G.I. Joe 2009...

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niky

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http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1046173/

Well, in all honesty... it might suck, big-time... but who knows? I mean, I actually watched Street Fighter, so it'd be an injustice not to watch this. :lol:
 
There's chicks in tight suits. There will definitely be explosions - with a little luck, also a few bikes and some hard rock'n'roll..

This movie WILL rock 1...
 
OK, this is sad.

First, Dennis Quaid: Fail.

Second, I look at the pictures and I think they are Flint (turns out it's Hawk), Scarlett, Lady Jaye (turns out it is the Baroness), some dude I can't identify (Turns out it's Duke WTF?), and Snake Eyes. Then I look at IMDB and see that only Scarlett and Snake Eyes are even listed as characters.

Shipwreck and Gung Ho are only rumored and I see no mention of Roadblock, Snow Job, Mutt, Cutter, Doc, Flint, Lady Jaye, Spirit, or Wild Bill.

Shipwreck, Gung Ho, Flint, Lady Jaye, and Roadblock are musts. Especially Roadblock, because if I don't get a character that sings the GI Joe theme song while in hand-to-hand combat I will be severely upset. Although, after looking at the shot of Heavy Duty (who?), it looks more like he is Roadblock.

And while I see Zartan on that list I fail to see any of the Dreadnoks listed.

Now, continuing on: Destro is just a normal looking dude. And while I think Christopher Eccelstone is a great actor (love him in Heroes) he is not Destro without some crazy looking shiny skin.

And I can give two definitive reasons why this movie will suck: Joseph Gordon Levitt and Marlon Wayans. Honestly, I could have just said Marlon Wayans and been done with it, but having the guy best known for his work in sitcoms and romantic comedies play Cobra Commander is unforgivable.

Maybe I am being too harsh and I feel like my childhood is being stolen away from me, but some of the casting and character choices seem horrible. It looks more like they are aiming to get as many hotties into this film as possible (Cover Girl and Dancer, really?) and forgetting the awesome guys that made GI Joe.

If they want to save this, no matter how bad it is, I will forgive them if they have a "And knowing is half the battle" PSA at the end of the credits.


And I finally see my problem, at the bottom of the IMDB page it says the source is GI Joe Sigma 6. Ugh.
 
FoolKiller
I feel like my childhood is being stolen away from me
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That says it all.

Why to I get the feeling that someone saw "Team America: World Police" and thought "Wow, if I did this with a serious tone, it'd be G.I. Joe... Waitamminut... Live action!"

Unless rave reviews roll in, (similar to Iron Man reivews) from real movie goers, I might entertain seeing this on DVD. Other than that, I'll take a pass, and rewatch the Iron Man trailers.

Even with Storm Shadow:

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Here are a few others
 
The more I think about it the more this is going to be sooooo bad. Are they purposely setting up the entire thing to disappoint fans? Who the hell is at the helm of this thing? I don't mean the director, I mean who's REALLY in control? Must be someone who really hated toys in the 80s, because any true G.I. Joe fan could give you a proper list of not only which characters should be in the movie (see Fool Killer's post), but which actors shoud be playing those roles. I haven't heard of nor do I care about 90% of this cast, other than poor Dennis Quaid who, while another of those competent but often overlooked actors, is in so over his head here he's probably going to singlehandedly bring the entire show to the ground. They'll probably have his character die to give it some depth, but there's no escaping that this is the biggest mis-cast since Van Damme as Guile, Wes Studi as Sagat, and Raul Julia as M. Bison. That Storm Shadow picture just SCREAMS Street Fighter: The Movie. Looks like Ken's outfit with a face mask added on!

Also it appears that they've "leaked" a character photo to each of these big internet movie sites, so that together you get them all, which is lame on a scale entirely its own.
 
niky
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It really feels like they reused the clothing from Doom, after it had been shrunk in the washer. Then added pads to it. Or is it that this guy looks like Karl Urban?
 
I was a HUGE GI Joe fan as a kid, but I'm a bit wishy-washy on it. As soon as I found out that the "dance guy" was playing Duke, that was an automatic time-out for me.

