R.I.P.D. (2013) Jeff Bridges, Ryan Reynolds, Kevin Bacon, Mary-Louise Parker Movie Review

R.I.P.D. (2013)   2/52/52/52/52/5


Jeff Bridges and Ryan Reynolds in R.I.P.D. (2013)

Here Comes the R.I.P.D.

Nick (Ryan Reynolds) finds himself looking down the barrel of a surprising gun as he never thought it would be his partner on the force, Hayes (Kevin Bacon) who would kill him. But even more surprising is that having died Nick finds himself at the R.I.P.D., the Rest in Peace Department, who patrol the planet with the use of Avatars making sure the evil undead don't threaten the living. Partnered up with old lawman Roy (Jeff Bridges) the duo find themselves trying to bring down Hayes who has been trying to re-assemble a gold artefact which will bring all the dead back to the Earth.

Thinking about it, with "R.I.P.D." being a 12A in the UK there could be teens who watched this on its release who weren't even born back in 1997. You may wonder why I mention 1997 but that was the year "Men in Black" came out and the two movies are so similar I wouldn't be surprised if somewhere someone has reviewed "R.I.P.D." and called it a re-imagining of "Men in Black". As such the aliens are switched for the dead but we still have a secret agency who have a secret location, who have special weapons and Jeff Bridges plays a veteran character who is the equivalent of Tommy Lee Jones' Kay whilst Ryan Reynolds gives us youth and wise cracks in a similar way to Will Smith did as Jay.

Now for those young teens who might possibly have never watched "Men in Black" "R.I.P.D." might end up an entertaining movie as it certainly delivers a lot of CGI visuals with comically gruesome versions of the dead. But not only did I find myself thinking the whole time whilst watching that it felt like a "Men in Black" rip-off but I also felt it didn't work. For some reason the comedy of Roy being an old lawman and Nick a wise cracking cop just never gels and both characters end up hitting the point of being annoying.

What this all boils down to is that "R.I.P.D." is for me the "Men in Black" on 2013 and maybe it entertains a young generation of movie goers who think the effects are great and Ryan Reynolds is cool. But for an older generation it just feels like it is treading over old ground and not doing a very good job of it.


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