By 
A YULTIDE BLOCKBUSTER DUD
Christmas movies have always been a “time honored” tradition during the festive holiday season. With the masses celebrating Christmas spirit, seasonal feature films get their chance to shine; dazzling viewers with their yuletide cheer and overly sentimental narratives of love, family, and holiday struggles and tribulations. With plenty of classic films and TV specials making their circulation during this time of year, it’s been a struggle to find a somewhat “new” memorable / timeless holiday Christmas film of late. Sure, there has been a plethora of holiday themed flicks that have recently appeared such as The Knight Before Christmas, Let it Snow, The Princess Switch, The Christmas Chronicles, but none of them have been quite that memorable to match the same theatrical / cinematic timeless feeling to that of the same caliber of It’s a Wonderful Life, Miracle on 34th Street, Home Alone, The Nightmare Before Christmas, or Elf. With the rise of streaming services, various streaming outlet / platforms have begun to branch out in producing (or buying) holiday themed Christmas films to help promote their streaming services during the holiday season. Now, MGM Studios and director Jake Kasdan present the latest Christmas movie in this longline of holiday theme motion pictures with the release of Red One. Does this movie make for a surprise entry in this long-running subgenre or is it a sad (and boring) lump of coal?
THE STORY
Callum Drift, is the head commander for the North pole’s E.L.F (enforcement, logistics, and fortification) squadron, which a secret service detail for the protection of Santa Claus (J.K. Simmons). However, after years of serving for Saint Nicholas, Callum has lost his faith in humanity, for the “naughty list” grows more and more each year. Looking to tender his resignation to Santa (aka Red One), who agrees his old friend’s request, looking to make this Christmas season his last one before leaving his post for good. Several days before “the big show” begins, the wicked witch Gryla (Kiernan Shipka) and her evil horde break into North Pole’s protection and kidnap Red One, planning to end his yearly holiday mission to the world. Feeling responsibly for Red One’s kidnapping, Callum races to figure out how to retrieve his boss, using help from M.O.R.A. (Mythical Oversight and Restoration Authority) head honcho, Zoe Harlow (Lucy Liu), to find known hacker, Jack O’Malley (Chris Evans), who unknowingly sold Santa’s location to Gryla. Jack is a sly scumbag of a man, a selfish human who takes the easy way out of many situations he finds himself in and is also a bad father figure for his son, Dylan (Wesley Kimmel). Forced to work with a “Level 4 Naughty Lister”, Callum finds his hands full with working with a delinquent man as the pair races to follow the clues to Santa and Gryla’s whereabouts, while Jack gets a hectic crash course of the hidden fantasy realm in the world and its advance technology as well as dealing with his estrangement to his son, who begins to gnaw at him.
THE GOOD / THE BAD
Borrowing some of my lines from my review Jingle Jangle: A Christmas Journey, I am a fan of Christmas movies. Always have and always will be. Christmas time is a big holiday for me since my childhood, so the marriage of the good old yuletide cheer and cinematic tales in holiday themed movies have always been to my liking. Of course, I love a lot of the more traditional /classic holiday movies, especially ones that have become classics within their own right like It’s a Wonderful Life or Miracle on 34th Street or the ones that were released when I was growing up like The Nightmare Before Christmas or Home Alone. Still, one of favorite ones would definitely have to be Polar Express (love that entire movie) or maybe Elf (before actor Will Ferrell became increasingly unfunny). As mentioned above, there has been a ton of new Christmas themed movies from rom-coms to raunchy comedies, to dramedies, and to several other genres. However, not a whole lot have become timeless. Some of them I do like such as R-rated comedy film Office Christmas Party or the animated tale Klaus or even the new cartoon remake of The Grinch from DreamWorks. So, there is room for some quality entertainment in these endeavors of late and it doesn’t seem that the production of Christmas / holiday themed movies will be stopping anytime soon.
