The star of the new Snake Eyes: G.I. Joe Origins film, Henry Golding, has said that the attention to cultural detail in the film is amazing. After two modest attempts at bringing Hasbro’s G.I. Joe to live-action form, with 2009’s Rise of the Cobra and 2013’s G.I. Joe Retaliation (starring Dwayne Johnson), Paramount will now reboot the G.I. Joe franchise with the upcoming Snake Eyes project. Henry Golding will star as the popular title character, and the film will explore his back-story and how he became the deadly ninja commando. It will also star Samara Weaving as Scarlett, Andrew Koji as Storm-Shadow, and it has director Robert Schwentke (Red) leading the charge.
Snake Eyes started filming last fall in Vancouver before moving onto Japan in January, and it concluded its production in February. Unfortunately, like most films this year, due to the coronavirus pandemic, G.I. Joe’s spinoff was delayed. It will now release in October 2021 instead of 2020. However, Golding has still been keeping fans informed and excited for his upcoming film, from describing his first week on set as “hell” to calling Snake Eyes “a far throw from what we’ve seen thus far.” Now, the star has given even more details about the film’s Japanese touch.
In an interview with EW, where Golding discussed his most recent film Monsoon, and also the upcoming Snake Eyes film, the actor described what made the upcoming Joe film different, including the inspiration from Japan:
"Robert is a huge Japanese cinephile, everything from [Akira] Kurosawa to just the phenomenal Spaghetti Westerns of samurai movies," Golding comments. "He is so hooked into that history and we see some of those scenes. With some of the fight scenes there are some chimbara sequences." Meaning, Japanese sword-fighting. "A lot of attention to cultural detail was put into this movie. There are not a lot of movies that are allowed to film in Japan and we went to some amazing, amazing places. The authenticity is there."
Considering the background of Snake Eyes and that a big part of his character’s history is when he trains in Japan alongside Storm-Shadow under the tutelage of the Hard-Master, it’s promising to here that the film’s eye for cultural detail in Japan is strong, as it may also help create a more grounded character story as well. The insight into some of the action scenes also seems to tie into what Golding has said previously, that the film is “much more of a martial arts film,” which sounds appropriate and promising for fans of the Snake Eyes character.
Although the first-look of Snake Eyes was likely delayed due to the release date being pushed back a year, Golding’s continuous insight does seem to suggest that this could be the film to finally successfully launch a G.I. Joe universe. Paramount and Hasbro will no doubt be banking on the Golding starrer being a success, as they are reportedly already planning a new film post-Snake Eyes. Whether or not Snake Eyes is as “insane” or its cultural detail is as strong as Golding says remains to be seen, but undoubtedly, he continues to do a good job building anticipation for the film.
Source: EW