The Green Hornet

If Hollywood is in love with anything more than remakes right now, it’s superheroes. Over the last few years, there has always been at least one movie about superheroes coming out every year. As a result of this we’re starting to see more of the obscure characters of the medium getting films of their own, and to put it bluntly, The Green Hornet is about as obscure as you can get. Created as a spiritual successor to cowboy hero The Lone Ranger, The Green Hornet is about Britt Reed, a news paper mogul that fights crime in a mask with his butt kicking sidekick Kato and their advanced super car that would make James Bond blush. The hornet originally appeared as a radio show, then in pulp magazines and comics, but most notably as a cheesy TV show in the vain of the live action “Batman” series that was on at the same time. It only lasted one season, but was of note for being the vehicle which introduced the epicly awesome Bruce Lee to American audiences. The production of this film has been in and out of development since the release and massive success of films like “Spider Man” and “Batman Begins”. At one point it seemed about to be done under the helming of indie icon Kevin Smith, but that didn’t work out and instead was picked up by Columbia pictures with Seth Rogen starring as well as co-writing the screenplay, which was finally made and released.
The film’s plot is pretty basic fair, Britt Reed is a notable party hound living off his wealthy news paper tycoon father’s allowances before being thrown into the real world when his father dies and he inherits the news paper. After meeting Kato, who reveals that his father was feeling paranoid in his final days casting a haze of suspicion over his death, they decide to go fight crime, creating Reed’s identity as the Green Hornet. No really, that’s how it goes down, they both get drunk and during a drunken escapade they stop a mugging and decide that they must fight crime because it feels right. I actually really like this idea, it’s not as deeply explored as say “Kick-Ass” but honestly it was nice to see a hero that rose from something other than an utter tragedy that defined their rise to becoming a crime fighter.
Though, it must be said that this movie works better if you view it as more of a buddy cop comedy than a super hero action movie. Rogen’s Britt Reed is goofball and funny in that way most of the parts he’s played have always been. Added to that he plays well off Jay Chou’s Kato, whose fights in the movie are some of the biggest attractions, as well as the films villain played by one of my new favorites, Chirstophe Waltz of “Inglorious Basterds”. It has some nice character bit parts by Eward James Olmos as Reed's chief editor and a rather fun cameo from James Franco in the film’s first scenes.
Speaking of Chou’s fights, the movie has some really nice action scenes with exciting car chases and is shot very nicely. This both does and doesn’t surprise me as the movie is helmed by Michel Gondry, an indie favorite notable for the likes of “Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind” and “Be Kind Rewind”. It was odd to hear that he was chosen for this kind of movie, but it looks like he was up for a challenge, and I feel he did very well. The camera work is nicely done, not needing to be filmed by someone that’s been hit a caffeine over dose, and since you get to see everything it’s fun to watch and really exciting. As well as having a very stylized take on how Kato fights though at times it feels like it was created primarily to pander to the 3D conversion, but I still thinks makes for an interesting idea and adds to his character. Not to mention the movie’s final chase is just awesome wrapped in bacon being both exciting and silly in a way that made me recall some of my favorite scenes from the Roger Moore era Bond movies.
Unfortunately, it feels as if the movie’s troubled back stage life spilled into the finished product. At times you can feel that the movie may have been a bit of a rushed production,mostly in the second act, which drags almost to the point of ruining the delightfully silly and interesting first act and is saved only by the rousingly bombastic third. It’s that typical part where the two buddies get into a fight over something and it starts to drive a wedge between them, in this case it’s love interest Cameron Diaz. Her character isn’t bad, but feels kind of crowbarred in, basically existing to be a plot mover and causing her to feel rather less important than she’s supposed to be. Actually, that can be said about a lot of the movie, it seems like Columbia is hoping to make a franchise out of the hornet and leaves enough interesting things unanswered that I felt more and more this was really just the first part and only existed to set up the pieces so that they could have more fun with them in the sequel, kind of like "Iron Man" and to a certain extent "Batman Begins".
Don't read too much into that, those are both far better movies. But that being said, I did still enjoy "The Green Hornet". It was a silly, fun action comedy with nice action scenes, funny jokes and car that fires missiles. It can drag a little but the slog is worth it for those last 20 or so minutes at the end.

3 super cars out of 5