This brings me back to talking about Red One, a 2024 action / Christmas film and the latest film to feature a holiday theme in its proceedings. I don’t remember much about this movie when it was first announced a while back. I think I can recall hearing about a Christmas themed movie was coming out from MGM / Amazon Studios (released internationally by Warner Bros. Studios) and that actors Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson and Chris Evans were going to be starring opposite each other in the leading roles. Given the amount of star power both Johnson and Evans have in their respective acting fields, it does certainly seem like it was going to be a “match made heaven” and that the movie, while being a holiday film, was going to be treated almost like an action blockbuster picture. This was (of course) confirmed when the film’s movie trailers and marketing campaign began to appear both online and in the in-theaters’ “coming attractions” previews, which promote a Christmas storyline of Santa and saving Christmas mantra, but also utilized a more action-oriented aspects and nuances, which had a more blockbuster feeling. I will admit that the previews alone got me interested in seeing Red One as it looked like it was going to be quite a fun ride with flourishes of Christmas yuletide spirt. So, yes…I was excited to see the movie when it was set to be released on November 15th, 2024, which was originally supposed to be released on Prime Video on December 20th, 2023, and was delayed a year due to the actor / writer strike in 2023 as well as giving a proper theatrical film window release. I did actually see Red One during its opening weekend, for I knew that the movie was going to be mostly “pushed out” somewhat sooner than later due to the stacked popular movies coming out near Thanksgiving (i.e. Gladiator II, Wicked, and Moana 2). However, I wanted to get some of those reviews done before working on this one. Plus, I wanted to publish my review for this movie a bit closer to Christmas, which is why the delay for it. Now, I am finally ready to share what I thought of Red One. And what did I think of it? Well, sadly, I was disappointed with it. Despite its attempts to bring something new with its blockbuster action, Red One ends up being a rather boring and derivate endeavor that feels to shallow and overstuffed to make heads or tails of its holiday themed jaunt. There is stuff to like about this movie, but it’s buried underneath such a sloppy mess of a picture…. or rather a “Christmess” picture.
Red One is directed by Jake Kasdan, whose previous directorial works includes such films as Jumanji: Welcome to the Jungle, Jumanji: The Next Level, and Walk Hard: The Dewey Cox Story. Given his familiarity of what he was able to do with the two Jumanji sequels, Kasdan does certainly seem like a suitable choice to helm a project like this, which has the same type of energy and family friendly atmospheric tones and attitude in both Welcome to the Jungle and The Next Level. To that affect, Kasdan manages to make a blockbuster holiday movie that has plenty to see and do throughout its entire runtime, which provides plenty of distraction and humorous moments from beginning to end. In essence, the movie is presented as a buddy cop endeavor, framing Red One that classic (and well proven) narrative path that’s wrapped in a holiday Christmas presentation (with all the trimmings). As stated, it does work to some degree, with Kasdan managing to cultivate something that is easy to digest for all ages to comprehend as well as follow the journey of Callum and Jack on their journey to find Santa. This then goes into the major aspects of the feature, which is in the comedy and action. Both of these particular genre’s themes definitely could’ve been reworked more (more on that below), but, for the positives, Kasdan is able to shape the movie with those pairing of premises in a somewhat decent way. There is a lot of comedy in the movie, including a lot of sight gags as well as back-and-forth banter from its main leads, which does work on occasion. Likewise, the action gets the job done and display several moments of Christmas action variety here and there.
For its narrative themes, Red One does present a sort of syrupy message of the spirit of Christmas and how the populace has become more on the “naughty” list more than on the good list. Though done many times over in holiday movies, it’s an interesting aspect that plays an important part of story and the main characters, with Callum, struggling to find the “good” aspect in humanity after so many years as well as Jack, a selfish man, who has to come to terms with such bad behavior. It certainly is a good setup for some plotting and conflict, especially this plays a part in Gryla’s reasoning for her endgame plan and does fit into the holiday theme presentation. Overall, Red One, while not the greatest, still manages a few redeeming qualities into its production, with Kasdan making the feature easygoing and accessible to all and keeps in mind its target audience and the several genres that the picture pulls from.
For its presentation, Red One certainly looks like a lot of money was put into it, with the feature oozing with a lot of visuals and production value placed throughout the entire movie. With a production value of more than $200 million, Kasdan and his team give the project a necessary blockbuster boost within its background sets and visual moments, which does certainly help display the more fantastical moments scatted in and out of the narrative being told. Mystical creatures and beings, otherworldly fantasy places and locales, and a heaping of visual renderings play an instrumental part of the feature’s presentation, with Red One cultivating in that certain spot of realizing its marriage between a holiday film and summer blockbuster. Thus, the movie’s “behind the scenes” key members such as Bill Breski (production design), Danielle Berman, Davale Davis, Javed Noorullah (set decorations), Michael Crow and Laura Jean Shannon (costume designs), and the entire art direction department, for their efforts in making the film’s background setting and visual aesthetics come alive with such vibrant details. In addition, the movie cinematography work by Dan Mindel has some pretty good shots throughout the feature’s presentation, which certainly adds some both dynamic and dramatic flair in various scenes, especially the more fantastical ones. Lastly, the film’s score, which was composed by Henry Jackman, is pretty good and helps build upon the movie’s moments of action and drama, while the feature does have a good rolodex of tried-and-true Christmas songs that are played throughout the picture.
