User reviews

GI Joe:Rise of Cobra was better than expected, at least in my view. It is far from a masterpiece, the story is often thin and unfocused, Channing Tatum is bland and painful to watch sometimes and the quality of the script is uneven, there are some smart and witty lines but there are also some really bad howlers as well. That said, I did enjoy it for what it was, and I have seen far worse movies, some of which didn't promise much(Disaster Movie) and some of which did look as though it would be entertaining but it was actually a pile of rubbish(Dungeons & Dragons). The sets, scenery, costumes, cinematography and special effects are wonderful to watch, the music is memorable and suitably bombastic, the action is thrilling, the film is decently paced, the finale is the epitome of the term epic and Dennis Quaid is quite good in his role. Overall, far from perfect but for me not a pile of buffalo dung either. 7/10 Bethany Cox

I just saw G.I. Joe, and I must say that I actually enjoyed it. This is NOT a masterpiece. This is a fun, Summer action flick. The so-called professional critics who obviously miss that point do not deserve their cushy jobs. The action is unbelievable, non-stop, breathless, and requires a total suspension of disbelief. The critics that have a problem with that should remember one thing. This is a movie based on a cartoon that's sole purpose was to sell a set of toys to 5-12 year old boys. Nothing more. Expecting "War and Peace" from this source material shows a lack of insight and intelligence from most of the reviews that I have read. If you like action films, you will enjoy this one. If you want angst-ridden characters stopping every five minutes to discuss their feelings... pull the stick out and move along to a sappy low-budget romance; this isn't your kind of film.

I watched this film last night and luckily I had no high expectations. As a fan of the G.I Joe toys when I was a kid (back then they where called Action Force) I had a good idea of the characters and story before hand. I am glad to say this film stayed true to most of the original concepts with a few tweaks for the better here and there.

Go see this film if you want to see a fun action film full of special effects and doesn't take itself too seriously.

Don't go and see this film if you are an uptight, unhappy film critic that spends too much time highlighting plot holes and acting because that's not what this film is about. It's more of a roller-coaster ride. Fast, furious and just fun.

Please, take note that I rated this film 8 only because of it's value as an action film, but that's exactly the point I came here to get across. Everybody seems to have the same argument when they trash this film.. "it's all effects and no brains or dramatic undertones". OK, that is true, I've got to admit, but then again what kind of movie were these people actually expecting to see? Huh?!

G.I. Joe is as pure as an action film can possibly be and most importantly, it doesn't pretend to be anything else. Look at the poster. Check out the trailer. After those, were you perhaps waiting to see an Ingmar Bergman film? IT'S G.I. JOE, for Christ's sake! And I must say that in it's category, it isn't that bad. Sommers can direct good action sequences (the pursuit on the streets of Paris is stunning!) and although the film is obviously overblown with ridiculous gadgets and over the top plot lines, it doesn't matter because Joe succeeds in it's ONLY primary mission: to be entertaining. It's never boring and it's the silly fun it was always going to be.

So in a nutshell.. if you want a serious film to watch, check out There Will Be Blood or Doubt, but if you just want to forget for two hours the mess your leaders have left your nation, nay, the *world* and just have fun, check out this action film. Thank you.

Let me first say that I knew absolutely nothing about the GI Joe franchise except that they were (are?) toys. But that did not hinder me from enjoying this movie.

What do you get if you mix a few parts James Bond, a few parts Transformers and a few parts Star Wars? Well, you get G.I. Joe: The Rise of Cobra! Basically, if you like the aforementioned movies you will probably enjoy this one. Things explode constantly, shiny things glimmer past the screen and hot chicks in tight outfits show up now and then.

If you are the type who crave realism in your movies then do not - I repeat, do not see this one. Realism does not even come within shooting distance of this movie. But if you can enjoy a popcorn summer movie then this is not a bad way to spend an afternoon.

And yes - there is a Wayans brother in this, but strangely enough, he did not annoy me...

