For my first-ever Redbox rental, I decided on GIJROC. (Actually my first ever rental from one of those machines was Sorceror's Apprentice at Times: Liliha, but it wasn't a Redbox.)
I decided on this because I always thought the trailer looked pretty cool. And the Blu-Ray is on the top of my wish-list on swapadvd.com.
I had seen the DVD available before, but never rented it. Then it disappeared for a month or two. Then I saw it again at Foodland Liliha, but it disappeared again. But a search at redbox.com showed it was available at Foodland Dillingham. OK, I'll venture out my 1.04. (Or maybe it's free because I'm supposed to have a free credit for signing up, not sure if it's claimed automatically.)
Anyway, even though it wasn't a Blu-Ray, I thought the picture looked pretty good on my 42" Plasma. Saw the first half yesterday and the rest today on the old 27" Panasonic outside. OK, maybe a little confusing with all the characters. And the picture was a little darker since the scenes went underwater. But overall, I'd say it's filled the bill as an action picture. I'd give it a thumbs up.
But then, I'm speaking as one who never really watched the G.I. Joe cartoons. Here's another view (which turned out to be nearly as entertaining as the movie for me).
The movie's ostensible lead is Duke, played by Channing Tatum, who is without question the absolute worst actor to have ever lived in the history of mankind's existence on this planet we call Earth. I'm talking all the way back to the birth of drama in ancient Greece, never has there been another actor as awful as Tatum. Even Ed Wood would have laughed at this guy's screen test. The filmmakers should have called his character "Cue Card," because he's obviously reading his lines off of them.
Nearly as bad is Sienna Miller as The Baroness. Yes, she's sexy, but my lord, the woman needs to take some acting lessons. Not only is Miller's delivery stilted, the movie's version of the character is an American bimbo (a blonde, we learn in flashbacks) with no accent, is Duke's ex-girlfriend, and isn't even really evil. What the hell? What does any of that have to do with The Baroness, who was previously one of the juiciest characters in all of G.I. Joe lore? I'm going to assume that Miller had to be cast in the movie due to some studio contractual obligation. If she has to be in the movie, why not give her a more appropriate character that she could handle, like Cover Girl? Shouldn't The Baroness actually be The Baroness, and played by someone who can pull off the role?
Supporting characters make just as little sense. Saïd Taghmaoui is Breaker. Except that he's not actually playing Breaker, the team's radio operator. He's playing Mainframe, their computer tech geek. So why isn't the character just called Mainframe? Obviously, the writers didn't know who Mainframe was because they'd never gotten past Issue 3 of the comic book.
The film is agonizingly, insultingly stupid. It has been written by people who have no respect at all for their audience's intelligence. Movies like this are often called "turn off your brain" entertainment. I've never understood the appeal of that. There's nothing stopping any movie from having major excitement and thrills along with a decent story and interesting characters, except the will to do it. How far must we lower our standards to find something like this entertaining?
***
Then again, I just picked up Karate Dog from swapadvd.
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