Going on a date!

My daughter (she's eight) took me out to see HoodWinked. She'd seen it before—two weeks ago— with my wife. She liked it enough that she wanted to see it again and wanted me to see it with her.

So "How was it?" you ask. Well—in a word—FUN! She had a good time (again) and I enjoyed it too. In the end, that's what matters the most. The CG animation might not be on par with Disney, Dreamworks or Pixar but hopefully one of these days Hollywood may realize that special effects do not the movie make—did you get that?

So "What's it about?" you ask. Well it's the story of Little Red Riding Hood with a twist—better make that three twists. Besides Red's version of what happened, we see the same story from the perspective of the Wolf, Granny and the Woodsman. Like an old style detective drama, nobody is who they seem to be and everything that you thought happened didn't. Having multiple storylines interweave reminded be a bit of Snatch and Pulp Fiction; however, everything is very clearly framed and there's no chance of confusion.

For the kids, it's a lot of fun cartoon-like action. For the parents, there are plenty of gags that the kids will miss but put you in stitches. Young teenagers will probably be caught in the middle and not be interested—there's no innuendo to speak of either. There isn't any single defining scene to set the movie apart, and no character development to speak of, but it still works overall.

At 80 minutes or so in length, it's neither too long nor too short—I used to think that I wasn't getting my money's worth if a movie was significantly shorter than 120 minutes. I've since learned to appreciate it when Hollywood decides not to pad a movie out with scenes that frankly don't belong.

Only time will tell, but I think it's safe to say that Hoodwinked isn't destined to be a timeless classic. "Not as bad as Shrek 2" is hardly a ringing endorsement—but it's a pretty good summary. I am fairly certain that it will end up in my daughter's DVD collection, and it won't make me cringe every time she'll watches either (it's strange how some movies that are fun to watch in the Theater don't wear very well after repeated viewings).

Click link below to purchase from Amazon.com
Hoodwinked (Widescreen Edition) (2006)

Final Grade: 7 on a scale of 1–10.

Written By

* Cory Edwards
* Todd Edwards

Directed By

* Cory Edwards
* Todd Edwards

Staring

* Anne Hathaway
* Glenn Close
* James Belushi
* Patrick Warburton
* Anthony Anderson

And

* David Ogden Stiers
* Xzibit
* Chazz Palminteri
* Andy Dick