I came in with low expectations and got even less. I'm kind of offended that someone got paid to write this because its essentially a big-budget movie made with a fan-fiction caliber script. The plot riddled with holes, characters speak in clichés and the laws of physics are completely ignored. The female characters are treated with the action-movie standard sexism, and there are some subtle racist undertones as well. Seriously, 12-year-old boys write text messages that are more coherent than this script. The screen writers should use their payday to refund the tickets of everyone who went to see this movie.

I'm okay with going a movie just for the special effects, but even that is sub-par. The martial arts choreography is good, and stunning in one scene. The practical effects are believable, but the computer graphics are mostly cartoonish and detract from the visual impact of the film, so its hard to say go see it even if your standard for a good movie is if they blow stuff up in new and interesting ways.

I did enjoy the sheer audacity of its failure. Surely the filmmakers had watched even one movie before and knew they had a piece of Star Wars/James Bond ripoff fan fiction on their hands and just tried to be as bad as possible. This movie has a lot of laughs in it, although probably not where the filmmakers intended.

If you can look past the slightly ropey 2009 era CGI plus one or two terrible examples of Foley, this film, like another Hasbro licence (I'm looking at you Battleship) is perfect for when you just want to switch your brain off and enjoy the whiz bang boom explosions as well as all the insanely corney one liners.

Sure, it wasn't greatly received in the States through it not being real G. I. Joe (having international members instead of just Americans) or the fact that it wasn't called Action Force like the cartoon in the old days for the rest of the World.

It'll never be an action classic, but I think that was sort of the point.

But it does have Brendan Fraser briefly and that's a good thing!

This movie may have a questionable script, some sub-par actors (Some were surprisingly good for a popcorn movie which is applaudable) and some Team America style action (They seemed to cause a lot more damage to Paris then the terrorists plan to) but the film can not help but be entertaining. It has what Transformers 2 had which was good special effects, but what Transformers 2 lacked was entertainment which this movie definitely has, even if it is n't a very good movie from a movie point of view.

While lots of people and critics alike are going to bag the hell out of this film, I think as long as you go in with an open mind a low expectancy of the movie to hold any sort of realism you will have a pretty good time, which is really the reason the film was made (After the money of course).

Overall, this film is a good watch for non fans of the series at least but, not having seen the cartoon I cant speak for existing fans of G.I. Joe but I had a good time, and I think a lot of other people will 2 as long as they can maintain an open mind.

OK, I had almost every GI Joe toy growing up. I also watched the cartoon. Being a young kid during the 80's was awesome. As far as I am concerned, the toys and the cartoons from that era are the best. However, after first seeing the preview for GI Joe, and seeing that they now wore mech suits...... I had very low expectations for the movie. Just figured they were trying yet another way to milk money off of the remainder of 80's cartoons/ re-imaging.

However, I have to say, even though there was a little cheesiness to it, I really enjoyed this movie. This movie is based off a toy/cartoon/comic book. It isn't like other comics that could be deep, or thought provoking. It was always mainly about action, cool weapons, good guys and bad guys, getting caught and then escaping. This movie is just that. A action movie from start to finish. Has enough of a storyline to make it from beginning to end, but is mainly about the action. It doesn't give you a lot of back story to the characters. You do get a couple flashbacks, just so you know who people are, and how they are connected. But this isn't really an origins movie. I think some people were expecting some kind of epic movie experience. This movie is not that! This is a popcorn/ summer action movie/ and a way to relive some childhood memories for those of us who grew up watching the cartoon, or playing with the toys.

For those of you complaining about plot holes, and/or unbelievable science......... come on!!! What about the original cartoons was so believable??? This is fantasy!!!

I will admit though, although I did like the movie, some of the special effects were not that good. There were a few times during the movie where I saw something that just looked too fake, and I was like ... "that is just cheesy". But overall, it was a fun movie. Definitely not one I regret going to see.

G. I Joe: The Rise of Cobra is really dumb, full of bad CG and has some terrible character designs but it's still good fun that's extremely over the top and action packed. Channing Tatum gives a really good lead performance and Dennis Quaid, Sienna Miller, Marlon Wayans, Rachel Nichols and Byung-Hun Lee are all good. Stephen Sommers' direction is great, it's extremely well filmed if a little reliant on CG. It's well paced and the music by Alan Silvestri is good.

