The Green Hornet

I watched "The Green Hornet" with a sense of skepticism. Having grown up with the original TV series, this movie really had some big shoes to fill out. And surprisingly enough, it managed to do so in a good enough way. But there were also aspects of the movie that were less than successful.

First of all, Seth Rogen (playing Britt Reid/The Green Hornet). No, no, no. I know he was involved in directing and writing the movie and all, but he is not chiseled out for an action role of this caliber. I do admire his spirit and enthusiasm, but he is more suited for comedy movies. Seeing him in this role didn't go well with me. He did bring along some comedy, but it didn't work so well in this particular movie.

And the scene at the beginning where Britt Reid was bringing home a woman and they went through the garage and sat in all the cars (showing them off for the audience, actually) in high-speed capture, what was up with that? Already at that point, the movie started to falter and crash.

Jay Chou (playing Kato) certainly had HUGE shoes to fill out after the original role was played by Bruce Lee. And actually Chou did a decent enough job, with good acting and well-choreographed action/fighting sequences. So hats off to him for that.

However, the most memorable person in the movie was Christoph Waltz (playing Chudnofsky). He was fantastic as a villain and worked his role very well and very convincingly. Plus there was also a good sense of humor to his role, and it worked well.

The story told in the movie was fast-paced, captivating and interesting enough to keep you enthralled throughout the entire feature length.

For an action movie, then "The Green Hornet" is actually quite good. But for a follow-up to the legacy of the TV series, the movie is a mediocre attempt with good intentions. Had they cast someone else for Britt Reid, it would have worked much better. Now, I am not saying that Seth Rogen is a bad actor, he was just ill-suited for this role. "The Green Hornet" is good entertainment if you are in for an evening of action, corny one-liners and a trip down memory lane.

"So this is what you want out of your life? This gives you sense of fulfillment? I spend all night, writing about the corruption in this town, and you do nothing." Jack Reid (Tom Wilkinson) to his son, Britt (Green Hornet Seth Rogen) The Green Hornet is unlike most other comic-book-hero film adaptation: Seth Rogen's slacker Hornet is a dipstick without a clue about navigating the crime world while Kato ( pop star Jay Chou), his valet/associate, pretty much plays the Bruce Lee/kung-fu role as cool, even when he's goofing with the Hornet, which is most of the time. It is also a bromance with Cameron Diaz as Lenore Case, a love interest who helps us get over the homoerotic subtext.

Geeks know the Green Hornet franchise well: radio show from 1936 to 1952; TV show in 1966 by the producers of the campy Batman TV series, while Green Hornet's greatest asset was emerging martial arts star Bruce Lee. Writers Rogen and Evan Goldberg renew that 60's camp but with it seeming out of date, as if the parodic part of the genre cycle had long ago been played out and not welcome anymore. Of course, you could argue that Despicable Me, Kick Ass, Megamind, and Iron Man 2 last year took to parody, but each one of those is more successful at marrying the satire to the action than Green Hornet.

The personality of the film is split—it's either satire or action, Hornet or Kato. The film is a bit away from the accepted concepts of this sub-genre except in Chudnofsky (Christoph Waltz), the arch villain whose ironic reactions are an adept amalgam of menace and insouciance.

As he did in Inglorious Basterds, Waltz commands the screen with his charming menace. Actually he is equaled in the opening sequence, the best scene of the movie, when he faces off James Franco in a cameo, two hoods pissing about their territory. Franco is quite good as a semi-clueless drug lord.

Britt has daddy issues, specifically making something of his life while newspaper owner dad. Jack Reid (Tom Wilkinson), is a hero to the city. With dad's death, Britt decides to fight crime as the Green Hornet while letting everyone think he is a criminal (as in the original versions).

The gadgets are Bond-worthy, and Kato has the Bruce Lee charisma; it's just Rogen who seems out of place—not believable as a hero from beginning to end of the film. He can be amusing as a man-kid, but the geeks will never accept him as their hero.

The Green Hornet has lost its buzz.

