Yeah yeah I lied. I know it. But I told you I would be back. It wasn’t easy but I made it. I know it isn’t the day directly adjacent to the day I posted my last entry (it is not even the day adjacent to that day, or the day adjacent to the day that was adjacent to that day, it is the day after the day after that) but this is pretty close to it. Yes? No? Whatever. So what did I say I was going to tell you about? Oh yeah, The Green Hornet.
When I went to go see this I was expecting to be blown away by its high level of crapitude. I thought I was going to see pure garbage; a the further destruction of our fictional heroes. I was pleasently surprised when it turned out not to be a complete failure.
After the sudden death of his father playboy Britt Reid (Seth Rogen) is shouldered with the responsiblity of running “The Daily Sentinel”. He befriends his father’s former assistant Kato (Jay Chou) and they become a crime fighting duo posing as bad guys to expose the corruption in their city and take down the crime lord Chudnofsky (Christopher Waltz).
The Green Hornet is a pretty obscure hero to make a movie about. Back in the 1930 – 1960s he was pretty popular with a radio drama, comic books and a tv series but fell to the waist side as other more fantastic heroes took off. I think that was because even though the Green Hornet did some deducing it was his side kick Kato that did most of the work.
So when Seth Rogen had the idea to write the film he had a pretty clean slate because most people in the demographic that this is aimed at wouldn’t know much about the Green Hornet. They did keep the basics; dude in green and his Asian kung fu knowing driver in black with masks in a black car.
The movie started out surprisingly well with a great cameo by James Franco and the introduction of the main characters in a succinct manner. Not to rushed that you end up unsure of their purpose and why you are supposed to care about them. And not to long that its tedious and you don’t care anymore. Humour is interjected throughout the dialogue making it fun. It is relatively grounded making it realistic for the most part.
Then Cameron Diaz is thrown in there. Her character is completely useless; her lines are badly written and her acting doesn’t help the situation. The plot becomes predictable. And the last action sequence is ridiculously long, drawn out, and jam packed with ludicrous antics (half a car driving around inside and office building if are less interesting to watch than you would think). The whole thing just falls apart. Plus it was in 3D which was completely underutilized.
It was really sad. I wasn’t expecting much but then it raised my hopes with the beginning only to dash them on the floor, call them names, and spill milk all over them while dressed in green and yelling hee-ya the whole time.
Except for Diaz the acting isn’t too bad. Its an action movie so the actors had fun with their roles. Seth Rogen was a good fit for the role; he does a lot of talking but not much else. Jay Chou’s English is a bit hard to understand at times because of his accent but you don’t mind much cuz he kung fus (can I do that?) well. Christoph Waltz continues to play the role of the bad guy well. Franco’s cameo was a welcomed surprise and there is even an appearance by Ed Furlong (who has not aged well). There are a lot of secondary characters that are introduced but glossed over and they aren’t missed.
The Green Hornet is a passable movie. It only has a medium level of crapitude and that mainly takes place within the last 30 minutes of the movie. That is kind of sad because that scale could have easily dipped to low. It isn’t worth 3D prices but if it is is regular old 2D it is totally up to you to check out. It is more of a bored on the weekend kind of movie.
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