REDis a 2010 American action comedy film loosely inspired by the three-issue comic book series of the same name created by Warren Ellis and Cully Hamner , and published by the DC Comics imprint Homage . The film stars Bruce Willis , Morgan Freeman , John Malkovich , Mary-Louise Parker , Helen Mirren , and Karl Urban with Robert Schwentke directing a screenplay by Jon Hoeber and Erich Hoeber. The film was released on October 15, 2010.

In the film version, the title is derived from the designation of the status of agent Frank Moses (Bruce Willis), meaning "Retired, Extremely Dangerous".

Frank Moses ( Bruce Willis ), a former black-ops CIA agent, is retired and living a quiet life in Cleveland , Ohio . However, he begins to feel lonely and often chats on the phone with Sarah ( Mary-Louise Parker ), a customer service agent working for Frank's pension office in Kansas City . He creates opportunities to talk to her by tearing up his pension checks and calling her to say they had never arrived.

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 ( Karl Urban ) is assigned to hunt and kill Frank.

Frank kidnaps Sarah, keeping her tied up and gagged in his car and then at the hotel, first goes to New Orleans to find his mentor Joe Matheson ( Morgan 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 New York Times 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 Boggs ( John Malkovich ), also a former black ops agent and a paranoid conspiracy theorist, to provide more information. Marvin tells them that the names on the list are all connected to a 1981 secret mission in Guatemala in which Frank and Marvin participated, and that one person, Gabriel Singer ( James Remar ), 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 has been killed to silence them. Singer is then assassinated by a helicopter-borne sniper, and the team makes their escape as Cooper closes in. With the help of Russian secret agent Ivan Simanov ( Brian Cox ), Frank and Sarah infiltrate the CIA headquarters to steal the file but Frank is injured in the process after fighting with Cooper. Joe, having escaped an attempt on his life, helps extract the team and joins them, and they all hide out in Victoria's ( Helen 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 on the reporter's list but not in the file, Alexander Dunning ( Richard 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 ( Julian McMahon ), who at the time was a young lieutenant who experienced a breakdown and massacred the occupants of 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's order to hold fire. The confusion buys the team enough time to escape, but Sarah is captured. Frank calls Cooper and threatens his family if Sarah is harmed, and says 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 ( Rebecca Pidgeon ), is also in on the plot. Disgusted with Dunning and Wilkes' greed and corruption and being used by her and Dunning, Cooper gives Frank the key to his handcuffs and shoots Wilkes while Marvin and Victoria kill Dunning's bodyguards, and Frank crushes Dunning's windpipe. 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.