What I expected from a Seth Rogen film. I enjoyed the goofy humor mixed in with very cool weapons, and kick butt martial arts action. I would have to say this movie targets guys and people under the age of 30 or so. You have to take the movie for what it is worth, if you are a serious person looking for A+ acting with a top-notch storyline then you should skip this movie. However, if you still have a kid inside you that enjoys laughing, not taking things to seriously, and comic's/super hero action then you will enjoy this film. The villain Christoph Waltz who also starred in Inglourious Basterds also helped make the film worth seeing in my opinion, and he had one of the sweetest gun's I've seen in a movie. Other big actors in the film include Cameron Diaz & Tom Wilkinson.

Even though I liked this movie, I think most people would not feel liked they missed out on anything too special if they waited for DVD. It's a fun movie, with good special effects, fight scenes, and a laid back attitude, but nothing that will blow you away.

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If you don't know what to expect and you haven't even seen the trailer than i believe you are going to have great fun. The movie is not a classic main stream super hero movie but a very nice parody making fun of the way super hero movies are made, emphasizing on their blank spots. Do not expect a meaningless script like "super hero movie". Green Hornet has its own storyline that is consistent, but the characters and situations are hilarious. I haven't laughed so much for a long time, which makes the movie a success judging by the result. I believe it is a great way to spent an evening if you want to relax and watch an easy entertaining movie.

The Green Hornet is a very old hero character, dating back to radio dramas in the 30's, playing alongside The Shadow, Buck Rogers, and The Lone Ranger. (In fact, the Green Hornet was a spin off of The Lone Ranger... The Lone Ranger was the Green Hornet's grand-uncle, in the radio world.) Like his contemporaries he appeared in other media, including television. The television series, which featured 1/2 hour segments, starred Bruce Lee as Kato, and was his boost into celebrity. The great Bruce Lee martial arts movies might never have happened if it weren't for his gig on the Green Hornet.

The Green Hornet may have also been Bob Kane's inspiration for Batman in 1939. There are many similarities, which need not be listed here.

But alas, this feature film remake is a dull take on this old character, which deserved better treatment. I don't know exactly how Seth Rogen (who played Britt Reid and who has a writing credit) got a hold of it, but it's as though someone behind the scenes mistook the Green Hornet for a farce comedy like Get Smart and then failed to even make it funny.

The dialog had no horsepower at all, and while there were a few funny moments, after a while I got aggravated at the desperate attempts to make me laugh. Sometimes it seemed like the actors were derailed, trying to improvise, and it wasn't working.

There were two cool things about the TV series. 1) Kato, because he kicks butt. They got lucky, because Bruce Lee really was one-of-a-kind. 2) Black Beauty, their armed car that flips up from the garage floor and has guns built into it. While both of these aspects remained pretty cool in this movie, they were also elevated a little too far into the realm of fantasy. And it didn't need to be that way.

Not a good offering by director Michel Gondry, who gave us the brilliant and original Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind years ago, and it may mean that he's one of those directors who cannot improve -- or does not see improvements in -- a script. He therefore shines when he gets a great script and fails when he gets a bad one. Tim Burton falls into that category.

The movie villain was played by Christoph Waltz, whose character was no less dumb than Seth Rogen's. A bad choice for an actor who just won an Oscar for his brilliant role as Hans Landa in Inglourious Basterds. What was his agent thinking? In all fairness, Waltz and his agent couldn't have known beforehand that The Green Hornet was going to be a sloppy script, and a sloppy execution. The super-hero wave is a big one at the movies these days, with one hit after the other, but they fail to remember other sloppy remakes of old radio heroes, such as The Shadow in 1994 starring Alec Baldwin, and The Legend of the Lone Ranger in in 1981 starring Klinton Spilsbury (who??).

The Green Hornet should have been a much more serious period movie set in the 30's about a man who is inspired to fight the mob in the fashion that his grand-uncle did as the Lone Ranger years earlier. That would have led to a serious Lone Ranger tie-in (a prequel as it were). Missed opportunities.

Save your $8, this movie isn't worth it.