G.I. Jane (1997)

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Jordan O'Neil (Demi Moore) is a Naval Intelligence officer recruited by a conniving U.S. senator (Anne Bancroft, with a terrible Texan drawl) to become the first female to train in the Navy SEAL program. Every male between Washington D.C. and her training base in Florida are against the idea, which serves to get Jordan's moxie all riled up, but then she falls victim to political shenanigans.

This isn't a complicated film, but the film makers throw the audience into the fray without time to get to know Jordan, so I really didn't care whether she makes it or not. We are given little glimpses into her personal life, but nothing that makes you stand up and say "Go, Jordan!" Viggo Mortensen's chief training officer comes off as psychotic, and the other recruits who learn to eventually respect Jordan -no grudging, dramatic salute, thank God- meld together into a half dozen cliches. Most of the male politicians and military officers are cigar-chomping misogynists with backwater Southern accents. My father was an Air Force officer, but it's too bad he didn't join the Navy! The parties! The champagne! Rubbing elbows with the political elite! Cool! Scott's direction of the impressive cast is fine, but Hugh Johnson's cinematography is all wrong. The training scenes look like they were shot during a forest fire, and can no one in an interior room scene find a light switch or lamp? Indoor shots are comically dark, the scene set during a senate committee confirmation hearing for the new Secretary of the Navy (Daniel von Bargen) is pretty to look at but has no basis in reality whatsoever. The final coincidental action scene feels tacked on, Scott must have had some leftover rental time on his fog machines. I remember when this film came out, and the biggest news was that Moore shaved her head. No one could see what that infamous plot point would do at the Academy Awards almost twenty-five years later.

I finally saw "G.I. Jane," and now I can go on with my life. Dis-missed!

Stats:
(1997) 125 min. (* *) out of five stars
-Directed by Ridley Scott
-Screenplay by David Twohy and Danielle Alexandra, Story by Danielle Alexandra
-Cast: Demi Moore, Viggo Mortensen, Anne Bancroft, Jason Beghe, Daniel von Bargen, John Michael Higgins, Jim Caviezel, David Vadim, Kevin Gage, David Warshofsky, Morris Chestnut, Josh Hopkins, Boyd Kestner
(R)