Customer Reviews

G.I. Joe: The Rise of Cobra (Two-Disc Edition) [Blu-ray]

5 star:		(100)
4 star:		(84)
3 star:		(51)
2 star:		(39)
1 star:		(82)

 

 

I am a fan of this director-Stephen Sommers...."Mummy", "Mummy Returns", "Van Helsing". He really knows how to direct an action pic.

Based upon, yes, the popular action figure for several generations. This film throws a lot of CGI effects (which are impressive) and good-looking actors on the screen. I enjoyed all the eye candy and the action scenes.

the story has something to do with good guys protecting an ultimate weapon from the bad guys; the usual chaos follows.

this movie is a nice way to warm up your cold winter days with heavy action.

recommended mood to be in when you are about to watch this movie: lethargic. You won't feel lethargic after watching it!

fun, energetic film..

Yesterday, I received my 2 disc edition of G.I. Joe: The Rise of Cobra, and I looked over the sleeve and it looked nice and got me all excited, reminded me of the G.I. Joe days of when I was a kid watching the cartoon! Then, I later last night put the second disc in to check out the extras! HA that was a joke! The only extras on this 2 disc is the making of the movie, and the special effects behind the scenes thing. Now granted those were cool, but the only real reason for the second disc is for the digital copy! I honestly think this movie is not worth [...] at all, maybe 16.99! Big deal you get the digital copy! How many of us out there really use the digital copy? Where was the deleted and alternate scenes? Is it really coming to the point where things are going to Blu Ray and not to regular dvd which their are a heck of a lot more dvd player owners then blu ray! I say if you are looking at this review on deciding whether to purchase the 2 disc, wait till it goes cheaper and get it! Don't spend over 10 bucks for it! Thanks for your time I hope this helps!

I had low expectations of the film after hearing some of the many disappointments. But to my surprise, I found it very entertaining. It was a fun and had great martial arts sequences, good action scenes and a nice sense of humor to it. The story line for an action flick kept me attentive as well. The plot moved along well and didn't feel like there were any slow moments. I wasn't comparing it too hard to the original cartoon because it's a different time now and artists can have some creative liberty. It was still fun to see some of the old familiar characters. Great job with Snake Eyes. Overall, good entertainment.

The main problem with G.I. JOE: THE RISE OF COBRA? It's not a G.I. JOE movie. At all. Somewhere along the way, the studio probably decided (correctly, it seems) that they could tack the G.I. JOE label on this baby and make a few extra bucks. This story line could be told with any characters, and it would still make no sense whatsoever.

Let's face it: you don't watch films like this for the story, the plot, the acting, the dialogue, or anything that you would watch a decent movie for. You watch it for cheesy lines, lots of action...basically something to watch while eating nachos and drinking beer. And, on that level, God help us all, THE RISE OF COBRA works.

I won't bother rehashing the plot; there isn't one. There's a whole lot of miscasting--Marlon Wayans? Really?--and way, way too many flashbacks; we don't care about Snake-Eyes's past, we only care about how much a** he kicks in the present (and, thanks to Ray Parks, he kicks a lot). There's too much back story between Duke (Channing Tatum, as reliably wooden as always) and the Baroness (Sienna Miller, slumming it hardcore), and eventually a showdown between Duke, Cobra-to-be Rex (Joseph Gordon-Levitt), and Destro-to-be McCullen (Christopher Eccleston) involving who loves the Baroness the most (did I just ruin things?). Yeah, even for an action-and-no-brains flick, it's far-fetched. And don't get me started on the excelerator suits.

But there's something to be said for actors who know they're making a horrible movie. Gordon-Levitt is a pure and under delight, hamming it up almost as much as he did in (a far superior film) KILLSHOT; Eccleston is pure and utter camp, as is Dennis Quaid as the leader of the Joes. We also get cameos from Sommers mainstays Brendan Fraser and Kevin J. O'Connor, and you know you're watching crap when you think to yourself: "This film could use more Brendan Fraser." Fraser's MUMMY nemesis Arnold Vosloo is grossly under-used as Zartan, Cobra's shape-shifting wild card, as is Jonathan Pryce as the U.S. president. Ultimately, we are left with a movie that means little or nothing to those of us who grew up with G.I. JOE, but is still valuable as mindless action schlock that appeals as a 2-hour distraction from reality.

