Back in 2010 the movie Red was released.  The term, which stands for “retired, extremely dangerous”, involved the goings on of a retired CIA agent named Frank Moses (Bruce Willis), his looney tune friend Marvin (John Malkovich) and Sarah (Mary-Louse Parker) a “civilian” Moses pines for.  Into that mix appeared ancillary characters such as the deadly British assassin Victoria (Helen Mirren) and ex-Russian KGB superagent Ivan (Brian Cox).

The movie was an action adventure with the (mostly) over the hill ex-agents kicking some serious ass while Moses romances the somewhat flighty Sarah.  While I admittedly don’t recall too many of the movie’s details, I recall the film was a pleasant diversion, made especially so because of the presence and interactions of all those veteran actors.

Three years later, Red 2 hit theaters and I’ll be damned it it didn’t have a really great theatrical trailer:

Would the film live up to its advertising?

Well…yes and no.

On the one hand, there were plenty of great gags in the film, including several instances where deadly assassins in the middle of planning or executing some kind of skullduggery take a moment to talk about how Moses can maintain a vibrant and positive relationship with Sarah.

On the other hand, as the film played out, I got the feeling what I was seeing was either a “rush job” or was whittled down from a too long run time…or both.  After a terrific opening act (the best part of the film) scenes kind of whizzed by and slammed into each other without much grace.  It simply didn’t flow very well.

Part of the problem may well lie with the film’s very, very large cast, which this time around includes many new ancillary characters.  We have Anthony Hopkins’ potentially looney Bailey.  There’s Byung-hun Lee’s deadly assassin Han.  There’s also Katherine Zeta-Jones’ Russian agent Katja (sadly, the most wasted of the big name stars).

And that’s not getting into the smaller roles!

Red 2 winds up being a globe trotting affair, with the team trying to figure out why they have been marked for assassination.  The peculiars of the plot are quite interesting, involving the possibility of a weapon of mass destruction hidden away in Moscow, but it is the characters and their interactions which are still the main draw.

Perhaps one day a “director’s cut” of the film might show up and smooth over the film’s rushed feeling, but I doubt it.  While not an outright bust, Red 2 is a decent film that flirts with being a damn good one…all while just missing the mark.

Trivia Alert!  Is this the first film to feature the two most famous actors to play the villainous Hannibal Lector?  Sadly, neither Brian Cox, the original Hannibal Lector (from the criminally -pun intended!- underrated Manhunter, which featured the first appearance of the character) nor Anthony Hopkins (the most famous actor to play the role, starting with SIlence of the Lambs) share any screen time together.  Might have been fun to see them face to face!

Ah well!

In case you’re not familiar with it, here’s the trailer for Manhunter.  Years later this film was remade with Anthony Hopkins in the Hannibal role as Red Dragon (the original title of the novel it was based on).  You can see Brian Cox’s Hannibal Lector for the first time at the 1:20 mark…

Bonus, bonus trailer: That of Red Dragon (why the heck not?)…