Normally when you see a blockbuster come out in August, it usually means that the movie isn't that great. That seems to be the case here because GI Joe is very bad. It's a movie, but it can hardly even be called a movie because it essentially is just an elaborate toy commercial as you can see when the Hasbro logo is shown before the film. This is actually the second movie to be produced by Hasbro this summer after Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen in June. There also seems to be a consistent pattern that the worst movies this year have been Hasbro productions.

If you're expecting to see a direct adaptation of the GI Joe cartoon, then that's not what you're going to get here. This is an upgrade in technology and that could actually be quite entertaining for the first hour of the film. It's a big problem when you could tell that a lot of work was put into the special effects and not so much on the character development. I honestly couldn't care for anyone in this movie and it didn't help that they were so annoying.

The plot is very simple. Basically all you need to know is that there are two sides, GI Joe vs. Cobra and they are fighting against each other. You are easily able to identify who is on which side.

The movie is directed by Stephen Sommers that previously did The Mummy, The Mummy Returns and Van Helsing. I actually haven't seen any of the movies in The Mummy series but I have seen Van Helsing and I did like it the first time I saw it. When I watched it recently it was actually quite dull. So, he isn't exactly a great director.

I guess I can briefly talk about the performances. You can't expect the acting in GI Joe to be anything special. In fact, it's quite terrible. No one is believable with these remarkably cheesy lines from the script. Even Dennis Quaid didn't impress me in this. I suppose this is a flaw that would be blamed on the writers, rather than the actors. I do know that Channing Tatum is terrible in anything that he's in. Marlon Waylons was also in it doing the comic relief. I thought that he was funny at times, but mostly his jokes and just fell flat. I can't say more about the performances that hasn't already been mentioned.

The special effects in GI Joe were actually quite good at times, but it looked very fake at other times. Still, it saved it from becoming a complete disaster. I could say that I hated every scene in the movie, with the exception of the Paris scene which was the most fun I has with GI Joe and people seem to agree with me on that.

And of course it ends with characters holding guns and walking towards the camera because it's a stereotypical brainless action movie.

To conclude this review, I'm going to give GI Joe: The Rise of Cobra a 4/10. Still if you are a fan of brainless action movies, you might actually like GI Joe: The Rise of Cobra, but I still was very bad in my opinion.

Not the best made movie but I like for what it is. It could have been better. I still enjoy rewatching this.

I have to confess I'm not much of a G.I. Joe fan when I was a kid, partly because the other Hasbro product in transforming robots had more appeal to a boy than a bunch of plastic figures in military garb. The cartoon series too didn't convert me either, as it was up against a whole host of classic series from MASK to Silverhawks, Centurion to Starcomm. Ahh, the wonderful 80s to be growing up...

So while I do not hold G.I Joe in as high a regard as Transformers, between the two films this summer based on the Hasbro toys, I will unabashedly proclaim that G.I. Joe triumphs over the other by a long mile. Michael Bay in his second robot outing has proved to be a two-trick pony, relying on countless of larger than large explosions - hardly a frame passes by without being engulfed in an inferno - and of course, Ms Fox's bouncing assets in slow motion. While one can afford to leave one's brains at the door for popcorn flicks such as these, Bay had forgotten than they have to be basically fun to watch, and magically he had dumbed Transformers down to a mind-numbing bore.

Enter Stephen Sommers, who had a couple of box office successes with the action-adventure genre in The Mummy movies, so this guy obviously knows what he's doing, and it shows. Forget the excuse of a story just to link up the big set action pieces, and it is precisely in the action that Sommers understood when to show restraint, add in a dash of humour, pepper it with proper camera angles, though of course still unable to buckle the trend of slowing things down just before any impact. Slow motion unfortunately is here to stay I guess.

