Red Riding Hood (1988)

Rediscover the magic and romance of one of the best-loved fairy tales of all time! Charming suspenseful and wonderfully moving Red Riding Hood is filled with stirring songs spectacular dance numbers and superb sets! Starring Craig T. Nelson Isabella Rossellini and Amelia Shankley this feature-length musical is a timeless and touching tale of courage for the whole family!In a magical forest alive with wonderment a little girl finds that not all is as it seems. Living alone with her mother (Rossellini) Linet (Shankley) spends her days exploring the woods with nothing to fear. But when she embarks on a perilous journey to visit her grandmother and discovers both an enchanted wolf and an evil lord in her path it ll take a magical red cloak and a friendly woodcutter to save the day!System Requirements: Running Time 71 MinFormat: DVD MOVIE Genre: MUSICALS/MUSICALS Rating: NR UPC: 027616903914 Manufacturer No: 1006189 Product Description

One of the Cannon Movie Tales

Red Riding Hood is one of the many "Cannon Movie Tales" that I grew-up with and am happy to find released on DVD. It was by no means my favorite of the series (which includes- Snow White, Rumpelstiltskin, Beauty and the Beast, Emperor's New Clothes, Puss in Boots, Hansel and Gretal, and not released on dvd in the U.S.- Frog Prince, Sleeping Beauty). This series of movies looks like it was done all with shared sets (most of the sets from Red Riding Hood can be seen in Beauty and the Beast, Snow White, and Frog Prince) and sometimes the same actors. Red Riding Hood includes Isabella Rossellini (Merlin, Death Becomes Her) and Craig T. Nelson (Coach, Poltergeist). There's a few delightful songs, some overripe acting from the infamous "wolf," and some general changes in the story to stretch it out for a full length movie. All in all I like it mostly out of nostalgia more than anything else. April 30, 2008

Red Riding Hood Pee-Eww... I mean Review

Be prepared to watch the enhanced version of "Little Red Riding Hood". Ever wondered what became of Red's father? Want to know a little more about her mother and grandmother? This version of the classic fairy tale is certainly full of surprises. It was so surprising, I didn't even recognize the original story. In fact, the real story doesn't even begin until about a half hour into the movie!

"Red Riding Hood" features an oddball collection of characters in a disinteresting plot. Red's evil uncle attempts to romance Red's disinterested mother after Red's father becomes MIA. The only "mildly interesting" character is the wolf who spends much of the show disguised as a spy for Red's uncle.

This film includes a cute little ditty entitled "Never Talk To Strangers", which is the underlying moral of this tale. Though I still wouldn't show this movie to any child younger than 10. I do not think younger children will be that interested in the plot. September 4, 2007

Wonderful movie

Although this movie departs greatly from the original fairy tale, it is still worth purchasing. It is well made, the acting is superb, with Isabella Rosselini reminiscent of her wonderful mother Ingrid Bergman. I taped this for my daughter on VHS many years ago and she watched it so much! It is very well done and no one who buys it will be disappointed. It would be intense for very young children, however. December 27, 2006

To be perfectly honest...

I am 15 years old and I've only seen this movie 2...3...4...times? Something like that. We have a crumby tape recording of 4 songs of the movie. It doesn't matter to me how crumby the recording is; I've listened to it religiously for years. That's how good the songs are.
It has been noted here that "Never Talk to Strangers" is a favorite song of many. It's my favortie as well. It's absolutely incredible how the werewolf is developing his own personality. He is warning the girl, quite literally, of himself. He seems exasperated when she doesn't listen - of course the carefree Red Riding Hood doesn't take anything anyone says seriously. I have wondered whether he is honestly hoping in a hidden heart (unlike his truly heartless master) that the girl will be able to stay away from him, or only slyly winning her trust. That's only a tiny, twisted piece of how great the plot is.
All in all, it's very true what the other reviewers have said - this is nothing like the original story we all know. It's better. It's been expanded into a world of lifelike characters, the simple life of the harvest (Green in the Blue), Corrupt politics (Red's uncle, naturally), war (her father was fighting)... and everything else you could hope for in a fairy story. A wonderful tale to grow up on. I know that from experience.
One last thing I note, is that it does not portray the wild wolf, a natural animal quite as badly as the old tales because it is a summoned werewolf, not a natural wolf, who does the evil. This is a winning point in my book since I'm a majorly pro-wolf person. :) October 4, 2005

Surprisingly bad

I bought this because it is made by Cannon Movie Tales and I love "Puss in Boots", which they also made. Because "Puss in Boots" was so good, I thought this would be, too. Alas, I was disappointed. "Red Riding Hood" has almost no relation to the story we are all familiar with. The plot in the actual fairytale is more of a parenthetical remark than the main story line in this movie. Add to this that the acting was rather painful and the special effects were anything but special and you are left with 1 star. The one thing it had going for it was that it was perfectly clean and not very scary for youngsters. Since small children are easier to please in the cinematic area than adults, perhaps they would still enjoy this adaptation to "Little Red Riding Hood". December 31, 2004

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