Product Description
-------------------
“The greatest American Heroes are back”* and they’ve been set up
to take the fall for a terrible crime they didn’t commit. Now,
the G.I. Joes must once again face their mortal enemy, Cobra, as
well as dangerous new threats operating within the government.
When all else fails, one option remains: Retaliation. Roadblock
(Dwayne Johnson) leads a new team (including Bruce Willis) on
this explosive adventure that critics are calling "unlike any
action movie you've ever seen. A thrilling ride that leaves you
wanting more!"**
*Julian Roman, MOVIEWEB.COM,
**Raquel Baldwin, Talking Pictures (ABC/CW)
Special Features:
* G.I. Joe: Declassified: Mission Briefing / Two Ninjas / Cobra
Strikes / The Lone Soldiers / The Monastery / Fort Sumter
* Deleted Scenes: Pakistani President Assassinated / Interns /
Arlington
.co.uk Review
-------------
For everyone who rolled their eyes even as they were secretly
digging 2009's G.I. Joe: The Rise of Cobra as a guilty pleasure
(not to mention giving it big box-office clout), this rejiggered
sequel will probably prove irresistible. Hasbro and Hollywood
have successfully created a franchise based on toy action figures
that were introduced almost 50 years ago, now featuring all the
s, glory, and apocalyptic politics of the modern age. Along
with that come the heights of preous circumstances and
childish fantasy that any $200-plus million action movie
requires. The video game quality and action figure/comic book
childishness notwithstanding, G.I. Joe: Retaliation is anything
but childlike with its incalculable body count, physical carnage,
and extreme fetishisation of violence and techno armaments.
Feeling cocky from their vanquishing the evil Cobra organisation
in the first movie, the Joes are all the more ready to save the
world from itself, making clandestine forays into North Korea and
Pakistan with deadly precision. (The dizzying assault on a
Pakistani weapons base is genuinely spectacular.) What they don't
know is that Cobra has been lying in wait, and that the free
world's Commander in Chief (Jonathan Pryce, having a fine time)
is being impersonated by the nefarious Cobra operative Zartan
(Arnold Vosloo). In the guise of a benevolent leader seeking
world nuclear disarmament, "President" Zartan discredits and
wipes out all but three of the Joe force. Fortunately Dwayne
Johnson is among them, and every moviegoer knows he's pretty much
an army of one. The script is so whiz-bang fast and full of
impossibly extravagant CGI-enhanced eye-poppery that any synopsis
would be akin to, well, 10-year-olds smashing three-inch action
figures into each other and making up a narrative to go along
with their guttural sound effects. And isn't that a pretty good
description of escapism? Mention must be made of an incredible
sustained set piece staged on sheer Himalayan cliffs where
-wielding ninjas soar on ropes in an elaborate choreography
that is as inventive as it is thrilling. The finale explodes at
historic Fort Sumter, of all places, where the faceless Cobra
Commander showdowns with the revivified Joes during "The
President's" bogus disarmament summit. The cast is adequate in
portraying good or bad real-life action figures with funny names
and unbreakable bodies. Bruce Willis seems very happy chomping in
to a glorified cameo as the retired Joe commander. Though the
Joes carry the day and glory can be cled, it should be noted
that a sequel is teed up perfectly, especially in light of the
fact that Cobra pretty much succeeds in its world-domination plan
by obliterating the whole of London and its eight million
inhabitants. It is the most extreme of money s, rendered with
loving detail; but don't worry, kids, it's only a movie. --Ted
Fry