| “ | "I had no choice. She finally realized...what I am." | „ |
| ~ Cesaire revealing to Valerie his true colors |
Cesaire is protagonist Valerie's father and the main antagonist in Catherine Hardwicke's Red Riding Hood. Like most of Daggerhorn's residents, Cesaire harbors a dark secret: he is The Wolf that is terrorizing the townspeople of Daggerhorn. In his marriage with Suzette, he discovers that the eldest daughter Lucie is not his daughter as was believed and killed her. He then attacked Suzette for her infidelity and then killed Adrian, his wife's lover. At the film's climax, when he's discovered to be The Wolf, he attempts to turn Valerie into a pure-blooded Werewolf by passing the curse on though a bite when Peter intervenes. Though Cesaire fights him off, Valerie distracts him enough for Peter to impale him in the back with a ax and allow Valerie to stab him in the stomach with silver fingernails from an amputated hand, killing him instantly. He is portrayed by actor Billy Burke.
Role in Red Riding Hood
Cesaire as a werewolf
When Valerie arrives at Grandmother's house looking for her grandmother, a mysterious figure thought to be Grandmother is seen rising from her slumber coughing and assuring to Valerie that she is fine and tells her there is some soup inthe couldron if she's hungry. As "Grandmother" urges her to eat up and ingest more of the soup she cooked up, Valerie grows suspisious and asks "Grandmother what is the soup she cooked up as it appears to be blood-red, thick and chucky. Then, the candle light goes out, and the myserious figure steps out from the room, revealing herselfd to be Cesaire, Valerie's own father. Alerted, Valerie asks her father what is he doing in Grandmother's house and where is Grandmother. Cesaire, with a look of guilt, confessed that he had no choice and that he had to do what he done because Grandmother finally figured out what he truly is, The Wolf. Shocked, Valerie asks how could he do all of this, and Cesaire tells her to sit down, first in his human voice, then in his Wolf voice to be more stern so she could obey him.
Cesaire reveals to Valerie that he hated living in Daggerhorn, let alone his life in the feared town and expresses that he felt he settled for far less then he deserved. At that moment, he decided to one leave Daggerhorn for the cities and richer hunting grounds. Valerie asked that if he hated living his life in Daggerhorn so much, why didn't he leave sooner. Cesaire explained that as much as he wanted to leave, his love for his wife and daughters was much greater and that he had to wait for the Blood Moon to rise so he could pass the Werewolf curse down to his daughters starting with his eldest, Lucie. Taking advantage of Lucie's infactuation with Henry Lazar, a blacksmith aquantance who was also her half-brother, Cesaire written a note in Henry's signature asking Lucie to meet him out by the haystacks at moon rise. As Lucie waited by the haystacks awaiting Henry's arrival, Cesaire approached her in his Wolf form telling her that Henry was really coming out to the haystacks to see her and that she should accept his Werewolf curse with a bite. However, as he tried to speak to her knowledge, Lucie was frightened and couldn't understand him. Knowing that any offspring with Werewolf blood could understand their father when he spoke in Wolf form, Cesaire figures out that Lucie couldn't be his biological daughter and that his wife Suzette lied to his about Lucie true parentage. Despite many years of being careful not to kill, Cesaire was so enraged by this discovery that he bit Lucie in the neck and killed her. Shortly after, he took revenge on Suzette cheating on him with her lover and scratched her across the face, nearly blinding her and attacked her lover Adrian Lazar by biting him in the stomach and taking out chucks of flesh while he was still screaming.
Cesaire revealed that the night he killed Adrian Lazar, Adrian's son Henry smelled the Wolf's scent that night and assumed the scent came from Grandmother when he was arguing with her one night, which was impossible because Grandmother herself has lived with that scent her whole life. After catching whiff of the scent, she looked at Cesaire and immediately went home to search thought her closet chest and noticed that the same Wolf scent remained on her late husband's clothing. When she finally realized what it meant and that her son was too a Wolf just like her late husband, Cesaire appears from behind and asphyxiates her to death to keep her from talking.
After his confessions, since it was the last day of the Blood Moon, Cesaire proposes to Valerie that she becomes a Werewolf like him and join his side. Cesaire believed through his family history that werewolves are stronger though blood as his father was stronger before him, Valerie will be stronger than him. He attempts to be with her incestuously for he is one of few (if last) werewolves in his family and will inbreed if he has to continue the species through his biological child, Valerie. Cesaire convinces Valerie that if she consents, they will both be "invincible" against all people who oppose them. Valerie disagrees with him and refuses his offer by telling him that there must be a God because he is The Devil. Angered by her rejection, Cesaire fires back at her by claiming that if he's The Devil, that makes her The Devil's daughter.
He tries to bite her to pass his curse onto her only to be interrupted by her love interest Peter, who breaks down the door and attacks him. Peter yells that Cesaire is not so terrifying when the sun is arise. Cesaire stops him when he is almost chopped with an by ax by grabbing his weapon mid-attack and throws him aside, taunting as he does so. As Peter laid on the ground defeated, Cesaire's eyes glow red in their Werewolf form as he goes in for the kill. However, he stops when Valerie calls for him claiming that she has something for him in her basket. Cesaire retreats from killing and lowers his guard as he approaches Valerie. This gives Peter time to recover and grab his weapon. Distracted by Valerie's offer, Cesaire is stabbed in the back literally by Peter's ax, during which Valerie reveals that her basket contains the severed hand of Father Solomon with the silver fingernails still on them, which she used to impale Cesaire in the stomach as revenge for his betrayal. Mortally wounded from the silver fingernails impaled in his stomach, Cesaire falls to the ground dead, causing Peter and Valerie to cut open his stomach, fill it with rocks as weighs and dispose of it in the river so no one would know he was the Wolf.
However, before being murdered by Peter and Valerie, Cesaire successfully managed to bite Peter in the arm and pass his Werewolf curse down to someone else on the last day of the Blood Moon.