Unfortunately, Red One is far from a stellar or timeless holiday hit, with the feature having some huge and glaring criticism in and out of the film’s shaping, undertaking, and execution. How so? Well, for starters, the movie itself is rather bloated and unfocused at times, with too many ideas that aren’t either fully realized or feel quite “shoehorned” into the presentation. The big culprit of this comes from the actual story being told, with the movie’s script being handled by Chris Morgan and Hiram Garcia. What’s presented is decent enough, yet it feels also very contrived and jumbled at the same time. There’s definitely a lot of ideas and plotting to unfold in this story, especially when exploring the magical world that is hidden of all various creatures, beings, and rules to follow. In truth, everything is presented in a rather messy and unfocused presentation, with Kasdan (as well as the script handling) more interested in displaying plenty of cool ideas and visual “pizzazz”. While that may be a good attitude, especially for a blockbuster, the end result is a rather middling endeavor that has bombastic energy, yet fails to deliver on its premise of a holiday and action / comedy cinematic laurels. Basically, Red One is everything that a summer blockbuster should be…big, loud, and expensive, but lacks charm and entertainment value within its bland and formulaic narrative and flat dialogue driven moments.
Additionally, the comedy aspect of Red One does feel flat and redundant at times. I did find myself chuckling once or twice, but most of the written comedic material ends up rather flat or pretty “meh”. This is also felt in some of the action scenes that are presented in the film. They are not that bad, but they are simple there and just rather “been there, done that” sort of vibe. Nothing to get upset about, but neither to be “wowed” over. These, of course, are two crucial areas where the movie indeed to be its strongest, especially since the movie was being touted as action blockbuster, and it really didn’t level up to its own inherit hype. The same can be also said for the sentimental holiday themes that the movie is trying to convey. The setup for it starts out strong, yet sort of pitters out and becomes a more of a distraction as events progress forward. This ultimately turns the holiday spirt themes and messages to be “shoehorned” and feel rather force, which I do know that holiday Christmas movies have that “forced” feeling in its syrupy drama, but it feels rather awkward and clunky at times in this movie.
Due to these facts from the script and director, Red One does feel (at times) quite bloated with plenty of excess throughout. Again, there are lot of areas where the movie wants to touch / speak upon them (i.e. the holiday season, Gryla’s past, Krampus estrangement to Santa, Callum’s frustration with humanity, Jack’s disconnect with his son, the fantasy world hidden in reality, and so on and so forth. There is indeed a lot to unpack in this movie (more that it needs to be). Thus, there is a sense of the movie being bloated and being overstuffed with too many superfluous nuances and story threads. This is especially noticeable in the various aspects of what M.O.R.A, which does make like the script (and the movie) is trying to set up a cinematic universe of some kind. I get what they (the writers) are trying to do, but it becomes more of a distraction with a few scenes trying to establish a larger world building lore instead of focusing on the main plot being told. Additionally, due to this bloated feeling, Red One does feel sluggish at times and, while there is always something to see and do, the movie does run longer than it needs to be, clocking in at around 123 minutes (two hours and three minutes), which does sound like your standard movie nowadays, but Red One feels too long in the latter half and stretches the story with some storytelling subplot moments that don’t exactly work out properly. Thus, this creates several pacing issues throughout and (again) makes the movie feel quite exhausting and boring at times.
The next big criticism that I had with the movie is the over usage of CGI or rather the sloppiness that the feature holds when rendering such visual depictions. Given the fact that Red One was presented as adventure-blockbuster, I had a feeling that the project was going to have a load of CGI visual effects, especially when depicting various fantastical shots and creatures throughout. Although, while some moments do feature some impressive visual looks of computer-generated effects, a great deal of them are presented with some shoddy renderings / presentation quality. Whether they (the studio) ran out of money or time, such shots are clearly noticeable when appear on-screen, with glaring and obvious green screen backdrops and background settings that feel completely outdated and takes away from the more extravagant / fantastical sequences that the movie is trying to convey. Basically, Red One, despite carrying an expensive and heavy production budget and being presented as a very visual movie, the actual presentation feels very lackluster in its effect shots, with a few feeling dated.
