Red Riding Hood (1989)

Director:

Adam Brooks

Writer:

Carole Lucia Satrina (writer)

Genre:

Adventure | Family | Fantasy | Musical

Tagline:

CANNON MOVIE TALES: Lavish, feature-length new versions of the world's best-loved storybook classics!

Plot:

The faithful little girl must brave the forest and the big, bad wolf to bring her grandmother a basket of goodies in this musical version of the classic fairytale.

Plot Keywords:

Wolf | Twin | Self Discovery | Kingdom | Actor Playing Multiple Roles

Cast

Amelia Shankley	...	Linet
Isabella Rossellini	...	Lady Jean
Craig T. Nelson	...	Godfrey / Percival
Rocco Sisto	...	Dagger
Helen Glazary	...	Nanny Bess
Linda Kaye	...	Badger Kate
Amnon Meskin	...	Peter
Julian Chagrin	...	Allen Owen
Haim Zehavy	...	1st guard
Stuart Kingston	...	Villager
Danny Segev	...	Villager
Arie Moscuna	...	Villager
Igor Borisov	...	Bartender

Also Known As:

Cannon Movie Tales: Red Riding Hood

Runtime:

84 min

Country:

USA | Israel

Language:

English

Color:

Color

Sound Mix:

Dolby

Certification:

Canada:G (Quebec) | Australia:G | UK:PG | USA:Unrated | West Germany:6

Company:

Golan-Globus Productions

Trivia:

The US. theatrical release was cancelled when Rumpelstiltskin (1987) flopped at the box-office.

Quotes:

Lady Jean: I love Percival.
Godfrey: Then you love in vain. He's dead.
Lady Jean: I can't believe that.
Godfrey: You're stubborn. He's dead.
Linet: He is not dead, Uncle. You mustn't say so.
Godfrey: HE IS DEAD!

Movie Connections:

Version of Little Red Riding Hood (1922/I)

Soundtrack:

Green in the Blue

Nice, But Not Perfect

Once upon a time there was an unpublished writer who saw five versions of the Brothers Grimm classic tale "Little Red Riding Hood". Here's his review of number three.

A curious young girl named Linet (Amelia Shankley) looks for elves in the woods, but only finds trouble. She lives with her mother (Isabella Rossellina) and a maid, as her father (Craig T. Nelson) is off fighting in a war. Her uncle and now king (also Nelson) wants to marry his sister-in-law (!), as seven years have passed since his brother left for the war. The evil king has used black magic to transform a wolf into a man to spy for him. The wolfman learns that Linet is not afraid of her cruel uncle, so uncle decides to do something about this.

It takes 57 minutes for the story of Red Riding Hood / Linet traveling to Grandma's through the woods to happen, and Grandma isn't even sick or frail! And like most children's movies made for American audiences, this is a musical. This means people burst into song every five minutes for no apparent reason. Since the music is all synthesizer music, it really clashes with the 18th Century setting. Still, some of the songs aren't bad, and who knew Nelson could sing? The bad news is MGM's DVD is fullscreen. A note about this takes up ten seconds of the running time. Something like this should be separated from the movie, which should begin at all zeros. It's unlikely a demand for a widescreen version will create a reissue. At least the transfer is good, and there's a trailer.

Shankley, by the way, debuted as young Alice Liddell in Dreamchild (1985), the quasi-biopic of the girl who inspired Rev. Charles Dodgson / Lewis Carroll to write "Alice's Adventures In Wonderland". Unfortunately, Red Riding Hood is not as good as that movie.

The film's copyright is 1987, MGM's box has 1988 on it and IMDb lists 1989. Just once, can't we all agree on something?