There are obviously some updates to this big budgeted flick, that while it's still a military- type based movie per se, some common sensibilities have crept in. No more are the soldiers "Real American" heroes (though that iconic phrase still managed a mention), and a more inclusive (but still token in a way) United Nations type best-of-the-best elite troopers get invited to this highly classified unit blessed with unlimited budget for high tech weapons and toys. Unlike Bay's invasion-and-conquer type of US troopers, these guys do get arrested after they unleash their weapons of mass destruction, diplomatic immunity not withstanding afterwards. And of course having futuristic toys help to lift this into fantasy-land, than an all out US Military commercial selling the virtues of why Uncle Sam needs you.

Sommers also managed to blend in the myriad of characters from the beloved toy lines and series, akin to what Bryan Singer managed to pull off with X-Men, but of course without the cerebral material to go along. Everything here is plain and simple, with black being black and white being white. It doesn't get bogged down with trying to tell the origin stories of everyone, but does so at precise intervals. I suspect if there was going to be more movies, then the case dossiers of the Joes would get their respective air time.

Otherwise, like the subtitle mentioned, it's more of a bad guys take all film, where surprisingly the Joes always a step behind, from the first action sequence until the last. It was smart too that the film had action over land, sea and air, covering a wide range of military operations to mop up a growing conspiracy involving arms dealers and nano- technology that doesn't seem to far fetched (in fact also seen before in other science fiction films). The best part of course is echoing some sentiments whenever opportunity allows in lambasting a superpower's policies, including a subtle jibe that most of the world's terrorist type problems, stem from ineptness and how the monster came to grow from within.

G.I. Joe was much better than expected as pure entertainment, and you really shouldn't give this a miss as it might just restore your faith in big-action summer popcorn flicks that takes a huge leaf out of their cartoon counterparts. A bevy of good looking, established stars in its casting also helped in making this watchable, even though some, like Ray Park, had to spend all his time behind a mask. See if you can spot an uncredited Brandan Fraser as well!

I enjoyed this movie when I was younger I rewatched it for back ground noise while playing some games and always felt myself pausing to watch it. It sucks you in there with all the explosions. Enjoyable plot but its not special. Special effects suck. All in all it was fun.

After the Transformers, it's G.I. Joe for more crazy summer action. Like Transformers, G.I. Joe (or Action Force) was also a brand of Hasbro toys featuring all kinds of combat figures and high-tech vehicles that fire a young boy's imagination. At the height of its popularity in the 1980s, the Action Force brand spawned a cartoon series, a Marvel comic and even an animated movie before fading away in the early 1990s.

Now it is set to rival Transformers: Revenge Of The Fallen at the box-office. I am not well acquainted with Action Force toys but I was totally immersed in the action right after the opening flashback. For those who have played with G.I. Joe toys as kids, this is definitely the chance to relive their wildest action fantasies...

The Plot: MARS Corporation, led by the dastardly James McCullen (Christopher Eccleston), has developed a 'nanomite' bomb that contains greenish particles capable of 'eating' metal and demolishing structures and vehicles in seconds. You can imagine that anyone who has the nanomite bomb will be able to control the world - which is what McCullen is trying to do with a secret organisation known as Cobra.

Sent out to get the bomb are the Baroness (Sienna Miller) and Storm Shadow (Lee Byung-hun) and trying to stop them are the elite G.I. Joe team led by General Hawk (Dennis Quaid). Leading members of the Joes team are Heavy Duty (Adewale Akinnuoye-Agbaje), Scarlett (Rachel Nichols), Snake Eyes (Ray Park) and Breaker (Saïd Taghmaoui). They are later joined by US Special Forces members, Duke (Channing Tatum) and Ripcord (Marlon Wayans) who provide the movie with its love story, romantic interests and comic relief, not to mention fast-paced action and thrills.

The Review: Indeed, director Stephen Sommers and his scripters (Stuart Beattie, David Elliot and Paul Lovett) seem obsessed with wanting to throw in everything from James Bond-type action, villains, underwater sets and romance to Star Wars battles, weapons and awe-inspiring gadgets. Sommers spares no expense in getting the stunts and scenes he wants and most of them are 'real cool'. Still, he takes time to provide the 'backgrounds' of the major characters, albeit in flashbacks so that they do not 'clash' with the main action and storyflow.