Still, Dennis Quaid... I'll give it a shot. There better be more boobs and explosions, my guess is that it is the only thing that will save this movie.
 
YSSMAN
There better be more boobs and explosions, my guess is that it is the only thing that will save this movie.
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Considering that the cast resume has more modeling and dancing gigs than acting credits I would say that the concept of teasing glimpses is not far from the goal here.

The only thing that still has me hoping for something is that the couple of legitimate, experienced actors they have aren't ones to just jump into any crappy movie. However, I have lowered my expectations of Dennis Quaid ever since The Day After Tomorrow. I mean, if he is going to do some bad movies the least he can do is follow in his brother Randy's footsteps and do bad movies that are bad on purpose.

Actually, now that I think about it Dennis Quaid peaked with Great Balls of Fire. It's sad really.
 
YSSMAN
The new GI Joe trailer is out...

I'm saying awesome. Blowing up certain European cities with ninjas and commandos, rocks.

...And knowing that Shipwreck isn't in the movie, I feel as though I can't hate it that much.
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I saw it during the Super Bowl and did not knwo what I was looking at until I saw Stormshadow and Snake Eyes. The fact that it got that far without me knowing what was going on was a sign to me that I will like it just as much as Transformers.
 
Really? I knew that was Baroness right away, and I starting jumping up and down in excitement! To be honest, I think I'm more excited about GI Joe than TF2 at this point.
 
YSSMAN
Really? I knew that was Baroness right away, and I starting jumping up and down in excitement! To be honest, I think I'm more excited about GI Joe than TF2 at this point.
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I was eating food at the time, so I may not have been paying full attention, but had I not seen some of the early images I doubt I would have thought it was GI Joe until the logo.

Looking at the cast and crew, with few exceptions, I am not hopeful. It takes more than explosions and ninjas to make me think a film will be good. If that is all it took Street Fighter would have been/will be good. Heck any Uwe Boll film would be good.
 
Early impressions say the game will suck.

http://www.joystiq.com/2009/02/12/yo-joe-more-like-oh-no-g-i-joe-game-impressions

Yo Joe? More like: Oh no, G.I. Joe game impressions
by James Ransom-Wiley { Feb 12th 2009 at 2:16PM }


EA is talking up its first G.I. Joe game, a movie spin-off, as "cross-generational." It's so easy to control that even "mom" can play. Which means, moms -- if you're reading -- not only will you be subjected to chaperoning a mission to the local theater to suffer through the G.I. Joe film adaptation this summer, you also may be expected to idle away your weekends with the game. Let's hope it's a short one.

G.I. Joe: The Game plays as any generic third-person shooter, with the bonus of the aforementioned base layer Mom Controls®. Literally, all that is needed to proceed is the left thumb steering the on-screen character and the right index finger, locked down on the designated shooting button -- just keep on holding it and the game will automatically target a new enemy once the current one has absorbed too many laser blasts and disappears into the well known in-game ether. Of course, "hardcore" gamers will find melee and character-exclusive secondary attacks, along with a rolling dodge and cover mechanic mapped to their controllers.

EA is throwing out some big-name inspirations for its game: Contra, Ikari Warriors and Ikaruga. We suppose you could consider G.I. Joe as a like-designed title in so far as it is built as an "arcade" throwback, with high scores being the ultimate reward. Actually, the ultimate reward is unlocking all twelve playable characters -- unlocking characters requires score points, though. Scoring is linked directly to difficulty setting and one's play. Dying, for example, decreases one's overall score, but, on the lowest difficulty setting, will not produce further setbacks. Think of this as a "no fail" setting -- you know, the one mom can play.

