G.I Joe The Rise of Cobra
Directed by Stephen Sommers
Written by Stuart Beattie, David Elliott, Paul Lovett
Starring Channing Tatum, Marlon Wayans, Dennis Quaid, Ray Park, Joseph Gordon Levitt
Release Date August 7th, 2009
Published August 6th, 2009
It is very, very, bad form to reference the great French auteur Jean Luc Godard in a review of something as ludicrous as G.I the movie but, the great director's quote that the best way to criticize a movie is to make another movie an apt and ironic way to discuss Paramount Pictures persnickety reaction to bad reviews of their other toy based movie Transformer Revenge of the Fallen (Again many apologies for dragging you into this Monsieur Godard).
G.I Joe: The Rise of Cobra acts as a near perfect commentary on the Transformers sequel. The parallels are almost endless. You have properties based on toy lines. You have stunningly awful dialogue shouted by utterly moronic characters and stories so incomprehensible that they leave almost no logical basis whatsoever for their very existence. Oh, and don't forget the girls in the super tight clothes. The only difference between these movies is that G.I Joe knows it's ridiculous and runs with it while Michael Bay thinks he's making Lawrence of Arabia with giant talking robots.
Stephen Summers, the good natured hack behind The Mummy, keeps things light and goofy and allows a good time to be had by all and not just those most forgiving. The plot of G.I Joe The Rise of Cobra is of absolutely no consequence. Ok, fine, here's a capsule: G.I Joe is a secret NATO organization with elite soldiers from around the world who keep bad guys at bay. The latest bad guy to step out of line is an arms dealer named McCullen (Christopher McCullen) who is grinding a 400 year old ax over the way his arms dealing fore-fathers were treated.
McCullen has developed a weapon that is sentient and can eat all metal structures. The unwanted logical question is: Why, if he built the weapon does he then hire thugs to steal the weapon? We never knew the weapon was stolen or taken from him so it is weird to see him send people to steal it. Who knows why but McCullen indeed does hire The Baroness (Sienna Miller, every nerd's dream in librarian glasses and tight black leather) and Storm Shadow (Byung Hun Lee) a ninja. I mention that Storm Shadow is a ninja because, like all fanboys, just the word 'Ninja' makes me giddy.
The attempt to steal the weapon draws the ire of G.I Joe and all out war ensues in both the Joe's buried in the desert bunker and the arms dealer's underwater fortress beneath the ice caps of the north pole. I imagine director Summers and Screenwriter Stuart Beattie laughing like school children as they chose these locations, I certainly did when each was revealed. There is a definite kitsch at work here but not so much that G.I Joe becomes all out camp. It's a little too aware of its own out-there-ness to allow for camp.
Ah, but kitsch without a doubt, this is kitsch. Just check the buck wild goofy cameo by Mummy star Brendan Fraser who appears for one scene and seems more like a reject from a Rushmore production of Apocalypse Now than the star of G.I Joe sequels to come. Fraser is the only actor truly aware of the goofiness. The rest of the cast mixes dedicated professionalism with a healthy amount of incredulity.
That is except poor Channing Tatum whose deathly seriousness as the newest Joe, Duke, becomes the film's biggest unintentional joke. Tatum is a handsome kid but his mumbled lines and wooden face turn even his attempts at humor into the most forceful of kitsch. Tatum has a following among young girls who have only recently discovered how to properly apply the new school slang 'hottie'. New school, in that it has only been a part of our low culture for maybe a decade.
The rest of the cast of G.I Joe seems about as in on the joke as director Sommers. The key is, their awareness never becomes irritating in that winking fashion, again save for Fraser. Dennis Quaid is among many who, I am sure, stifled giggles over his dialogue that is almost entirely exposition. Rachel Blanchard is quite the trooper selling an attraction to the mugging comic relief that is Marlon Wayans. She, naturally, has a 'catfight' with the Baroness that is pure cheesecake but also brief. Sienna Miller has the most backstory of any character and plays it to good effect, as good as can be expected of such a limited and witless script.
And then there is Ray Park as Snake Eyes. This is the character most fanboys were waiting for and we are not disappointed. Park is already a fanboy legend as the gone too soon Darth Maul in Phantom Menace (There is a stunningly large amount of fan fiction solely dedicated to Darth Maul murdering Jar Jar Binks, not related to this review really but interesting). Snake Eyes is the brother of Storm Shadow and they battle with swords, guns, fists and feet in well choreographed battles that culminate in unexpected fashion. Ray Park has more range behind Snakeyes's leather mask than co-star Channing Tatum has shown in several movies.
G.I Joe: The Rise of Cobra shames Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen not just in its better attitude and knowingness but also in special effects, editing and sound design, the alleged specialties of Mr. Michael Bay. The effects in G.I Joe work because of the clarity and uncluttered direction of Steven Sommers who managed this same economical trick in realizing The Mummy. Where Transformers 2 is a mess of robot carcasses battering one another at an ear splitting volume, G.I Joe is fleet and nimble, keeping the ludicrous action in focus where we can actually make out who is doing what to whom.
G.I Joe The Rise of Cobra alsi unfolds quicker and lingers on noise far less than Transformers 2. Indeed, as Godard said, if you want to criticize a movie, make another movie. G.I is the other to Transformers 2 and Stephen Summers shows Michael Bay almost every mistake he made and then proceeds to make most of them again, only with a little more style and a whole lot more fun.