In the Transformers movies, the battle sequences are often blurred and confusing when we have trouble differentiating the good and bad robots. There is no such problem here. The chases and fight/stunt sequences are so spectacular and breath-taking - one of the most mind-boggling action pieces I have seen this summer. This especially applies to the Paris street chase sequence which has the Joes in accelerator suits hot on the heels of the Baroness in a reinforced Hummer.

Usually in action movies like this, performances take a back seat. However, I was pleasantly surprised by the chemistry between Tatum and Miller, and between Wayans and Nichols. Yeah, in the midst of all that zapping, clashing and crashing, Sommers wants us to know that 'the heart still goes on'. And of course, he ends with an intriguing narrative hook - provided by a subplot involving Zartan (played by Arnold Vosloo).

It has its flaws but this is an adrenaline-spiked 'Government-Issue' fun ride from start to end. - By Lim Chang Moh

I was very looking forward to the G.I. Joe film, not because I'm a fan of the toys or the animated series, but because I knew what to expect: tons of cool special effects and some really exciting action. And guess what? That's exactly what the film provides.

If there's something G.I. Joe is, it's an action movie. But unlike movies like Transformers 2, Sommers' motion picture actually succeeds at providing with wall-to-wall action. Unlike Michael Bay, he doesn't insert explosions every three seconds, and doesn't seem to have the need of shaking his camera like a madman so that the audience doesn't have a clue of what's happening. Yes, there is a lot of action in this movie, but it is of the comprehensible sort, meaning the viewer actually knows if his favorite characters are in danger and also has the opportunity of enjoying and being marveled by the special effects instead of watching balls of fire and tons of CGI that doesn't make sense. Sommers' approach to action is almost "old-fashioned", and I thanks him for that. Of course, that doesn't mean that all of the action sequences work beautifully; some of them are a little tiresome actually. There is no denying, though, that the Paris action set-piece is quite awesome, both in terms of special effects, and in terms of how excited and tense it made me feel.

Now, regarding the special effects... yes, they are by no means perfect, and yes, the film does have a sort-of artificial look from time to time, but it's nothing serious. Sommers always inserts a lot of computer-generated effects and other extravagances in his movies, and although these kinds of tricks have improved in quality during the last couple of years, it's always hard to make them look 100% realistic if you're inserting them virtually everywhere. (The movie doesn't have an infinite budget, after all.) Nevertheless, because the film doesn't take itself excessively seriously (unlike Revenge of the Fallen), these kinds of "mistakes" are allowed. I even accepted a final "revelation", which occurs during the last few minutes of runningtime, and which includes a "new" (and very cheesy) Darth Vader-looking bad guy. Why? Because I accepted the fact that this is a "toy movie", and that nothing (expect maybe some of the characters) should be taken too seriously.

Performances are what should be expected from this kind of movie. Not particularly strong, but not bad either. The standout is Sienna Miller, who is almost unrecognizable with black hair and dark glasses. (She looks really hot, though.) She seems to be having lots of fun playing the bad guy, and thus manages to create a very memorable and entertaining character. Rachel Nichols is cute and believable as Scarlett, and Marlon Wayans is great as Ripcord; he can be funny and dorky from time to time, but because he's also a pretty good soldier and because he's never too goofy, one can take his character (kinda) seriously. His flirting with Nichols was great, not only because it was fun, but because it was - for a lack of a better word - awesome to see an inter-racial romance making an appearance in a big-budget Hollywood blockbuster. Christopher Eccleston is effective as a megalomaniac villain, and despite their small parts, the likes of Dennis Quaid (always reliable, that bloke), Brendan Fraser and Jonathan Pryce (!) are memorable. The one disappointment, though, is Channing Tatum, who as Duke is almost as wooden as Hayden Christensen's Anakin Skywalker. He looks good during the action sequences, but that's about it.

