Moore gives another fatiguing performance in 'G.I. Jane'

August 27, 1997
Web posted at: 4:24 p.m. EDT (2024 GMT)

From Reviewer Paul Tatara

(CNN) -- Let me state right off the bat that Demi Moore (registered trademark) bugs the living hell out of me.

First and foremost, she's a painfully joyless, humorless actress whose sole near-performance is in "Ghost," and that's only by default, because she gets to sink her teeth into 25 or 30 crying jags.

Outside of that, she seems to think that she's carrying some kind of banner for the unwashed masses of women out there who haven't had the good fortune to receive a magnificent set of implants, and don't have the time to obsessively hone their tummy muscles.

"G.I. Jane" - movie trailer 1 min. 51 sec. VXtreme video "G.I. Jane" - movie clip 940K/21 sec. QuickTime movie

On film and in magazine spreads alike, Moore displays her breasts as if they're a dual Red Badge of Courage. I got the biggest laugh when she acted like she was striking a chord for the Sisterhood by earning 12 million bucks to yank her shirt off in "Striptease." I'm fairly certain that Meryl Streep can do without this kind of trail-blazing.

"G.I. Jane" suggests a cross between producer/director Taylor Hackford ("An Officer and A Gentleman," "Against All Odds") and Leni Riefenstahl, who filmed the 1934 pro-Hitler propaganda documentary "Triumph of the Will."

Where's the acting?

"G.I. Jane" features the ultimate Moore performance, substituting, as it does, sit-ups and one-armed push-ups for the more bothersome form of communication known as "acting."

After a powerful U.S. senator (a sometimes not-bad Anne Bancroft) makes a big stink about the lack of women in military combat positions, Moore is hand-picked to become the first female to train with the elite Navy SEALS.

This is perfect territory for Moore, who, in recent years, has shown an ever-growing propensity toward the "Tom Cruises." Like Cruise, her movie persona repeatedly (and loudly) announces her physical and emotional superiority to us mere mortals. (It's even pointed out, when Bancroft is perusing applicants, that Moore's character is very good at writing essays!)

"G.I. Jane" gives her the chance to finally train with the big boys, in a hyper sado-masochistic endurance test that after a while starts to resemble a dimly lit, fatigue-covered level of hell that Dante somehow neglected to tell us about.

'Pain is our friend'

The SEALS program (as portrayed in the film) is so mindlessly brutal, you'd be more likely to kill an entire phalanx of sailors with it, rather than prepare them for any kind of combat. Under the steely, sneering gaze of the Master Chief (played by Viggo Mortensen with sunglasses in place, the better to lift from "Cool Hand Luke,") Moore and her comrades get huge, weighted drums rolled over them, do hundreds of push-ups in the ocean surf, get fed by hand out of garbage cans, and are kept awake for hours by obscenity-screaming platoon leaders.

And this is during the FIRST DAY! "Pain is our friend," we're told, but it didn't look like anybody I'd ever volunteer to go to a ballgame with.

I'm inclined to think that only a very desperate person would need this kind of pumped-up degradation to develop a sense of self-worth, but Moore is packing enough backbone to lift Detroit onto her shoulders.

In fact, when she complains to the commanding officer, it's not because of how hard it all is, but because they're being too easy on her! This only makes sense because, as we all know, Demi can do hundreds of push-ups, thousands of sit-ups, bring home the bacon, fry it up in a pan, and never-ever let you forget you're a man.

Pretending to deal with social issues

She's like a cross between Dolph Lundgren, Jayne Mansfield, and a bulldozer. In one supposedly inspiring scene, she chooses to shave her own head, finally completing her chosen career trajectory by becoming a taut-skinned ball-peen hammer. Of course, Moore's character doth protest too much by saying things like, "I'm not interested in becoming some poster girl for women's rights." If I were a woman, I would give her wish by wholeheartedly endorsing someone else as my spokesperson.

The story occasionally starts to toy with real issues, but this is just a Rambo movie that's pretending to deal with social questions as a smoke screen.

At the point that the Master Chief pretends to rape her in front of the other sailors (in a humiliating, ridiculous sequence in which he and his cohorts actually torture the SEALS, apparently to show them what it's like), Moore settles things by kicking him near-unconscious while her hands are tied behind her back. In the last act, she actually risks her neck to save this same animal from the blazing barrels of a bunch of marauding Libyans. Forgive and forget, I guess.

The message seems to be that the better spirits of a human being (male or female) can be ground down into a powder, but as long as they're replaced by a savage enough self- possession, you're still on the side of the angels. And this is supposed to be inspiring.

The movie is directed by Ridley Scott, but the credit should more properly read "driven into your skull by ... " Moore, Scott, and screenwriters David Twohy and Danielle Alexandra have managed to turn feminism into a TV wrestling match. It's all quite pathetic, and remember, as Bancroft's character says at one point, "Nothing is final until you've seen it on CNN." I'm assuming she includes the Internet.

"G.I. Jane" is a demeaning, violent, bloody workout video. Some brief nudity, bad language and a false sense of human resilience. Rated R. 115 minutes.

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Related sites:

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• G.I. Jane - from Cinema1
• G.I. JANE - official site

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