I tend to waver back and forth on Red Devil. There’s a lot to like and not like about the film. What I like is its all-around style. It’s got a cool, hip attitude coursing through its story, lots of blood-spurting gun violence, and desperate addicts doing crazy stuff. Its soundtrack also stands out shifting between western shoot ‘em ups guitar licks and smooth 60s big band jazz. Lastly, the characters, in and of themselves, are pretty cool as well. There’s a lot of them, and no two ever repeat themselves across a varied spectrum of the underground drug world as well as its plethora of international accents.
“It’s got a cool, hip attitude coursing through its story, lots of blood-spurting gun violence, and desperate addicts doing crazy stuff…”
Red Devil bills itself as a comedy thriller, which is the problem. It’s really not a comedy. It has comedic elements, like the satanic witch chants, the VR club, and the h***y assassins. It presents entertaining and humorous ideas but never structures them to elicit laughs. What’s given to us is an over-the-top world of drugs, killers, and dealers, where characters sit around and explain themselves through outlandish stories, but it all falls flat in the end.
Red Devil is a visually wonderful, dark world, and if it had leaned more into the thriller, even toward horror genres, I think it would have been a more engaging film. By leaning into its thriller strengths, this would have made the build-up to the end even better.
In the end, there’s enough about Red Devil that works. The good moments outweigh the bad, and the action and violence will get you through some of the lulls in dialogue and gags.
"…a visually wonderful, dark world..."
