The Green Hornet (2011)

"Following the death of his father, Britt Reid, heir to his father's large company, teams up with his late dad's assistant Kato to become a masked crime fighting team." (imdb.com)

Viewed in theaters, 16 January 2011

OK, I'll admit it: I love superhero movies. I especially love superheros who are fast-talking, sarcastic, funny, BA, borderline narcissistic. And I really love it if the movie is a remake of a 1950's/60's cheesy television show.

I'll also admit that I get really frustrated when a superhero doesn't learn anything and we wind up at the end of the movie with the same fast-talking, sarcastic, funny, borderline narcissistic jerk that we started with. (Unless he's Tony Stark, in which case he can do whatever he wants.)

Enter "The Green Hornet." It's been hyped up as a "nontraditional superhero movie," a film where the "good guy is actually the bad guy," where the lines between right and wrong get blurred. Okay, I'm down with that. However, I found myself searching for the moral of the story, the silver lining on the edge of the green-tinted, bullet-riddled cloud. I never quite found it. Agreed, this film doesn't take the typical superhero route of teaching a moral lesson (be nice to your family, help the underdog, stay away from pretty women who want to find out your secret identity, blah blah blah), and instead what we get is a 2 hour long immature ego trip, complete with Seth Rogen-style humor. Basically, in a nutshell, "The Green Hornet" is a pointless, humorless-but-trying-to-be-funny, sex-charged, profanity-laden, morality-starved, "man-this-3D-looks-dumb" waste of time.

Let me start at the most obvious point: the worthless-but-insanely-expensive-3D. With the notable exception of the minute-and-a-half credits sequence (and the fold-out comic book sequence), the 3D is completely and totally wasted on this film. There is NO point to it; it's not even like they throw junk in your face. It's like they ignored it and acted like it wasn't there. It just gives me a headache.

Second problem: This movie is just not funny. It's a constant stream of flat jokes. It is almost awkward, in that it's obvious that the filmmakers think it's hilarious, but...it's really just not all that funny. Again, there are one or two exceptions; for the most part it's simply Seth Rogen thinking he's the funniest thing since Antoine Dodson.

Third problem: there is WAAAAAY way way way too much sex and profanity in this movie. I'm of the mind that Hollywood writers are losing much of their creative salt, and instead they throw burning acid at us in the form of sex and obscenity. Seth Rogen (of course) is known for this type of humor--I might even go so far as to say it's his signature and he's recognized as one of the kings of it. But honestly the filth and foul just get in the way of the movie. I almost felt like I was trying to push an obnoxious drunk fat man out of the way to see the movie the entire time--it just obscured the potential of the film and completely stole the humor by being SO smack-in-your-face hey-dingbat-this-is-funny.

Fourth problem: Seth Rogen's character ("Britt Reid") learns absolutely nothing in the course of the film. We wind up with the same jerk that we started with. The best character in the movie is his sidekick, Kato--and that's only because he's the only really "normal" person in the whole movie. This film wound up trying too hard to be funny, which came across as trying too hard to be taken seriously, which produced a general feeling of, "Wow, this is a dumb movie."

NEGATIVES:
>>Profanity: As I said before, there is waaaay too much profanity in this film. I lost count; PluggedIn lists over 75 profanities (40 of them being the "S-word"). It's just ridiculous and completely, totally unnecessary.
>>Violence: There's a whole lotta smacking, punching, throwing, falling, stabbing, shooting, crashing, kicking in the groin, etc. Again, it's totally mistreated and abused and is not nearly as fun as it should be. People get shot with real guns as well as gas guns (the real guns sometimes splatter the person against the background wall). There's a near-drowning. Explosions are a normal occurrence. One character is shoved out of a high-rise window by a car and falls 30+ stories to be crushed underneath said car. Another character receives hunks of wood to his eyesockets. The Black Beauty herself (the slick-looking car) is loaded with weaponry and armor. There's an awful lot of police chases, car crashes, and scuffles--it looks like Britt and Kato get away with all of their stick-it-to-the-man antics. There's also a heckuva lot of groin shots.
>>Spiritual Content: One character receives a vaguely Christian funeral.
>>Alcohol and Drugs: Britt spends half of the movie completely wasted (he's a partying millionaire playboy, what else does he have to do all day? er...night...). He even gets Kato drunk once. The Green Hornet (and Kato) crash the Black Beauty into a criminal's meth lab--turns out that half the city's underworld is funded by drug deals. In one of the more comical scenes in the film, Britt accidentally shoots himself with Kato's newly invented knockout gas gun; Britt winds up unconscious for eleven days.
>>Sexual Content: Britt has quite a problem with taking a different woman home every night (if he even makes it home). He's a womanizer; this is made abundantly clear in one of his first appearances when he takes a woman on an extended makeout session on/in/around/over some of his father's expensive cars from the family car collection. (It's pretty funny but kinda gross once we realize what they're doing.) Sometimes Britt can't even remember his fling's name. We see several women in underwear. Britt's secretary ("Lenore") has to deal with constant nonstop sexual harassment from Britt; she finally threatens to sue him. Kato insinuates a sexual relationship with Lenore via obscene hand gestures. Kato draws pretty erotic anime-type female figures. Of course, there are the obligatory "He's my partner but not my partner" jokes. Britt refers to one particular food dish as an "orgasm in your mouth."

Basically, this movie is one big, explosion-laden, gunslinging, obscenity-ridden, sex-driven, pointless mess of a disappointment. Only a few scenes are worth watching; the rest of this film should not be brought into the presence of children. (Britt's father tells him that "Trying doesn't matter when you always fail," a childhood memory that causes Britt to seek immature revenge later.) This film does not teach a lesson; it's not even fun to go along with. I'd pass on it, if I were you. There are thousands of better superheros to spend time with--even arrogant ol' Tony Stark is more worth our time than Britt Reid.

2 out of 6 stars

So that everyone (including myself) may benefit from it, please feel free to leave your own personal opinion of this film.

Plugged In Movie Reviews 
The Internet Movie Database