The main reason, though, of why G.I. Joe is so much superior to Revenge of the Fallen (I know I'm comparing both movies a little too much, but it's almost unavoidable) is that the former actually has memorable and fun characters worth rooting for, while the latter has virtually no characters, and instead provides with a gazzilion CGI robots who look virtually all the same during the confusing action sequences. I like the fact that each Joe is given a back-story through flashbacks (the most interesting is definitely the one concerning Snake Eyes and his rival, Storm Shadow), and I also like the fact that, despite having very archetypical personalities, each character is instantly recognizable and played with style. The screenplay might not be particularly smart (although it's a million times wittier and organized than the one for Michael Bay's picture), but it accomplishes what it sets to do: provide with nice and entertaining characters, a plot that actually makes sense, and action sequences that don't feel repetitive or dull.

So has Stephen Sommers and his creative team managed to fulfill expectations? Well, considering buzz for the movie a couple of months ago was horribly negative, it won't be hard for the filmmakers to please their audience, but even if expectations had been higher, I don't think viewers would have emerged disappointed from theatres. I can say I was a Joe virgin before watching the movie; I knew nothing about the characters, the plot or the role of the "Cobra" organization in the series' mythos, but after watching the film, I am now more interested in everything related to it. Needless to say, the movie does do a really good job at presenting the characters and the plot to newbies, and I'm sure that for die-hard fans, it is a very entertaining and visually-pleasing way to revisit their favorite characters. With its comprehensible action, cool special effects, effective performances and mildly-interesting plot, G.I. Joe is one of the better big-budget action extravaganzas I've seen in some time. In short, what Transformers 2 should have been and sadly wasn't.

I see why The film has a low rating.

First of all the graphics are garbage. You could clearly see A lot of things aren't real. As well as some of the roles do not suit the actors. Like marlon's.

Also the story lacks deepness. Each character introductions wasn't good enough. There wasn't a lot of talking in the film action to action to action.

All that being said I found myself enjoying the film

A top secret organization known as G.I.Joe must take on an arms dealer hell bend on destroying parts of the world.

In watching the previews for this film the first thing that came to my mind was "This is going to suck". The over the top cheese factor was all over the previews. The suits they wear to make them run faster, jump higher, was ridiculous. Not to mention the horribly miscast lead of Tatum and the out of the blue decision to include Quaid. With all of this going against, I finished the film was a smile on my face. I was...wait for it....entertained.

I thought I was going to hate this film, it didn't feel like a G.I. Joe film to me, it felt like they were just cashing in on the character names and fan base. This still feels true, but the film has fun with itself and never tries to be more than the sum of its parts. When you compare it to other loud and dumb action films of the summer, like Transformers 2 and Wolverine, G.I. Joe is better.

The plot is inane and they do screw up some characters. They had a chance to do something special with the "Rise of Cobra" but the sequences of his "flashback" seem wasted. The character himself is weird and nothing what I, or the fans for the most part, expected. Is he bad? In those terms yes, but for some strange reasons he works in this film. He was more interesting than any of the other characters. Scarlett is heavily underwritten as is Heavy Duty. In the realms of this film they do their job, heavy gunner and sex pot. Duke, the aforementioned Tatum is the main character and Tatum plays it wooden. He has a relationship with the Baroness, but it's hastily thrown together and doesn't have the weight it should. The is the same for Cobra and his relationships in the film.

The special effects are mixed here, sometimes it looks horrible, such as Destro's face and the obvious green screen moments. Other times it blends in relatively well with the action scenes. The attack on the Joes and the Paris chase sequences are well done and thrilling. I get excited seeing a group of highly trained "bad-guys" fight highly trained "good-guys". I would guess that's why I liked the movie as much as I did. That and every scene with Snake Eyes. Who, for a character who doesn't speak, has more back story to him than most of the other characters.

This film is not as bad as everyone says it is, it is pure popcorn entertainment with over the top action sequences and some cheese. The 3rd act takes place underwater and there are fight sequences in underwater vehicles. It's a neat spin on the space battles you see in Star Wars. I expected trash, got high-octane entertainment. I might be really generous with this score and on a second viewing it might go lower, but as I said before...I was entertained.