G.I. Joe is much the brainless, hangover game you may plod through with a buddy on a late-rising Sunday afternoon. That buddy needs to be present -- like, next-to-you-on-the-couch present -- since EA hasn't confirmed online co-op (and seemed somewhat doubtful that it would include that feature in the final version). The entire game is played as a duo of Joes, with opportunities to swap characters from time to time. As a single player, one is able to switch, on the fly, between the two on-screen Joes. There's even a "Yo Joe!" co-op super move, which transforms our heroes into dudes (or gals) with one rocket launcher arm and one Gatling gun arm -- no, seriously. This newfound "ability" is a product of the movie-inspired "Accelerator Suit" (see teaser below: Joes jumping through bus).

The draw -- or perhaps, the gamble -- is the lure of fan service. EA is including elements from the cartoon and the Hasbro action figures, which may elicit an occasional, emotional spark. Like: "Hey, I remember that guy!" But, it's hard not to criticize G.I. Joe: The Game as anything other than a quickly assembled production (eighteen months, we're told -- for five versions of the same game, plus a separate DS take), designed specifically to capitalize on the blockbuster movie. This is Old EA, picking up New EA's slack.
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Whoa. Did They Just Do What I Think They Did?

Frankly, I'm surprised. Shocked even. I have absolutely no idea how the hell this happened. I'm sitting in the theater, surrounded by geeks, only to have a single expression fall over every one of us...

Lets be honest with ourselves. Much like Transformers, GI Joe is a childhood classic that most of us over the age of 18 grew up with as kids. Its near and dear to our heart, and having Hasbro making a new film based on the franchise certainly became worrisome. Add to the fact that GI Joe wasn't screened for the press, and yes, things get messy. Of course, you have the rather odd casting directions, some unfamiliar technology in the Joeniverse... I think all of us were prepared for a terrible movie.

...But it wasn't. Not even close. In fact, I loved every minute of it. Okay, maybe not every part of it, but I'll be damned if it isn't one of the best movies of the summer. Sure, we throw around the term "summer blockbuster" around frequently, but GI Joe hit the mark. (Some) Big stars, lots of explosions, and other cool things that go crazy. Real crazy. You recognize most of the characters right away, they still use all of the corny tag lines, and an infinite amount of crap gets blown up. What's not to love?

Yes, there were liberties taken. But, if you're re-booting a franchise, there isn't any reason why they wouldn't. I'd go over the plot, but talking about it kinda ruins the "surprise." I mean, if you're old enough to know the show, or how to do simple math, you're going to figure out where the story is going. Quickly. But it never ruins the fun. The pacing is great, I can't recall a dull moment in the story. The "flashbacks" get a bit repetitive though, but when you're building a franchise - whatever.

Clearly they've got another one or two in the pipe, and I have to admit, I'm excited. For a fun way to spend an evening, for not much money, GI Joe is definitely worth it.

8.5/10
 
This is the second movie in a very short period of time, Transformers being the first one, that provided me with a profound understanding of why the US government raises military budget every year: They have to finance these big-screen-promotional campaigns that are being produced more and more nowadays.
Apart from that it was a fun ride if you put your brains in the locker before entering the theatre. Some questionable ethics displayed in times and in the end any seriousity is going totally down the drain but very entertaining.
5/10 because it is not really a good movie but it is well made and provides entertainment above the score I'd give it.

PS: I have never played with the original action figures so my opinion is only based on the movie alone and not on how true it is to the original universe.

PPS: I took this from the movie thread, because I jus figured this might be the better place for the review ;)
 
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Interesting... so that's two negative... two positive (a friend locally attended the premiere... and he says it was pretty good)... dare I open up RottenTomatoes to find out what the experts think?

Hmmm... 51% on the Tomatometer. I love this review:

Watching “G.I. Joe” is like being slapped across the face with utility-grade meat for two hours and for all I know, that is exactly what screenwriters Stuart Beattie and David Elliot & Paul Lovett did to get themselves in the proper frame of mind during the writing process. The story doesn’t make a lick of sense for a minute, there isn’t a single line of dialogue that anyone with even the slightest bit of taste would want to quote with anything other than contempt and the characters are so uninteresting that by the time the film ended, I still didn’t know the names of half the characters that I had just spent the last two hours watching.
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But there's a bright spark in all of this...

