Why Paramount isn’t showing “G.I. Joe” to critics

Here’s an AP article about why Paramount isn’t showing “G.I. Joe” to critics. All I can say is that if they were so worried by the “critical trashing ‘Transformers: Rise of the Fallen’ received,” then what do they have to fear? Here in KC, there’s been lots of advance screenings, but the press were intentionally kept out. We had a screening we were invited to that was actually canceled. When they say they “want audiences to define this film,” what they mean is that they want to get one big box office weekend in before word gets out that it’s terrible. After all, they’ve got $175 million to recoup.

You know those people who say: “Well, if it’s number one, somebody must like it!” Wrong. It means a lot of somebodies WANTED to like it. They liked the idea of it. The ad campaign. The stars, maybe. But people pay BEFORE they see a film, not afterwards.

This story is a joke. It’s a piece of regurgitated PR. Enjoy!

Associated Press
Posted: Tue., Aug. 4, 2009, 8:24am
Paramount won’t show ‘Joe’
Studio denies critics a sneak peek
By Christy Lemire, ASSOCIATED PRESS

It’s the biggest movie of the summer that practically no one has seen.

“G.I. Joe: The Rise of Cobra” opens Friday, but Paramount Pictures isn’t screening the blockbuster for critics beforehand. Only a select few writers from blogs and movie Web sites have seen it for review - such as Harry Knowles, the self-professed “Head Geek” from Ain’t It Cool News - and their opinions have been mostly positive.

Instead, the studio says it’s intentionally aiming the movie at the heartland, at cities and audiences outside the entertainment vortexes of New York and Los Angeles. Paramount held a screening Friday for 1,000 military service members and their families at Andrews Air Force Base; it’s also focusing marketing efforts in places like Kansas City, Charlotte, N.C., and Columbus, Ohio.

While appealing to a sense of patriotism nationwide, the plan also is inspired by the disparity that existed between the critical trashing “Transformers: Rise of the Fallen” received and the massive crowds it drew at the box office.

“`G.I. Joe’ is a big, fun, summer event movie - one that we’ve seen audiences enjoy everywhere from Andrews Air Force Base in Maryland to Phoenix, Ariz.,” said Rob Moore, vice chairman of Paramount Pictures. “After the chasm we experienced with `Transformers 2′ between the response of audiences and critics, we chose to forgo opening-day print and broadcast reviews as a strategy to promote `G.I. Joe.’ We want audiences to define this film.”

With a reported production budget of $175 million and a cast that includes Dennis Quaid, Channing Tatum, Sienna Miller, Marlon Wayans and Joseph Gordon-Levitt, “G.I. Joe” follows the adventures of an elite team using high-tech spy and military equipment to take down a corrupt arms dealer. It comes from director Stephen Sommers, whose previous films include “The Mummy” and “Van Helsing.”

Long before anyone saw the completed product, though, “G.I. Joe” drew mixed buzz at best for its trailer, which premiered during the Super Bowl. Now it’s the final action picture of the summer - and it has a lot in common with the highest-grossing film so far this year, the “Transformers” sequel. Both are effects-laden spectacles based on Hasbro toys and both are Paramount releases from producer Lorenzo di Bonaventura.

“Transformers” has gone on to gross more than $388 million in the United States alone since its opening six weeks ago, despite receiving just 20 percent positive reviews on the Web site Rotten Tomatoes, a critical aggregator. The withholding of “G.I. Joe” from mainstream critics suggests that the studios believe they can succeed at the box office without them.

It’s a tactic normally reserved for horror movies or other genre pictures with built-in fans who don’t necessarily care about reviews - ones based on video games, for example - not summer blockbusters. Still, “G.I. Joe” has been tracking well because it represents the last big bang of the season, said Paul Dergarabedian, box-office analyst for Hollywood.com.

“They don’t need (to screen) it and there’s no upside to negative reviews. The film is going to open well no matter what,” Dergarabedian said. “They’re being very strategic in who they show the movie to. If they can win over their core audience from these reviews, that’s good for the movie.”

Devin Faraci from the film Web site CHUD.com is one of the few writers who have seen it for review purposes, and not just for junket interviews. He’s among the critics who’ve contributed to the movie’s 88-percent positive rating as tabulated by Rotten Tomatoes, saying: “If I was 10 years old, `G.I. Joe’ would be one of the best movies I had ever seen.”