The cast in Red One is sort of mixed bag, which can be both good and bad. The good part is that there is plenty of “star power” in the movie through the various lead and supporting roles to make the selected cast of acting talent recognizable and familiar, which certainly let them have their screen presence do a lot of the “fitting” in the feature’s story. The bad, however, is that the movie’s script and overall characterization of literally all the players in the movie are generally “cookie cutter” (to the letter) and don’t really amount to much beyond vague and formulaic characters that have been played out many times before, yet are presented to a lesser degree. Thus, making them bland and uninteresting, which is massively disappointing. Leading the charge in the movie are actors Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson and Chris Evans, who plays the main character roles of Callum Drift and Jack O’Malley respectfully. Johnson, who is known for his roles in Moana, Fast Five, and Jumanji: Welcome to the Jungle, has always been a “larger-than-life” character in both his physical appearance and in his commonplace personas that he customary plays throughout much of his acting career. It’s definitely his schtick that, for good or bad, works to Johnson’s caliber and does so again in Red One. As Callum, Johnson is very comfortable playing the role, providing plenty of nonsense bravado and the somewhat “straight laced” individual as well as showcasing his action lead strength every now and again. The character is very straightforward and doesn’t have a whole lot of mystery to him, which is perhaps the big downside to him. The narrative path for what Callum goes on start off interesting, especially when considering the themes of holiday spirt and how he (Callum) starts loses the “good faith” in humanity, but become a bit too generic and almost to the point of being stock-like. I guess it somewhat works for the movie, but there could’ve been a lot more to the character. This then means that the movie’s script is rather weak (as mentioned above) and that Johnson’s screen presence has to be help elevate it.
Likewise, the same can be said for Evans, who is known for his roles in Captain America: The First Avengers, Avengers: Endgame, and Fantastic Four, is very well-versed in the blockbuster realm and definitely knows how to play for the camera in those moments of action and larger-than-life heroism. Thus, one would think that he would play a good part in Red One’s story. Yet, Evans as Jack O’Malley, a self-serving and snarky “bad attitude” low-life hacker, comes across as someone awkward at times. I definitely get what the character was trying to be and how Evans was portraying him, but something about feels off. Sure, Evans does have one or two moments where he does make for a convincing portrayal of Jack, yet I feel that he has a hard time trying to be the “bad boy” type character. Plus, it doesn’t help that the movie’s script / character arc for Jack O’Malley feels very forced and shoehorned into the movie. Such sentimentality is usually present in a holiday movie and definitely could’ve worked in Red One, but its handled rather poorly and the execution of it all is rather weak; resulting in Evan’s Jack being pretty bland.
Collectively, both Johnson and Evans should technically work together perfectly fine, especially since both have the talents to showcase personas and bravado from the blockbuster sandbox arena. That being said, their on-screen presence does have some lackluster disconnect every now and again. I do like their “back-and-forth” that works well, but it’s charm only is good for a little bit before it looses its luster, resulting in a rather humdrum quips by the halfway point. It’s a bit perplexing because (as stated) Johnson and Evans should work well together, yet their on-screen chemistry doesn’t gel the right way, clicking only a few times every now and again.
Behind those two, the movie does shine a spotlight on actor J.K. Simmons (Spider-Man and Whiplash) as Santa Claus or rather Nick (short of Saint Nicholas). Personally, I like Simmons as an actor and I think he did a good job in playing the famous childhood figure. He has the right temperament and charisma to make the role endearing and likeable from the get-go and Simmons knows how to lay it on in the movie that Red One presents itself to be. Plus, I did like how the film made Santa a rather well-built old man rather than the generic rotund and jolly iteration that we all know from children’s stories. Perhaps the downside is that Simmons’s Santa (by design) sort of bookends the feature and doesn’t have a whole lot to do, which is disappointing because I think Simmons could’ve done a lot more with the character and could’ve strengthen the background lore material of Saint Nicholas within this larger mythmaking that Red One presents.
Such a depiction of lore and world-building comes across as one of the more surprising and memorable characters of the entire movie with the introduction of Krampus, Santa dark and nefarious brother, who is played by actor Kristofer Hivju (Game of Thrones and The Fate of the Furious). While the depiction of Krampus has been heavily documented and displayed before on the silver screen, the character’s presence in Red One was somewhat of a curve ball that I didn’t see coming and it was definitely somewhat interesting to see him play a part in this holiday themed blockbuster film. There isn’t much to the character that is new or original in the movie, but what makes the character memorable is in Hivju’s performance of Krampus and his screen presence / personality makes the character his own. It was quite a delightful treat. The problem I felt was that (as highlighted above) the storyline of Krampus sort of feels a bit too forced, chewing up a significant portion of runtime for the movie and (quite possibly) could’ve been its own movie altogether. It basically should’ve been removed altogether or had a better way to incorporate into the main plot in a better way. Still, it’s quite easy to tell that Hivju is having fun playing Krampus.
