RED RIDING HOOD

The early 2010's were a strange time in cinematic history when film studios really truly believed people wanted to see fairy tales turned into gritty movies for teenagers. Harry Potter was wrapping up, and execs were looking for a public domain property they could turn into the next big fantasy thing.

Hansel & Gretel were Witch Hunters, Snow White had The Huntsman, and Red Riding Hood’s village was being attacked by a werewolf. And the world went ‘Look, thanks for these, this will distract us for a little bit, but we need you to know, we don’t want this, we’ve never wanted this, so please cut it out’. And then it stopped.

Which is a shame, because it would have been good to live through a period where they ran out of fairy tales and started adapting nursery rhymes. “You seen that gritty new Georgie Porgie movie? This bloke is out there eating pudding and pie, and kissing girls and making them cry, and Rooney Mara and Luke Hemsworth have to catch him. Georgie Porgie is played by Russell Brand in a real dramatic turn for him. I reckon he could win a Globe for it! It’s 2011!”

Red Riding Hood is a weird movie. It’s directed by Catherine Hardwicke who directed this right after the first Twilight because after making a hit movie the studio were like “Hmm, good job, what about if we went with not a woman for the director of all of the next movies? Great job, Catherine, you’ve clearly nailed it, but we’d love to continue on with the dude who made American Pie instead. He just gets what the target demo is after with this property.”

The Wikipedia article about Hardwicke says that after Twilight: “Her following film was not a commercial or critical success.” Which, when Wikipedia aren’t even like ‘citation needed’ about your failure, it’s pretty rough. Is this movie any weirder than Twilight? Not really, there’s just less to hold onto – it’s a lot harder to imagine yourself as Red Riding Hood than it is to kind of see yourself as Bella. The strongest connection between the work is that both have terrible CGI wolves.

Where would I fit into Red Riding Hood? I would be a villager, obviously, and absolutely dying for any gossip. So let’s pop me in a mid-credits sequence after the film ends.

IF I WERE IN 'RED RIDING HOOD' I WOULD: FOR ONE FULL MOON SATIATE MY THIRST FOR GOSSIP