At one point during the two hours of random mayhem being released in theaters under the title of “G.I. Joe: The Rise of Cobra,” one of the good guys comes across one of the bad guys lying dead in the street and jabs a couple of electrode things into the corpse’s neck. When asked why he is doing this to someone who has most definitely shuffled off this mortal coil, he announces that he is retrieving images from the body’s cerebral cortex and reminds his colleague that “the brain survives for a couple of minutes after death.” Right about now, I was hoping to make some kind of glib comment speculating about how long the brain could possibly survive after being exposed to something as rock-stupid as the film itself but unfortunately, “G.I. Joe” is so mind-curdling that I am frankly surprised that I have enough synapses firing away to write my own name, let alone pithy commentary about something so dumb and incoherent that the nicest thing that can be said about it is that it isn’t as bad as “Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen,” though not by much.
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http://www.efilmcritic.com/review.php?movie=18136&reviewer=389

So, if it isn't as bad as TF2, maybe I will watch it... :lol:
 
I could see how the movie is polarizing for a lot of people, dependent mainly on how seriously you're taking the movie. I had an absolute blast watching it, and I plan to see it at least one more time. Looking around the internet, it just looks like too many people went in expecting some kind of Citizen Kane with guns masterpiece, but what can you really expect from a franchise that has lasers, ninjas and a super-secret international terrorist organization called COBRA that no one except GI Joe can fight? Really? You're going to take it that seriously?

Personally, I trust the AICN and /FILM guys on this one. Its not the BEST MOVIE EVAR!!!1!!!11!, but you're really going to be hard-pressed to have that terrible of a time. To me, it exceeds where Transformers failed by not taking itself too seriously, realizing how ridiculous everything is to begin with, and then completely reveling in it.


Totally thinking out loud for a moment:

I feel like there is some kind of connection to be made with Iron Man, but I've yet to put it into words. I mean, Iron Man was essentially a universally loved movie, while GI Joe certainly is not. I feel like placing them on an even keel does a great disservice to Favreau's work, but I dunno... I had the same feeling coming out of GI Joe that I did when I walked out of Iron Man. My mind was blown, overstimulated by awesome. GI Joe is not a good movie in the traditional cinematic sense. But, its an 'effing awesome experience.

I've heard people relate it to what we used to do in the sandbox when we were kids. You know, with the GI Joe toys, doing insane things. I totally agree. Although I'm not sure what the cinematic equivalent of shoving firecrackers in C130s and action figures is...
 
G.I. Joe was crap. Transformers 2 was uber-crap. The Summer of 09 is officially dubbed the Summer of Crap. Nothing but crap crap crap at the movies this season.
 
Anderton Prime
G.I. Joe was crap. Transformers 2 was uber-crap. The Summer of 09 is officially dubbed the Summer of Crap. Nothing but crap crap crap at the movies this season.
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G.I. Joe crap??? NNNOOOO... ok guess I'll put all my money on Inglourious Basterds... I REALLY wanna see that movie.... :D
 
Anderton Prime
G.I. Joe was crap. Transformers 2 was uber-crap. The Summer of 09 is officially dubbed the Summer of Crap. Nothing but crap crap crap at the movies this season.
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I take it you haven't seen Up?

A local drive-in is showing TF2 and GI Joe for $6 a person. I am thinking it might be worth the train wreck for just $3 a film.
 
FoolKiller
I take it you haven't seen Up?

A local drive-in is showing TF2 and GI Joe for $6 a person. I am thinking it might be worth the train wreck for just $3 a film.
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Bring a beer... you'll need it to make it through the last half-hour of TF2. :lol:

-

Damn UP! Thanks to all the blockbuster-budget films showing this summer, its local release has been pushed back another two weeks.

So our showing is over a month late due to TF2... which was rubbish... Harry Potter (my wife is a Potterphile, and she thinks it's rubbish) and G.I.Joe... which I'm still not sure I want to give the benefit of the doubt.

*Sigh*... :grumpy:
 
Anderton Prime
G.I. Joe was crap.
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Care to elaborate?

