Catherine Hardwicke’s take on Red Riding Hood, the classic story doused in teen angst and good looks, is certainly riding the zeitgeist—but it never really enters the woods, critics say:
- The film is “gorgeously shot, smartly conceived, cleverly cast, badly executed—the lush medieval beauty here is at best only skin deep,” writes Betsy Sharkey in the Los Angeles Times. “Sometimes, it's literate and lofty. More of the time, it's mind-numbingly simplistic and served up on a platter like leftovers.”