Diseased cynicism secretes out of Red like the flu, like poison. Anyone who says this bullshit comic-book actioner thing is “funny” is suffering from total corrosion of the soul. Nothing paycheck movies of this type sap and impurify our precious spiritual fluids. They’re a scourge and a pestilence. I really and truly mean that.

It’s fine with me that Bruce Willis, John Malkovich, Mary-Louise Parker, Helen Mirren, Morgan Freeman and the others got paid for appearing in this thing, but there’s no reason why anyone with even a modicum of taste would want to pay to see it. Words can’t convey how deeply depressing it is to watch Mirren blast automatic rifle fire with a blank expression and without any stress or vibration passed along to her body or face.

I hated this film so much that I got out of my seat and laid down on the screening-room floor (i.e., at the Dolby room on Sixth Ave. and 55th Street) and took a nap at the halfway point. It was that or leave, and I had nowhere to go. I really couldn’t stand sitting there any longer and letting this film infiltrate my system.