Who is actually the dullest in the movie is the actual villain, with Gryla, an old and vengeful shape-shifting witch and who is being played by actress Kiernan Shipka (Mad Men and Twisters) being a total throwaway antagonist. The character does sound quite interesting as a mystical and powerful witch that kidnaps Santa and wants to undertake a mission that Santa (and even Krampus) won’t do. Yet, the machinations behind her ultimate endgame plans feels rather half-baked, wooden, and needlessly complex, feeling a bit lackluster at times. It also doesn’t help that Shipka doesn’t really have that intimidating presence whenever she’s on-screen. She might be good as henchwoman and / or associate-like character that assists the main bad guy, but to be her own main bad guy feels rather goofy and underwhelming at times. Thus, Gryla, for all the pomp and circumstance that the movie places upon the character, turns out to be rather limp and unmemorable main threat that doesn’t make a lasting impact on the feature….and that’s quite disappointing.
In similar fashion, the character of Dylan, Jack’s estranged son and who is played by young actor Wesley Kimmel (Your Place or Mine and The Mandalorian), comes off as afterthought in Red One and ends up being one of the forgetful players in the story. It’s not for a lack of trying on Kimmel’s part (although his acting doesn’t help compared to everyone else around him), but the character of Dylan isn’t that fully developed as much as it should be, especially the impact it has on Jack O’Malley’s character redemption arc. As stated, it almost feels like an afterthought at times, with the character been quickly interjected into a plot that originally didn’t have him in it. Thus, the character of Dylan (as a whole) feels a little bit “out of place” at times and the limited screen that Kimmel has to play such a role leaves a lot to be desired for this otherwise throwaway character trope.
The rest of the cast, including actress Lucy Liu (Kill Bill Vol. 1 and Charlie’s Angels) as the CIA head liaison to M.O.R.A. named Zoe Harlow, actress Bonnie Hunt (Jerry Maguire and Jumanji) as Nick’s wife Mrs. Claus, actress Mary Elizabeth Ellis (Free State of Jones and Masterminds) as Jack’s ex-wife Olivia, actor Nick Kroll (Sing and Captain Underpants: The First Epic Movie) as Gryla’s associate Ted, and actor Reinaldo Faberlle (Ozark and Mayor of Kingstown) as the voice for the anthropomorphic polar bear Agent Garcia, round up the remaining players in the movie. Despite maybe Liu’s Zoe, these particular characters don’t get much screen time in the movie and end up being rather underutilized throughout Red One’s narrative, which is strange because some of them do play an important part here and there (Mrs. Claus and Olivia) and Agent Garcia was heavily featured in the marketing campaign. The acting talents that play these characters are relatively good, and I like them, it’s just a shame that they aren’t in the movie more.
FINAL THOUGHTS
With the kidnapping of Santa Claus several days before Christmas, Callum Drift sends out to find his old friend, with the help of a low-life scumbag named Jack O’Malley and prevent the evil witch Gryla from unleashing her plans unto the world in the movie Red One. Director Jake Kasdan’s latest film takes fun approach to a simple tale of a kidnapped Santa and turns it into a holiday blockbuster picture that’s filled with comedy, action, and some deep digging into world building / mythmaking of such mystical beings. While the movie finds merit within its premise, a few fun nuances, and some of its mythmaking lore, it can’t help from being a rather drool and bore of a picture, which is mostly due to the film’s direction, a one note script, formulaic tropes, bloated runtime, unfocused narrative, sloppy CGI effects, a forgetful villain, bland characters, and a cast, while stacked, doesn’t know how to be managed the correct way. Personally, I found this movie to be disappointing. It had a good premise and had some interesting ideas, but the overall film within its shaping, undertaking, and execution feels rather bloated and half-baked. It’s definitely a blockbuster that’s mixes the holiday Christmas theme, yet the two aspects are always at odds with each other, which gives the movie are rather noisy and lopsided feeling that never resonate nor delivers satisfaction. Thus, my recommendations for this movie would probably have to be bland “skip it” as the movie doesn’t really have the stamina to be a big studio tentpole endeavor as well as not being a memorable modern holiday movie. Despite the likeability of main cast and some of the flash visual moments, it’s best to stick to some of the holiday classics / fan-favorite ones instead of watching this bloated mess. You’ll thank me for it. In the end, Red One, despite its attempts of finding Christmas spirt within its action and adventure nuances, is ultimately a cynical and lazy cash-grab that aims for large commercial success yet settles for a yuletide blockbuster dud.
2.1 Out of 5 (Skip It)
The Official Website for Red One Link: HERE
Released On: November 15th, 2024
Reviewed On: December 24th, 2024
Red One is 123 minutes long and is rated PG-13 for action, some violence, and language
The post Red One (2024) Review appeared first on Jason’s Movie Blog.
