For those of you who have read the book (like me), you can see that this is a serious departure from the original story. In fact, it really doesn’t look anything like the book. There are three new characters, and while the plot of the CIA taking out one of their ex-spooks is still there, it looks to be more of a comedy than a bad ass violent romp.
However, there are two things to consider, I suppose. The first is that you can adapt a story outside of it’s comic and make it into an enjoyable film regardless. There are examples of this working (in my opinion, The Losers was a lot of fun -albeit flawed) and there are examples of this failing miserably (see: Kick-Ass and Watchmen). I don’t know if Red ever tried to be exactly like the comic, but the second thing to consider is that Warren Ellis is ok with all the changes. As written in his blog last year:
First off: RED, the book, is 66 pages long. If you were to film 66 pages of comics, you might, might just about get 40 minutes of film out of it. If you added a musical number. The comics-page to film-minute ratio is pretty bad. A straight adaptation of a 150-page graphic novel might, if you squint at it, get you a 100-minute film. But it’s unlikely, because comics and films use time so differently. One page with four lines of dialogue on it can be slowed to a crawl to the point where you have to spend several minutes digesting the information on it. In film, however, four lines of dialogue is four lines of dialogue, and you can’t just pronounce it very slowly for the same time consumption. Beyond filmic/dramatic effects like the pause or montage or whatever, film is timelocked.
So, yes, RED the film is very different. Not least because it needed to generate more material than the book itself actually constituted.
Ellis also adds, “I mean, if you don’t want to see a film with Helen Mirren with a sniper rifle, I’m not sure I want to know you.” So take that as you will.
Regardless, the film looks fun. It will be interesting to see Willis, Freeman, Malkovich, and Mirren play a group of assassins with the help of the lovely Mary-Louise Parker. I don’t see the film getting any kind of Oscar nod, but a fun evening with a bag of popcorn and friends? Definitely.
