Image courtesy of The Weinstein Company

HOODWINKED

Help! The Goodie Bandit is stealing everyone’s recipes in the forest, and only someone smart enough to understand a Rashomon style narrative will be able to solve the case! In this offering from the newly formed Weinstein Co., “Little Red Riding Hood” is deconstructed so many times even The Count would lose count.

Come on, you know the story: “Red” (Anne Hathaway) goes over the river and through the woods to her grandmother’s house to bring her a basket of goodies; and predictably, when she gets there, Red finds a cross-dressing wolf (Patrick Warburton) in Granny’s bed pretending to be the old crone. But, as luck would have it, a bumbling woodsman (James Belushi) crashes through the wall in the nick of time to destroy the house in order to save Red from becoming an after-school snack.

Here’s where things get interesting: Nicky Flippers (David Ogden Stiers) arrives to take over Chief Grizzly’s (Xzbit) inept interrogation of the suspects; and, quickly discovers that not everyone is who they seem to be. The wolf and his squirrel sidekick Twitchy (a sped up Cory Edwards) are tabloid journalists covering the “Goodie Bandit” case, the woodsman is an out of work actor, and Granny (Glenn Close) is an extreme sports junkie. But wait, it gets worse….

From the moment everyone leaves Granny’s house, the film turns into a never-ending string of chase scenes and one-liners: Red and Granny’s quest forces them to encounter Japeth the mountain goat (Benjy Gaither) who sings nothing but really bad bluegrass music, a funky sheep named Woolworth (Chazz Palminteri), the ambiguously shady bunny Boingo (Andy Dick), and the Goodie Bandit’s head muscleman Dolph (Tye Edwards) who sounds more than a little like the “Governator.”

Just like Freeway, Ever After, and The Brothers Grimm, Hoodwinked also jumps on the bandwagonning craze of deconstructing fairy tales; yet, in spite of all its ridiculous characters and their screwball hijinks, Hoodwinked still gives us one of the most original takes on an otherwise outdated story.

Image courtesy of The Weinstein Company

The most intriguing aspect of Hoodwinked is its fragmented narrative structure because it is driven by the four suspects telling four different versions of the same story from four different points of view. In spite of the redundant nature of repeating the same story, the Rashomon narrative made me just a little nostalgic for “Boomtown.” (Don’t get me started about those idiots at NBC who canceled one of the best written shows on TV.) Don’t worry, there’s something in there for the film geeks too – a clever allusion to the “Woodcutter’s Tale” from Akira Kurosawa’s original Rashomon.

Where I have to criticize Hoodwinked is the shoddy appearance of its cheap production value. Whoever thought no one would notice the flat 2-dimensional backgrounds behind the cheesy plastic look of the 3-dimensional CGI characters needs to have their eyesight checked more than once every 4 years at the DMV. Had the Weinsteins taken the time to polish the overall visual effects of the film, it probably wouldn’t have looked like someone cutting corners to push a release date.

Yet, what’s even worse than the substandard animation is the horrifically bad audio editing. At one point, you’re coasting along, being thoroughly annoyed by twangy bluegrass music; and, the next minute you’re blasted three rows back when a 100 decible increase announces Granny’s heavy metal music as she skies down the side of a mountain. Complaining about loud music may qualify me as now being officially old; but, at least I know to “normalize” audio tracks. Maybe I should forget about being a critic and ask the Weinsteins about the audio editor position that just opened up.

With such a unique concept and a clever narrative, it really is a shame that the underdeveloped CGI, bad audio, and Granny keep Hoodwinked from living up to its full potential. Wait a minute…Granny? Yes, Granny. By the time you learn about her ridiculous double life of baking and snowboarding, it’s almost pointless to ask if it was something that sounded better on paper than translated to the big screen. The answer is “yes.”

Image courtesy of The Weinstein Company

The exact moment I knew the old bat and her Xtreme sports addiction were getting out of hand was the second she jumped on her snowboard and took off down the mountain yelling, "You ready to get spanked?" Not in this lifetime, Granny.