Director Jon M. Chu Talks G.I. JOE: RETAILIATION; Reveals Film Has 10-Minute Sequence of Dialogue-Free “Kick Ass Ninja Action”

If you grew up reading the G.I. Joe comics and loved issue 21 (the one that introduces Storm Shadow, features zero dialogue, and is widely regarded by fans as the best issue in the series), you’re going to love what director Jon M. Chu told me earlier today at CinemaCon about G.I.Joe: Retaliation.  It seems that he paid homage to the issue with a nine to ten minute sequence of dialogue-free kick ass ninja action!  In addition to revealing this awesome sequence, he told me the G.I. Joe sequel is around two hours (right now) and to expect between 5 to 15 minutes of deleted scenes on the Blu-ray.  We also talked about the soundtrack, the action scenes, the tone of the movie, and so much more.

As you can see in the latest trailer, the reason the sequel is subtitled Retaliation is because at the beginning of the film, Cobra wipes out most of the Joe’s and the surviving members go rogue to try and take down Cobra.  G.I. Joe: Retaliation stars Dwayne Johnson, Adrianne Palicki, Channing Tatum, Walton Goggins, Ray Park, Byung-hun Lee, Elodie Yung, RZA, Ray Stevenson, and D.J. Cotrona. Hit the jump for more.

Finally, this extended interview was recorded earlier today in Las Vegas at CinemaCon.  You can also watch my exclusive video interview with Dwayne Johnson here, and here’s my video blog recap after seeing the sizzle reel and new trailer.   Also, here’s the new character posters and all our previous coverage.

Jon M Chu Time Index

• Talks about the tone of the sequel. Talks about how they wanted to show that the Joe’s can get hurt and bleed.  Also,  the film uses bullets and not lasers.
• 1:00 – Talks about the soundtrack. Henry Jackman, who did X-Men: First Class, composed the score.
• How long was his first cut and how long is the movie right now? Says the first cut was about 15 minutes longer than where the film is right now.
• 2:45 – Is the film 90 minutes or two hours? Says it’s around 2 hours right now.
• Is he a fan of extended cuts and will the deleted scenes be in a separate area on the Blu-ray/DVD?
• 3:37 – How many minutes of deleted scenes will be on the home video release? He’s says between 5 and 15 minutes
• 3:50 – Was there a moment from the G.I. Joe cartoon or comic book that he felt had to be in the movie? Talks about issue 21 (the silent issue).  Around 4:30 reveals the film will have 9 or 10 minutes of absolutely no dialogue with just kick ass ninja action
• 5:00 – How the film will balance the Snake Eyes/Storm Shadow stuff with the rest of the characters doing their own thing in the movie. Reveals that Snake Eyes has gone over to Tokyo to train new ninja commandos (this is at the beginning of the film which is why he’s not killed when the Joe ‘s are attacked at beginning of film).
• 6:10 – Will we see new Joe’s and were most of them killed?
• 7:00 – Talks about the action scenes.  Are there a few huge ones mixed with a lot of little ones?  Says that each scene is very different.