G.I. Joe: No Critics Allowed

by Shawn Lampron | Tuesday, August 4, 2009

According to Yahoo, G.I. Joe: The Rise of Cobra will not be shown to critics.  Among those who follow movies like Chris and yours truly, this is usually a frightening bit of news.  Often, the studio has a turkey so enormous that they’re hoping for as few reviews as possible heading into that first week.  That way, they can get that first big week of receipts until word of mouth puts the movie into the proverbial toilet.

However, this is somewhat of a mixed message when it comes to G.I. Joe: The Rise of Cobra.  A few reviewers have managed to see it, and so far, the reviews are mostly favorable.  It’s scoring a healthy 91% on Rotten Tomatoes.  For a stupid, summer movie comparison, Transformers 2 is wallowing in the 20% region, despite its success amongst people who watch movies for boobs, cars, special effects, and as little thinking as possible.  So, it would seem there’s hope for G.I. Joe: The Rise of Cobra.  Harry Knowles, the geek supreme of movie reviews, has even given it a favorable review.  However, as Harry acknowledges in a response to a reader, he gave Van Helsing a positive review.  Despite his defense that he admitted Van Helsing was dumb and fun, I’m wary of trusting the man.

Personally, I’m taken aback by the lack of buzz for this movie.  Perhaps I’m not being observant, but it seems that this movie is getting the least fanfare and press of any big, dumb summer movie in a long time.  Each Transformers movie led to robots being on everything in the toy aisle to the M&M bags in the candy aisle.  While I’ve seen a few tie-ins, I’m not seeing the out and out marketing blitz I expected.  For all the positive reviews, this is worrisome.  Are they trying to save some money on the marketing end because the movie won’t gross?

Another worry is the whispers that they had to re-edit the movie several times.  However, all the official reports shoot that down.  Still, it worries me that rumors state the movie had to be edited intensely just so the plot would make some semblance of sense.  I’m already planning a search for unreasonable plot holes when/if I see this.  Despite the positive spins, I’m not putting a lot of faith in this movie.  I can’t say I’m disappointed since my expectations have been low since this movie was announced.  Anybody have any news or thoughts on this?

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