Dir. Stephen Sommers, US, 2009, 118 mins
Cast: Channing Tatum, Sienna Miller, Dennis Quaid, Christopher Eccleston
Review by Carol Allen
G.I. Joe is not, as you might assume, a person but "an elite team of operatives" and the film is based on an American "action man" toy, tv series and comic book, probably unknown to many members of the UK audience. The formula is however tediously familiar;
Set almost inevitably in "the near future", said "elite team of operatives" battle with the forces of evil, in this case led by Eccleston as McCullen, an international arms manufacturer with a snazzy new destructive weapon, who's after that old chestnut, world domination. In the course of their conflict a lot of impressive, futuristic hardware and weaponry is employed and destroyed, there are a lot of chases and explosions, lots and lots of deafening music and some largely shouted and often inaudible dialogue.
Having said that, this is though a not unentertaining example of the genre. Eccleston plays the villain with a Scottish accent, which verges on the camp, and he has a mad scientist sidekick with an odd line in facewear, which masks the effects of some nasty accident in the past and whose identity provides one of the few surprises in the film. Batting for G.I. Joe is Quaid, barking orders as their commander; Tatum as Duke, the hero figure; Marlon Waynes as his best mate and Rachel Nichols and Said Taghmaoui, playing two of their technical experts. In McCullen's Cobra team is Miller as action girl Ana - she's actually Duke's ex squeeze gone rogue, though the fact that he's such a meathead, makes their romance difficult to believe - and the comically named martial arts killer Storm Shadow (Byung Hun Lee). The characters have all actually all got pretty silly comic book names, such as Hawk, Ripcord, Snake Eyes, Heavy Duty and such. Oh, and Jonathan Pryce puts in an appearance as the inexplicably English sounding American President - it's been suggested his accent is actually New England, but I'm not convinced.
As well as the action sequences, which include the impressive destruction of the Eiffel Tower, there's loads of plot, though it doesn't really matter if you can't follow it all, and a lot of back story told in flashback. The overall effect is rather like being battered over the head with a lead laden version of the G.I. Joe toy doll. But there's plenty here to please the audience for this sort of movie and if you're left at the end thirsting for more, fear not. The ground is clearly laid for a sequel ("Return of/Revenge of Cobra"?).
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