Faraci said he was in Toronto recently when he received a phone call at 8:30 a.m. Los Angeles time, asking if he could come to the Paramount lot that day for a “G.I. Joe” screening. He flew back, got off the plane and headed right over.

“It’s silly. It’s a film that plays on its own terms,” he said. “I don’t think reviews will kill it but I think it’ll get a more positive response than they expect. It’s a big, silly, pulpy, cartoony action film and it makes no apologies for being that way.”

Tags: box office, critics, expensive, G.I. Joe, isn't, no, paramount, press, screening, showing, sucks, why

Chicago Sun-Times film critic Roger Ebert, in his increasingly angry and fun-to-read Roger Ebert’s Journal has once again hit the nail on the head. His subject? The fact that movie critics everywhere are getting fired and thoughtful reviews are being replaced by celebrity news briefs about Britney’s clubgoing or cute bits about how Suri “won’t wear pants.”

I quote: “The celebrity culture is infantilizing us. We are being trained not to think. It is not about the disappearance of film critics. We are the canaries. It is about the death of an intelligent and curious readership, interested in significant things and able to think critically.”

I have been thinking about printing some kind of critic’s creed for this site, something that attacks “critics” who spend half of their review summarizing plot and/or making snide remarks about the actors in the film they are reviewing, rather than getting involved on any sort of deeper level with the movie itself. Ebert wrote his own personal Little Rule Book just last month. (Examples: Provide a sense of the experience, Advise the readers well, Keep track of your praise.)

Don’t get me wrong. Celebrity culture has its place. It’s not for me, but I get why it exists. It’s just that when I go see a movie, I like to get lost in it. I don’t want to be thinking about Suri’s dressing habits or Tom jumping on the couch when I watch “Mission: Impossible III.” I want to believe, for two hours, that superspy Ethan Hunt fears for the life of the girl he loves. Or that sexist evangelist Frank Mackie from “Magnolia” has a secret buried in his past that makes him say vile things in public and make a tremendous amount of money from them.

That’s because I love the mystery and magic of filmmaking. That’s why I do this site. I love to see films, write about films, discuss films, and examine how they reflect my life and how they open my eyes to others’ lives. Film is culture, that’s all there is to it. Anyone who doesn’t see that isn’t thinking about what they see.

Ebert mentions several great film critics whose prose is as good as their content. I’m always working on both and I’m never quite content with what I write, but I always strive to get better—more focused, more insightful, honest. There are/were also plenty of of lazy-ass critics out there who love to be the first ones to see and pass judgment on a film and really think nothing of it. I’ve seen plenty. In print and in person. They like nothing better than wielding what little power they have, and think very little about the consequences of words and comments tossed off so nonchalantly.

One reason people are becoming so pissed off at critics is because most of them are so formulaic and boring to read. Reviewing film is not a checklist activity. You don’t go right on down the line and talk about every little technical issue without discussing overall content and culture. The cinematography may be beautiful to look at in “Australia,” but how does that relate to the story? What is the filmmaker telling us? Is it different from what he thinks he’s telling us? Are there mixed messages being sent? The neo-realistic puke-cam look of “The Blair Witch Project” advanced that film’s purpose a thousand times better than the big-budget excess of “Australia” because the horror movie’s design was absolutely tied into its lack of budget.

If reviewing movies is different, then, from simply commenting on whether the acting was ”astounding” or the set design was “marvelous,” what is it that bugs you about movie reviews? (I’ll tell you what bugs me: Quote-whore critics who throw one-word value-judgment adjectives in movie ads.) What would you like to see writers avoid? What are you tired of? Or, what would you like to read more of? Now is your chance to sound off.

I hope you will start thinking soon, because it won’t be long before you will be a scene-stealer. Big changes are on the way here at Scene-Stealers.com, and soon this site will be allow YOU to be the critic. Ever wonder how that line gets drawn in the sand between a “credible” critic and everyone else? We are going to kick it right back in the faces of anyone who doesn’t think our opinions about movies matter. We’re the ones they make them for, after all.

Now it’s their turn to listen to us.

Tags: celebrity, critics, cult, ebert, little, movie, news, opinions, quote whores, review, roger, rules, scene-stealers creed, suck, why