Its not the most outstanding movie ever, but I'd easily rate it well above Wolverine, Terminator 4 and Transformers 2. Honestly, we can't go in expecting Citizen Kane every time, which is something I'm finding incredibly frustrating with some of the reviews. Its clearly a movie made for kids... And thinking back to how I played with my GI: Joe toys when I was in the target market, it was exactly what played through in my head.
 
I would rate it above all three of those turds as well, but that's not saying much.

Here are just a few reasons why G.I. Joe was an epic fail:

There was an incontinuity or plot hole every five minutes.

Channing Tatum sucked. I wanted to punch him in his pouty lips every time he was on screen.

Marlon Wayans is now officially the human version of Jar Jar Binks. The whole sub-plot with him and Scarlett was nothing more than a lame attempt to give the female Joes more screen time, and to give this untalented moron a chance to stretch his comedic wings. The result reads like an eighth-grader's impression of relationships.

IT HAD A BRENDAN FRASER CAMEO.

The end sequence degraded so quickly into a cheap rip-off of a Star Wars finale (think Empire and Return) I was groaning out loud. If you didn't see Snake Eyes and Storm Shadow as crappy versions of Darth Vader and Luke Skywalker, battling it out with their "civilized" weapons as the laser battle between everyone else rages on in the ocean around them, then you don't know for movies.

Heavy Duty did exactly NOTHING of value after the "saving Duke and Ripcord" sequence.

Don't even get me started on the Celtic voice-commands for the Cobra jet.

Did I mention it had Brendan Fraser in it? One of THE WORST actors in the history of film. Don't believe me? Go watch The Mummy: Tomb of the Dragon Emperor and tell me making it to the end wasn't harder than sitting through a root canal procedure. I know he was only in this for a few minutes, but focus on the fact that someone thought good ol' Brendan was a good enough actor to give him this cameo, and you'll see it as just another revealing factor as to why this movie sucked rocks.

Dennis Quaid is so awful. His General Hawk is little more than a series of one-liners and dramatic zooms in to his face. He seems entirely out of place with his beret and camo fatigues.

The technology was okay, except for the part where they stuck the needles into the dead bad guy's brain and extracted his dying memories into digital picture format onto some device they were using, and used this info to find out about McCullen being a villain. SO stupid.

They ruined Transformers. They ruined G. I. Joe. What's left of my childhood? Better call up Joel Schumacher and see if he's free to do the M.A.S.K. movie and the remake of He-Man.
 
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Of course these are just my own thoughts. If the movie moved you then there's no problem with that; I mean, I did see a few teenage males (16) come out of the theatre completely charged up by the movie, and I can remember being that age myself and thinking these kinds of movies were cool. In some ways, I miss my earlier, naive self. Ignorance is truly bliss, and nowadays it takes a helluva good flick to impress me. That being said, I'm in desperate, undying love with the Matrix trilogy, even in the face of complete and utter disdain for the films by virtually every other member of the movie-viewing public, so go figure. Something in them spoke to me, and though I didn't come out of Revolutions swinging my umbrella around and stomping it into the ground to punctuate just how awesome and kick ass the movie I just saw was (as was the case with these two chaps in front of me while exiting the G.I. Joe theatre), I was nevertheless moved immensely.

But I can't excuse movies like this as being "just good fun." Yes, when compared to something like Transformers 2, this movie is not that bad. But if I had a bowel movement on a piece of parchment paper and compared that to Transformers 2, it would look pretty entertaining too. When G.I. Joe is put up against something like Iron Man, for example, you see just how bad an example of a summer blockbuster this is. Movies that "don't take themselves too seriously" are beginning to use said phrase as an excuse when ends don't meet, things don't make sense, and performances simply fall short of expectations in their movies.

When I played with my G.I. Joe toys, the movies I imagined in my seven-year old brain were cooler than this giant piece of suck. G.I. Joe may not be King of the Turds, a position which is currently and, it seems. gearing up to be permanently, held by Transformers 2: Revenge of the Fallen. But it is definitely a member of the Royal Family.
 

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