when actors retire

Rating: 7/10 (24 December 2011)

When actors who played spies in action movies get older they have an option. They can start playing roles of retired spies in action movies. At least the best and the luckiest of them. Same is true for westerns or for science-fiction movies, BTW.
Bruce Willis, Helen Mirren, John Malkovich, Morgan Freeman are all among the good and lucky one. Some of them may have not even crossed the legal age of retirement in these times when the governments push the pensions limit higher for reasons I would not detail here. What counts is that all the members of this 'carre of aces' are in good shape and have fun making us have fun in this story where the renegade and rogue agents are the active ones the the institution one should trust less than any other around is the government. Conspiracy is not a theory, it's a fact of life whose credibility is not placed under question for one second in the script of the film directed by Robert Schwentke. who film after film builds to himself a name of one of the best action film directors in Hollywood and I expect him being trusted with one of more of the never-ending James Bond series entries sometimes in the future.
Did I forget somebody? Oh, yes - I should mention Richard Dreyfuss, one of the actors I mostly admired about three decades ago and who seemed to get lost into politics, to the point that I almost did not recognize him here in the retired villain role (sure, villains also retire). One could comment that only Willis is within his usual casting limits, while actors like Malkovich, Mirren, Freeman, or Dreyfuss could do more interesting things and certainly no Oscar was waiting for them behind the corner for the roles in RED, but, hey, this is entertainment, this is an action comedy, one of the genres Hollywood knows how to do well, the guys and the gal are having fun doing it, so get your popcorn and have some fun yourselves watching it.