Jeanskynebu the audience applauded

Stoutor It's not great by any means, but it's a pretty good movie that didn't leave me filled with regret for investing time in it.

Billie Morin This movie feels like it was made purely to piss off people who want good shows

Hattie I didn’t really have many expectations going into the movie (good or bad), but I actually really enjoyed it. I really liked the characters and the banter between them.

Dennis Moore I want to start by saying I normally really like Kevin Smith movies. With this one he makes a few logical leaps that I simply don't think is realistic. I'll talk about those in a minute.The good - the action is pretty good. The church folks behave like good little crazy zealots, making the audience clearly see them as villains. I thought that the acting was well done in the film as well.The problem is the ATF agents are also villains. There are really no good character in this movie aside from the poor kids that are held captive. John Goodman's character casually orders his subordinates to execute everyone. Everyone... the church folk AND the people they are holding prisoner... really? And why is this? Basically because he can since the news has not caught wind of any of the events transpiring. That in and of itself doesn't make a lot of sense, but then on top of that none of his subordinates question his orders. You're telling me that your run of the mill ATF agent is ok with gunning down innocent people? I don't think so. Don't get me wrong there are bad people out there in the world and some of them are in positions of power like this, but up to this point none of the characters behaved like a bunch of cold blooded murderers. It's a logical leap that I just cannot follow. It can be assumed that the characters have families/children. There is no way all over even most of them would be alright with murder. At the very least one of them would have thought about this being done to their family and turned on Goodman.I love you Kevin Smith, but you should stick with comedies.

Crabby McGrouchpants This moves at a clip unbelievable. Not unrelated, I'd have to believe, is Kevin Smith's role as editor -- like Steven Soderbergh (whose done plenty of his own films, under a pseudonym), the Coens (under the name "Roderick Jaynes"), John Sayles, and a surprising number more-than-you'd-think of directors, this seems to put more of the film "in hand."And how!In this case, Smith eschews humor almost (but not quite) entirely; even the jokes in the film are for the characters to respond to ("Zing!") without leaving room for the audience to respond as such. The pace is breathless without losing the viewer, contemporary without being preachy or pedantic, and draws off recent events (through the '90s) as though our sense of the world is viewed differently, altered and updated without parroting or mimicking said events ... you'll just have to see it for yourself!People who keep up with current events will be rewarded -- particularly since this means getting a sense of the *beating pulse* of the humans behind the actions, not just some ideological stance. John Goodman's given more to do than in most (non-Coens) films you've seen him in lately, and he relishes and runs with it.Is this movie funny, clever, scary, unsettling? You betcha!From Kevin Smith? Holy s***!(Where's the next one, referred to in the end credits? Sadly, this one went over too poorly to merit a pick-up ... so far!)

themightyquinn94 I was blown away by this movie. I hadn't heard of it until the other day, when I found myself scrolling through some lame Top 10 Films Tarantino Wishes He Could Have Directed or something equally as click-bait-y. But Tarantino did comment on this film in particular, highly favourably--and a film doesn't get a better recommendation than that, really. So I had a certain amount of expectation, but it was surpassed. I am a bit of a film addict, so when I say this movie blew me away, I mean it. I'm not going to bother blurbing the film or anything because that is 80% of the other reviews already, but for those of you interested in a random bloke's 2p, this film felt real to me. The acting never felt like acting and I was placed right in the middle of the conflict, literally jumping from moment to moment. John Goodman is ALWAYS a good guy to have in a film, but all of the others really held their own too. I think it would be easy to pass the film off as perhaps being a bit "confused" or "garbled" but those descriptions only go as far as describing how much of the film some viewers were able to individually take from it or maybe their Online- University-Major-In-Film-Critiquing egos that tell them all films have to follow a basic formula of arch and character development... Whatever. Regardless, I thought the film was an unforgettable thriller with snappy writing, a terrific script, memorable performances and a truly engrossing and amusing balance of poignant reality, overwhelming brutality, and powerful dialogue--with a delightful element of humour and not-taking-itself-too-seriously. It is immediately up there with some of my favourite thrillers and is therefore obviously recommended. ...I had no intention or writing a review but it was that good.

BA_Harrison Three horny teenagers use a dating website to hook up with a middle-aged woman, but instead find themselves trapped by heavily armed Christian extremists who intend to punish the trio for their sins.I'm not the biggest fan of Kevin Smith, but I do enjoy me some violent action/horror. Sadly, Red State isn't about to convince me that Smith is any more than someone who peaked with their debut movie, and who has been very fortunate to continue working in the business as long as he has. Clearly stepping outside of his comfort zone, Smith delivers a very uneven film that wants to be all thing to all men, but which actually leaves the viewer wondering what the point of the whole damn thing was.Not scary enough to be a horror, not exciting enough to pass as an action film, and with virtually no comedy, the film also gives us no one to root for, killing off its three teenagers at the halfway mark. Towards the end, I did think that the director had managed to pull off a clever and extremely bold trick, with the supernatural heralding of the rapture proving the religious fanatics to be right after all, but this turns out to be a convenient red herring, merely a contrived way of wrapping up the film.