It’s not easy to turn a fairy tale into a movie, but when you decide you want to create the next teen horror-romance franchise, you’re got quite a challenge ahead of you. Even the blockbuster Twilight movies have varied quite a bit in quality and tone, but nothing will prepare you for the ghastly OMG! mess that is Red Riding Hood.
I found a lot of the story twists completely incomprehensible. The film opens with a beautiful pan across the countryside, down a rushing river and through a massive, heavily wooded forest until it reaches the little town. We meet Valerie when she’s just a young 10yo (played by Megan Charpentier as some sort of Damien-like waif). She and young Peter (Dj Greenburg) trap a rabbit and she kills it with a small knife. This is apparently a profound moment because ten years later it’s referenced as proof that she’s no different from the werewolf, she’s also a killer. Um, it’s the middle ages, I’m pretty sure they killed anything they could catch so they could eat, so what’s the big deal with the bunny?

Absofreakinlutely! Wow, mountains of suck. 🙁