In the film version, the title of the film, "Red", is derived from the stamp on agent Frank Moses' (Bruce Willis) file, meaning "retired, extremely dangerous".
Plot
This article's plot summary may be too long or overly detailed. Please help improve it by removing unnecessary details and making it more concise.Frank Moses (Willis), a former black-ops CIA agent, is now living a quiet life in retirement. However, he begins to feel lonely and often chats on the phone with Sarah (Parker), a customer service agent working for Frank's pension office in Kansas City.
His life is disrupted when a hit squad raids his house in the middle of the night. Frank kills the assassins and, knowing they would have tapped his phone, goes to Kansas City to protect Sarah. She becomes Frank's reluctant companion while he tries to find out who is trying to kill him, and track down his old black ops team for help. Meanwhile, CIA agent William Cooper (Urban) is assigned to hunt and kill Frank.
Frank first goes to New Orleans to find his mentor Joe (Freeman), currently living in a retirement community and terminally ill, who tells him that the hit squad Frank killed were also responsible for the murder of a news reporter. While avoiding Cooper, Frank and Sarah find clues left behind by the deceased reporter, which leads them to a hit list. They then track down Marvin (Malkovich), a paranoid conspiracy theorist, to provide more information. Marvin tells them that the names on the list were all connected to a secret mission in Guatemala that Frank participated in in 1981, and that one name, Gabriel Singer, is still alive. The trio track down Singer, who tells them that the mission involved extracting a person from a village and that everybody on the list have been killed to silence them. Singer is then assassinated by a sniper, and the team makes their escape as Cooper closes in. With the help of Russian secret agent Ivan Simanov (Cox), Frank and Sarah infiltrate the CIA headquarters to steal the file but Frank is injured in the process. Joe, having escaped an attempt on his life, helps extract the team and joins them. The team hides out in Victoria's (Mirren) house for first aid. Victoria, who misses her old life as a wetwork agent, joins the team as well.
After reviewing the file, all the team can figure out is that the only man involved not on the list, Alexander Dunning (Dreyfuss), has some way of protecting himself. The team arrives at Dunning's house, where he reveals under interrogation that the mission was to extract Vice-President Robert Stanton, who at the time was a young lieutenant that experienced a breakdown and massacred the village. It becomes apparent that Stanton is trying to erase all the loose ends as he plans to run for president. At that moment, Cooper and the FBI surround Dunning's mansion. Cooper tries to negotiate Frank's surrender, but Frank tells Cooper about the vice-president's treachery, which shakes his faith. Joe sacrifices himself by taking Frank's place and pretending to give up. An unknown sniper kills Joe as he leaves the mansion, despite Cooper ordering his own men to hold fire. The confusion buys the team enough time to escape, but Sarah is captured. Frank calls Cooper and threatens to kill his family if Sarah is harmed, and that he intends to kill Stanton.
The team, along with Ivan (revealed to be Victoria's former lover), infiltrate Stanton's fundraising gala in Chicago and successfully kidnap him despite Cooper's best efforts to stop them. Frank calls Cooper and says he is willing to trade Stanton for Sarah. At the meeting point, Dunning arrives and reveals that he is the mastermind behind the assassinations and that Stanton was merely a pawn and scapegoat. Cooper's handler, Cynthia Wilkes, is also in on the plot. Disgusted with Dunning and Wilkes' greed and corruption and being used by her and Dunning, Cooper gives Moses the key to his handcuffs and shoots Wilkes while Marvin and Victoria kill Dunning's bodyguards, and Marvin kills Dunning. Cooper agrees to let Frank and his team go. As they leave the scene, Frank and Sarah are eager to start a new life together.
The final scene shows Frank and Marvin in Moldova, fleeing from Moldovan Army troops with a stolen nuclear device, in a wooden wheelbarrow with Marvin wearing a dress being pushed by Frank, as part of returning a favor to Ivan for his help.
Cast
* Bruce Willis as Frank Moses* Mary-Louise Parker as Sarah Roses
* Morgan Freeman as Joe Matheson
* Helen Mirren as Victoria
* John Malkovich as Marvin Boggs
* Karl Urban as William Cooper
* Julian McMahon as Vice President Robert Stanton
* Ernest Borgnine as Henry, The Records Keeper
* Richard Dreyfuss as Alexander Dunning
* Brian Cox as Ivan Simanov
* James Remar as Gabriel Synger
* Rebecca Pidgeon as Cynthia Wilkes
