SNAKE EYES – GI JOE, ORIGINS
2021, 121 minutes, Colour.
Henry Golding, Andrew Koji, Haruka Abe, Peter Mensah, Ursula Corbero, Samara Weaving.
Directed by Robert Schwentke.
Best to familiarise oneself with the Hasbro characters and stories, the previous films, GI Joe, Rise of Cobra and Retaliation, so that one is on the wavelength of what is happening in this rather complicated plot.
While there are sequences in the United States, especially at the Port of Los Angeles at the opening of the film, the main action takes place in Japan, sequences of urban Tokyo and high-rise, countryside sequences at an elaborate Japanese mansion. In fact, it plays more like a Japanese action film than an American production.
As regards Hasbro and GI Joe, the focus this time is on a young boy, bonded with his father, then witnessing his death at the hands of Cobra – only at the end to get to know that his father is one of the GI Joe special squad. The boy has grown up consumed with the desire for revenge on his father’s killer. We first see him as Snake Eyes, an adult playing in vicious cage fights, then approached by a Japanese businessman to work for him, persuading the young man that he will be able to find his father’s killer.
As mentioned, there are the Los Angeles wharves and the young man working in the fish market, smuggling weapons inside the gutted fish for export. He tangles with a bearded young worker who is then threatened by toughs, but defended by the hero, bonding with him, discovering that he is the head of a family household, invited to stay when they arrive in Japan, meeting the grandmother who is head of the clan, a young woman who is the security chief and other staff. He is offered the opportunity to become part of the clan if he successfully meets three challenges.
But, it is much more complicated than that, the hero actually ambiguous in his loyalties, ready to betray if he gets more information about his father’s killer, surviving various challenges (including giant snakes and a pit – which will play an important role, of course, in a final confrontation with the arch-villain)? And, despite a blood pledge, he steals the family jewel which has extraordinary powers of igniting fires which destroy buildings and foes.
And all this offers the opportunity for many, many, fights along the way, fists, swords – and, when it seems too hard, the Indiana Jones’ gun solution. And, there are car chases, bike chases, gymnastics over the cars.
And, since this is a story of origins, the end builds up a conflict between the two alleged friends, Snake Eyes not killing his father’s murderer, trying to become more pure in heart, invited by the GI Joe representative (Samara Weaving), but the hero turned villain choosing to call himself Storm Shadow, both of whom appeared as characters in the previous films.
Mainly for those who like this kind of action show and those who are wondering about the origins of Snake Eyes and Storm Shadow.
