I’m sure at some point there were good intentions about making a movie based on the Grimms’ Brothers fairty tale, “Hansel and Gretel”. Then something terrible happened. Maybe it was the greed of the studio, opting to for a big weekend; or maybe it was ignoring a keen script reader who kept reminding everyone the screenplay was awful — but instead of a Tim Buron-esque trippy fairy tale about a boy and girl battling a witch while lost in the woods, we get a mindless action movie with crappy CGi.
“Hansel and Gretel: Witch Hunters” picks up years after the incident made famous by the fairy tale. Hansel (Jeremy Renner) and Gretel (Gemma Arterton) are now badass witch hunters. They go from village to village, collect bounties for witches who are terrorizing the townsfolk and then conclude business with a violent and overly bloody kill. We get their backstory through a quick recap of their exploits over the opening titles –then an abrupt intro to the heroes when a small village is ready to condemn and execute Mina (Pihla Viitala), a seemingly innocent villager believed to be a witch, until Hansel and Gretel intervene to explain there are very simple ways to tell if someone is a witch i.e. they are usually ugly as hell, which Mina isn’t. The town’s mayor has called the bounty hunters in to help find the missing children, much to the dismay of the sheriff (Peter Stormare).
Hansel and Gretel have their work cut out for them. An evil grand witch, Muriel (Famke Janssen), is collecting children in order to perform a ritual by the light of the blood moon which will give all witches a protection against fire. Mind you, there are many, many ways to kill a witch but fire seems to be the best and most effective way. The blood moon ritual thing will definitely help the witches with the burning thing, so that’s their play against the brother and sister duo. Of course they need one of them to complete the ritual, for reasons that are best left to be discovered within the story. Not that it is a big secret. Everything that happens is predictable and telegraphed way ahead of time.
Directed by Nordic director Tommy Wirkola, “Hansel and Gretel” is a hyper-kinetic, over the top, foul mouthed, bloody flick. Not that there is anything wrong with that. The problem is that it feels like the studio knew they had a flop on their hand, so instead of aiming it at kids, who should have been the intended targets, they just threw a bunch of f-bombs and exploding heads in the hopes of landing at least one big weekend, aided by the 3D gimmick. Speaking of which, the 3D isn’t bad. It’s never overwhelming but it never feels validated. At least it’s not blurry.
So, I have always been open with my thoughts on Jeremy Renner. Literally every character he plays seems like the same dude. From “The Hurt Locker”, to “Ghost Protocol”, to “Avengers” to “Bourne”, he plays every character the same way. I’m waiting for J.J. Abrams to make a movie explaining the links between his character and how it’s all a bit episode of “Lost”. He’s alright here but it’s just more of the same. I’m not questioning the guys range, but I’m also not sure he has much.
Ah, but I digress —
Thankfully, the movie won’t waste your time for too long. At 90 minutes, the movie is in full-throttle mode just about the whole time, never really taking any time whatsoever to make any sense of anything thing that is going on. Wirkola and co-writer Dante Harper throw a lot at the audience, some of which is fun but a lot of which is eye roll inducing.
“Hansel and Gretel: Witch Hunters” is not a complete waste of time but make no mistake, it’s completely ridiculous, and ultra-violent. The audience I saw it with seemed to really be enjoying it but let’s be honest, there is a reason this flick is hitting theatres in January. It’s just not that good of a movie. There is however, an important lesson to be learned — and that is to never eat candy of a strange cabin in the middle of a dark forest that may or may not belong to an evil witch because you might get diabetes.
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“Hansel and Gretel: Witch Hunters” theatrical trailer
Photos and trailers are property of Paramount Pictures