This movie is bad. I mean really, really bad. It had potential but the makers chose to flush it all away in favor of cornball one-liners, plot holes galore, not-so-special effects, an ending that drags out about half an hour too long and some of the worst acting ever caught on film. When the mute Snake Eyes out-acts everyone else, you know your movie is in trouble. Even old pro Dennis Quaid looks bored out of his skull, not that I can blame him since he's given absolutely nothing to do.

The worst of the worst are Channing Tatum and Sienna Miller, who play Duke and Baroness. Based on their acting (or lack of it) I'd have to say they were having a contest to see who could deliver the most flat, lazy, wooden performance. Seriously, both spend the entire movie looking around as if they had better things to do. The clear winner of the bad acting contest is Tatum. You could have replaced him with a cardboard cutout and a tape recorder and nobody would have noticed. In fact, it might have been an improvement. Meanwhile, Miller delivers all her lines with all the enthusiasm of a 3rd grader delivering her first book report. In the scene at the graveyard her expression doesn't express grief so much as someone trying to decide if she wants to hit the McDonald's drive-thru for a burger and fries on the way home.

One of the worst films of 2009. I can't believe I made it through the whole thing. A complete waste of time and money.

While it's obvious you can see what they were trying to do, and what they took from the cartoon and everything, and not a half bad plot to start, it just becomes convoluted and full of horrible plot holes.

Generic training montage, generic characters, pointless twists in the plot and even more pointless fight scenes. The main hero, Duke, is played by someone who really doesn't act at all. There's no real emotion, there's no caring about this guy, and (no hyperbole) there's rarely any changes in his facial expressions.

Then his sidekick is a generic 'hey I'm the funny non-threatening Black Guy who makes an ass out himself randomly' archtype. And the geeky 'If I spit out random technobabble it will sound plausible' foreign guy.

There are complications to the fight scenes added for no real reason other than to make explosions, or to drag out a fight scene. Or to make it look like a giant toy advertisement.

It's mindless, empty of anything resembling acting, and does nothing but provide explosions and shiny CGI to distract people from it's lack of a plot.

This movie is bad. I suffered through it, because I'm a big fan of scifi and also of comic book films. But no. I felt awful after struggling through the length of this film. So much so that I decided to watch another movie immediately after, as if to counter the negative effects of GI Joe. What did I watch? Terminator: Salvation. And you know what? Compared to this movie, it was amazing.

I liked the special effects of this movie but that was all it had going for it. I didn't like the characters, the plot was as stupid as stupid can be and I felt that a lot of good actors were wasted in minor or ridiculous parts. Christopher Eccleston, my favorite Doctor Who of the recent regenerations, was wasted in this movie. Dennis Quaid was a stereotype and Brendan Fraser was in and out of the movie on the blink of an eye. The major characters were silly and I didn't care for or even like the "Duke" character wearing his self-assured, cocky smirk throughout most of the movie, with the exception of the scenes where he attempted to make doe-eyes at his lost love. In fact, this whole movie was one long action sequence interlaced with soap opera mini stories in between to make a sad and half hearted attempt at character development. I kept yelling at the screen, "Oh, come on!" It was so predictable and obvious how the movie makers were trying to manipulate the viewer. Even the end was a blatant setup for a sequel, which I hope never comes to pass. Don't bother seeing this movie unless you are addicted to CG actions scenes. The rest is a waste of time and talent (which was not evident in any performance here.) If I could give it a 1/2 start I would!!

