucks off of Hemsworth’s rising stardom. And they probably did, which makes it worth it to them. But not to me. Really, if you saw the first Red Dawn, there’s no reason to watch this one. It’s the same thing, but it’s not nearly as fun. It’s just thoroughly bleh. There’s still no reason for an invading army to target some Podunk town of little importance. Sorry if anyone is reading this in Spokane, but you should know what you are. I grew up in Barstow, and I didn’t complain when one of the Fast and the Furious movies treated Barstow like it was a piece of shit town. I knew that already. I grew up there. But I still think if some foreign army invaded Barstow, I would have no problem throwing down. I didn’t understand the kids that seemed to have a problem with it, like Hutcherson. He would hesitate when he needed to kill someone and throw up when he saw a dead body. Hey, it’s me or him. I’m cool with this. Stay out of my country and we won’t have this problem. White power. Wait, that went off the rails there… It was probably because he was in Hunger Games. That surgically implants a vagina on you. Also, why the hell is there a functioning Subway in this occupied town? The Sandwich Artists and customers are acting like this is just another day, seemingly oblivious to the fact that there is a Korean invasion going on. I like Subway too, but I think I’d take that shit to go and enjoy my Meatball Marinara at home if there was a war going on outside.
I can’t really blame the actors in this movie. This movie wasn’t their fault. They didn’t help it, and really didn’t seem to give it their all, but I can’t blame them for that either. This movie was paying for dinner. No need to bust your acting chops on this. Thor wasn’t nearly Thor-y enough in this movie, and I think the other characters caught on to that. That’s why that douche Pete guy was arguing about who was in charge with him. Under normal situations, of course Thor would be in charge. No one would argue that the God of Thunder was in charge of a group of stupid High School kids. But Thor wasn’t in a Thor mood in this movie. He tried to muster up at least a Captain America mood when he fought a guy using the back of a computer chair as a shield, but he still wasn’t getting into it. Josh Peck was a shit in this movie, but people kept letting him off the hook for it. He gets a dude killed by running off on his own to save his girlfriend, and the dude’s girlfriend or whatever forgives him just because they stared at each other for a few seconds. I wouldn’t have. That chick was evil. She didn’t show it in this movie, but I know for a fact that she’s an evil robot with a prehensile tongue. Okay, maybe it’s worth it then. And then I got mad at the other chick, old what’s-her-name (I told you I wasn’t paying attention!), for getting mad at the dude that was tagged with a tracking dart. He didn’t intentionally lead the bad guys to them! He was tagged with a tracking dart! Stupid what’s-her-name…
I almost feel bad telling you that the remake of Red Dawn sucked since I invested so little of my attention into it, but I feel like I saw enough to tell you that you don’t need to see it. It’s boring, it’s not fun, the action is mediocre, the story is ludicrous and unoriginal, and the actors phoned it in. There are better uses for your time. If you want a remake of a crappy 80s movie so much, watch the new Total Recall or Dredd. Leave this movie alone. Red Dawn gets “Dude, we’re living Call of Duty … It Sucks” out of “That’s a shit sandwich without bread.”
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