James Proclaims!

The third movie to make this year’s advent calendar that was released this year is Red One.

Promising to be the first entry in an enduring franchise of family-friendly action flics, it is exactly what you might imagine a Christmas movie starring Dwayne Johnson to be.

It’s formulaic, full of clichés, and the plot is thinner than the budget-friendly wrapping paper I use to wrap my daughters’ Christmas presents. But it has Dwayne Johnson in it. It;s hard to hate any movie with Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson in it.

The cast also includes Chris Evans, Lucy Liu and JK Simmons. They all contribute to making Red One quite a lot more watchable than it should be.

I quite enjoyed it. As commercially cynical as it clearly is, I’d watch it again. And I’ll definitely watch the inevitable sequel when it comes along.

In some respects, it is a missed opportunity. Red One could certainly have been better. However I console myself in the fact that it also could have been much much worse.

Score for Christmasishness

Red One is a Christmas movie. It’s entire raison d’être is the festive season and it would be strange to watch it at any other time of year. It is also an action movie of sorts and the kind of movie I would have adored as a child. It’s not necessarily a great movie but I think it is potentially a great Christmas movie and one that will endure for many a Christmas to come.