Earlier in the week, Paramount said it would not show the movie to critics prior to the movie's release today. Paramount cites the disparity between the critical reviews for Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen and the audience reaction. Critics hated it, audiences loved it (to the tune of over $388m so far). Instead, it screened the movie in front on military bases and other, smaller venues. Several smaller reviewers, mostly bloggers, were permitted to see the film before today as well, and most of their comments on Rotten Tomatoes were quite positive. Prior to today, the aggregate score for the movie was between 85-91%. Not bad, considering a trailer so awful it actually lowered my opinion of the movie. My co-workers have been at this conspiracy theory thing all morning in which Paramount paid off said bloggers to give the movie some great reviews going into the opening.
It seems that G.I. Joe may fall victim to the Transformers bug (if you could call Transformers a victim, given it's success), assuming it does well at the box office. Since the movie has released, it's Rotten Tomatoes score has plummeted to a pitiful 47%. This may not seem bad (especially considering Transformers' abysmal 21%), but when you consider that almost half of the fresh ratings (11 of the 23) came from those small bloggers whose reviews were up and glowing prior to the release, it's not so hot. I'm not buyin' into the conspiracy stuff, but it is very odd to see that big a difference in the reviews between the screenings and the release. Of course, most movies are shown to critics before the release, so that's skewing things as well.
Anyway, I should be off to see the flick tonight, so look for the review here later this weekend. On Monday, we'll take a peek at how well the last action movie of the summer fared, and see how much closer Transformers gets to the $400m mark.
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