RED STATE (2011) (a review)

RED STATE (2011) (a review)

This is the new movie by Kevin Smith (Clerks, Jay and Silent Bob, Dogma, Cop Out). Unlike many of his movies that fall in the View Askew universe this is more of an action/horror movie. The movie stars John Goodman, Kevin Pollack, Michael Parks, Melissa Leo, and Stephen Root.

The story: a couple kids drive out into the woods to meet a woman for quick sex, but are taken hostage by religious cult who plan to kill them. The cops arrive and leads to a stand off between the FBI and the fundamentalists.

Was it good?

Kind of. It was interesting, but I'm not sure I would call it good.

The first half is a pretty standard horror movie. There's some humor and some odd little moments, but it's played much more grounded than, say, a Friday the 13th. The kids are taken hostage and one of them is killed and the others struggle to survive. The religious people are a cult full of wackos and the kids are kind of a-holes, but they don't deserve to die.

Then, around midpoint is when the FBI arrive and that's when the movie gets odd. Up until them it's pretty clear we root for the kids and are against the religious/anti-gay/people killers. However, the FBI isn't actually good. And even more oddly, the kids that we have been following virtually disappear from the story. It becomes a stand off between two sides that no one would really root for.

Now this might work if the story was told in a realistic way and wanted to really explore both sides of a difficult situation, but that's not the case. Both sides are so exaggerated they become parodies at times. And the loss of any character or storyline where there is anything really to root for, it leave you (or me or whoever the audience is) feeling adrift. It's like the story was designed not just to end badly (which a lot of horror movies do...people tend to die at the end of them) but it's meant to end in a way that make you feel useless.

Still it was an interesting movie. For cinephiles and fans of indy movies maybe this will work too. It's just not a movie I could recommend for most. Still, there's enough good here that if you are looking for a rental it might be worth your time.

*** RENTAL ***