Not quite the sleazy Nicolas Cage casino film of 1998, this Snake Eyes is sleazy in a whole arsenal of different ways. Snake Eyes 2021 is a member of the GI Joe family of films, and –as such- it might be the best one seeing as how little GI Joe crap there is in it. Most of the film takes place in Japan, and the title character, Snake Eyes (Henry Golding) isn’t part of the GI Joe team during the timeline of the film – so, hey, right off the bat it has two things going for it that most GI Joe films do not.
Make no mistake, however: this ain’t a great film and nobody should mistake it for one.
I’ll try to get into the plot, but the point of this film is dudes fighting other dudes … for good reasons, for bad reasons, for ugly reasons, or just because they’re there. Don’t worry that you might not see two dudes fight one another because they’re on the same side; that will change. Just wait. As a kid, Snake Eyes watched his dad get aced by the mob. The hitman offered a dice roll salvation and dad rolled, you guessed it, “Snake Eyes.” Doesn’t that mean “Snake Eyes” should be the dad’s nickname, not the kid’s? Never mind. Years of punishment later, Snake Eyes gets the ability to avenge his father by joining a Yakuza gang … and using that connection to defy his gang to gain the trust of a Japanese Warlord … but secretly using that connection to collect an ancient weapon to trade with the original gang for news about his father. I think this is called the “Long Con,” but since it’s Asian, maybe it’s called the “Long Duk Con.”
It doesn’t really matter. The point is the fighting, the endless fighting. There’s a bunch of “Bowling Pin” fights in this film – that’s where a unarmed man hurls himself into a phalanx of guys with swords and several enemy combatants fall down never to come up again.
In one almost clever scene, our hero and his charge try to escape in the cab of a semi, but the bad guys are upon them too soon and stick their swords in the windshield, each one coming perilously close, but not hitting
either man … say, fellas, did you ever try sticking your sword where they are sitting? Maybe you could try that?
One of the screenwriters is named “Joe Shrapnel.” Well, what screenplay did you expect a guy named “Shrapnel” to write? A Jane Austen period romance?
Snake Eyes himself has one of the greatest ratios of cool name/mediocre skill set in movie history. There’s no question that “Snake Eyes” is a great nickname. Who wouldn’t want that? And you’d expect it to belong to a great fighter, right? In action, however, this Snake Eyes gets his ass kicked in just about every fight he has regardless of opponent. It’s kind of like discovering “The Sultan of Swat” is a light-hitting utility infielder or “His Airness” rides pine and only comes in during garbage time.
As I said upstairs, this film is buoyed by an almost complete lack of GI Joe stuff, which is great, because then it can only fail on its own merits, which it does. But, hey, swords. If you’re a fan of GI Joe films, this is probably the best one.
The next in the GI Joe relapse
Is a screenplay on the verge of collapse
No need to adapt
“Snake Eyes” is apt
Because I think this film just rolled craps
Rated PG-13, 121 Minutes
Director: Robert Schwentke
Writer: Evan Spiliotopoulos, Joe Shrapnel, Anna Waterhouse
Genre: Guess who’s the good guy, now
Type of being most likely to enjoy this film: Do you like films where people fight, a lot, for good reasons and bad?
Type of being least likely to enjoy this film: Realists
