Red Dragon

I like Edward Norton as an actor.  However, I think a good actor can be miscast.  It is not a reasonable expectation that a good actor can fit seamlessly into any part, even if one takes gender and looks out of the equations.

I don't think Norton was the right choice for Red Dragon.  Now there were possibly some directorial and script choices that could have helped communicate how the character is going over the edge and being overtaken by his unique ability.  I think the previous adaptation of Harris' book, Manhunter, did a better job of communicating this point.  The re-make however did a better job thrilling the audience with vile disgustingness. (It is a word; I just used it.)  The re-make seemed to mainly communicate this through trauma:  Will Graham has gotten so close to serial killers that he almost dies.  In

The opening scene where Will Graham figures out Lecter:  You know this will happen at the outset.  The film didn't do a good job giving the impression that Graham's unique abilities led him to a gestalt.  You see him open a cookbook and it's like "Lecter is obsessed with gourmet, the killer is also obsessed with gourmet."  It needed something more to not seem like a random leap, even if it gave the film a slower start.  There is a drawback to the obsession with immediate box office profit over making a good film.  But in long-term thinking, I don't think the film did that well in either box office or rentals over all.  It is a modest success at best (i.e. it probably didn't lose money) and not a critical success.

As one critic said:

Where Mann and Demme steered the hokum away from dull genre generalities, Ratner's point-and-film literalness churns out a thriller by rote, shorn of the psychological dogfighting that distinguished the first two films.

The mechanical nature of the film regardless, I didn't think of Norton's performance as mechanical but just not the character that was needed.  And it is up to casting and directing to match the performance with the role.  Norton is capable of presenting a character with a dark side, but it didn't come across in this film.  Even if that had been the case (which would have been an improvement) I still feel like Father Brian Finn (Keeping the Faith) has become a detective.