This is a good action movie, but it's not GI JOE. I don't know why they even bothered to call it GI JOE if they weren't going to stick closely enough to the original source material. Sure you can change things up a bit, but you don't need to go this far. The only time I got the chills at the sight of something that even vaguely represented GI JOE was when Snake Eyes and Storm Shadow were on screen, but that didn't make up for it. The other thing about this film is that it's for the kids. Gritty and real this is not. Some might say it's a bit harsh but I think it's only a hop skip and jump away from Power rangers territory. Even the Fantastic Four seems more serious, and more convincing, at times (much better acting played a big part in this) and even they stayed closer to the source material (Yes, even the one with Silver Surfer). So if you're looking for a good action movie this is good, but we've yet to see something that brings GI JOE to the screen. To be fair, the biggest departure is the visual aspect, but that's so important in capturing the feel. If no one looks like the characters you were expecting, then it feels like you're watching something completely unrelated. I was dying to see the Vipers as they really looked and many other characters too. It's possible to do it without it being a kiddie flick - if they can make 3 foot tall people with hairy feet who go around fighting goblins convincing then there's no excuse why GI JOE couldn't stay much closer. I give it 2 stars for a GI JOE film and maybe 4 for an action film - so evens out to about 3. Don't expect GI JOE, or anything adult, and you won't be dissapointed.

Anyone who thought this was a good movie, seriously do not understand G.I. Joe., the story, the characters, or how much it meant to those who grew up on the comic books, the television cartoons, and the wonderful toys. They probably don't even understand what makes a good movie. Period.

That's okay. They could have called this movie "G.I Joe - Revenge of the Mummified Huck Finn" and it would have made no difference.

I don't have a problem with the cast. They are fine looking actors and actresses. Can they act? No, not really, but we are talking about comic book heroes and villains, not Oscar winning historical dramas. Goofy plot? Yes, but no more goofy or formulated than the typical television cartoon series plots.

I was truly hoping for a movie to explore the origins of Cobra, the G.I. Joe characters like Snake Eyes, Scarlett, Destro, Cobra Comander, etc. Big, climatic battles, explosions, high-tech weapons and equipment are bonuses, not the major features of a movie. Good story telling makes a good movie.

Instead, they cobbled together a weak plot and needlessly recreated character origins, their MOS, and tried to make up for it with CG graphics, special effects, big explosions, and the occasional nod towards the cartoon series and toys.

Problems I had with the changes in the movie include:

1. Duke was never engaged to the Baroness. The cartoon series did hint at a remote attraction, but never followed up on it. She was also German.

2. Duke's friend / the Baroness' brother is NOT Cobra Commander

3. Snake Eyes was NOT some Japanese orphan. He is a white American.

4. Snake Eyes did not take an oath of silence. His vocal cords were damaged in a helicopter crash, in which he rescued Scarlett from.

5. Storm Shadow does not hate Snake Eyes for stealing food.

6. Storm Shadow and Snake Eyes were best friends.

7. Storm Shadow did not kill the "Hard Master".

8. Scarlett was never interested in Ripcord. In the comic book, it was Snake Eyes. In the television series, it was Duke.

9. Scarlett was a capable, independent, and somewhat aloof character, not some remake of Rachel Weisz's librarian character from "The Mummy" and "The Mummy II".

10. The Cobra Commander was not some mad scientist.

11. G.I. Joe was an AMERICAN, military, anti-terrorist, organization from multiple services, not a multi-national organization based in Egypt.

12. How can they call the movie "The Rise of Cobra", when their underwater base is destroyed, and all the major leaders are captured and put in prison?

13. They needlessly killed off Covergirl.

14. The Baroness was never a ninja student of Storm Shadow.

Other things like acceleration suits, slow firing energy weapons, funky green spooge that dissolves everything, impossible flight physics, Ripcord being African-American and a pilot, Breaker being French Algerian, can be written off as petty, but I was unwilling to cut this movie any slack after seeing all the other changes that were made.

I was wowed by the CG effects. I was amazed by the action. I memorized by the sexiness of Scarlett (Rachel Nichols) and the Baroness (Sienna Miller). I was extremely disappointed by the movie's plot, script, and the revisions done to the original concepts. Was it entertaining? No... not really. By the time the movie finally ended, I couldn't even feel nostalgic about G.I. Joe.

It was an exercise in bad movie making. Cartoon comic books typically do not have deep plots, the occasional exception being "Watchmen" or even "X-Men" to a lesser degree. For a movie to pull it off, it would need to focus on a character driven plot and character development. "G.I. Joe - The Rise of Cobra" tries to do this, and fails miserably by trying to cover too many characters' pasts, origins, and tie them together, which required them to complete rewrite what was previously established in G.I. Joe lore.