Hoodwinked

We saw Hoodwinked last night. The film has its moments, but it is probably the most mediocre of the recent batch of animated movies.

This one, from the Weinstein Company (not big animation guns like Disney, Pixar or Dreamworks), presents the story of Little Red Riding Hood as if it were a police investigation. The perspectives of delivery girl Red, investigative journalist Wolf, goodie-magnate Granny and wannabe-actor The Woodsman are each presented in turn, and it’s an interesting choice of narrative structure. Unfortunately, that’s where Hoodwinked’s originality ends. You can see the influences of many other recent animated movies. There’s even a hyped-up squirrel who is forbidden coffee.

Hoodwinked could have really done with Shrek’s pop-culture spoofing, but instead it sticks to a completely vanilla approach, with a shortage of knowing winks to adult audiences that were promised in the trailer.

Hoodwinked does have a few strong points though. Patrick Warburton and Glenn Close give outstanding vocal performances as the Wolf, and Granny respectively. They dominate the film. There are also some excellent extreme sport action sequences.

Otherwise, the storyline is very weak, the animation tends to have that ‘plastic’, oversmooth texture seen in so much budget 3-D, and the film is almost instantly forgettable. 6 out of 10.