G. I. JANE
1/2
Back from a couple of commercially and critically failed projects (WHITE SQUALL,
1492) in recent years, maestro director Ridley Scott gets his hands dirty this
time with sweat, guns, mud and women.
Demi Moore, possibly the most expensive actress money can hire nowadays, plays Lt. Jordan O'Neil -- a military specialist involved in deployment of special operatives in covert operations. Early in the movie, her talents become apparent to the audience as she successfully turns a doomed mission around. a success. Meanwhile, back in the capital, Senator Lilian DeHaven (Anne Bancroft) takes a shot at the US military by fanning fire over the issue of women not being allowed to participate in certain sections of the US military force. To prove her point that women can also perform up to par with their male counterparts, she chooses O'Neil to join in her crusade. O'Neil is selected to undergo the intensive and gruesome US SEALs training, the most highly skilled military members of the US Armed Forces.
Moore looks totally out of place in the male-dominated training programme, but
coolly keep herself composed and strong during the first few days. As we soon
discover, the training is not the only thing that O'Neil will have to go
through. Other problems include taunts from her male counterparts, the
military's interests in makng her quit ASAP, the sadistic training conductor
Master Chief Urgayle (Viggo Mortenson) and an unfolding scandal involving the
Senator herself. Despite all these obstacles, her sheer determination and
wit allows her to shine among her training-mates, winning their approval and
most of all, their respect. When all seems just well, military officials who
have been on her back since she started training jumps on the opportunity of
getting her expelled after gaining possession of photographs of one of her
outing with her female friends, on the account that she is a lesbian. O'Neil
then discovers that the Senator's ambition is not as noble as it seems. Threatening
to blow the lid of the whole operation, she manages to force the
senator to put her back into training. Needless to to say, as if it was
not expected of any Hollywood fare, she completes her training with flying
colours and even was able to save her mates in a real mission while at it.
Demi Moore fits the role of O'Neil perfectly with her husky voice, confident
presence and surprisingly fit physique. She definitely beefed up for this movie
and the film actually dedicated a couple of minutes to workout scenes, which were a bit too
long and overdramatic for me actually. While those scenes showed her
determination and strength, I can't help but imagine that I was watching one of
those late-night ads advertising some tummy-toning machine. Viggo Mortenson's
potrayal of Master Chief Urgayle is worth mentioning here. He performs well in
all those tight close-up scenes. G.I.JANE has quite a good story going for it
but in a way, it does not stand out because of the method the screenwriters went
about to present in through film, which really does smell like something out of
the TOP GUN factory. Ridley Scott's work does not show in any way either. After
giving us gems like BLADE RUNNER, ALIEN and BLACK RAIN, G.I.JANE passes off as
any other typical Hollywood fare, trying too hard at times. Still, G.I.JANE is
not too bad watch, it should be able to pass of as a semi-action, semi-drama
film.
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