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 2007 PG-13 / Scifi Action Directed by: Starring: |
- Their war. Our world.
Summary Capsule
- Massive, intelligent robots come to Earth and disguise themselves as vehicles while searching for a handy plot device.
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Drew's Rating: And Kyle thought Spider-Man 3 was the worst movie of the summer? Uh, no.
Drew's Review: So. Er. I feel obligated to review this movie, simply because — as the dozens of the little bastards infesting my bookshelves and desk will attest to — I am a certified Transfan. (Yes, that's really what they call us. Sad, isn't it?) At the same time, I'm not going to write a long review because… uh, well, I don't want to. So just know this: there are three sets of circumstances in which you might enjoy Transformers:
2) You were born prior to 1976, or else 1985 or later.
3) You always secretly thought the concept was pretty cool, but despised them because your big/little brother kept having them shoot your My Little Ponies.
If any two of the above three conditions apply to you, then see this movie and God love you… I hope you enjoy it. The plot is simple: Spike Witwicky (Shia LeBeouf) discovers that his first car, a junker Camaro, is actually a sentient robot named Bumblebee. The 'bee calls his Autobot pals to Earth to search for the Allspark, a giant Rubik's Cube that can give life to inanimate machines. But the evil Decepticons are already here looking for it so Megatron can create an army and conquer the universe. When it turns out that Spike's great-grandfather accidentally found and recorded the location of the Allspark, our boy is suddenly in very high demand among the robots, the U.S. government, and local hottie Mikaela (Megan Fox). So there just may be some fighting before things are all over.
If I can go off on a slight tangent (and I can, because I'm the one writing this): it was early 2002 when the cartoons of our youth — He-Man, Transformers, G.I. Joe, Thundercats, Voltron — began to be reintroduced to the Generation Next consciousness, first via comics and then DVD releases. Transformers was one of the first and easily the most popular, and I remember reading a quote back then that I thought perfectly summed up their appeal. It read, "Some people don't get the Transformers. It's simple. They're big robots. And they change into things. And they fight. This is beautiful and mad. If you do not get this, there is something missing in your soul."
That's about the best description I've ever heard for the phenomenon, so here's what I'll say: if you just nodded your head as you read that statement, and yet never watched the cartoon or read any of the comics while growing up, you should see this movie. You should. It's big and it's dumb and the plot has more holes than your dad's underwear, but it's fun. You'll see crap blowing up and the on-screen transformations guys like me dreamed of when we were 8. Or if you're a fan but are very good at treating different versions of the same concept as entirely separate entities, you may enjoy it. I'm mature enough to recognize that the cartoon was at least as stupid as this film, that I just remember it through rose-colored glasses, and that I'm a colossal geek who takes giant talking robots way too seriously. And that's fine. But if you happen to think, "Wait, I'm a colossal geek who takes giant talking robots way too seriously," then avoid this movie like the plague, because it is only going to make you cry. Especially when Optimus Prime, wise and noble hero of every daydream you had circa 1986, says, "Sorry, my bad."
And that's all I have to say about that.
Justin's Rating: Autobots, assemble! Audiences, assimilate!
Justin's Review: Really, part of me simply cannot condemn hack directors like Michael Bay and Uwe Boll (that's right, I just paired them up in the same sentence, and no birth control is involved). If it were not for their misguided, heroin-fueled efforts, then I'd be sitting here with a huge hole in my heart, missing more than just muscle matter in my life. I need their badness and their consistent delusions of what constitutes a "movie". I crave their ability to overload my brain with so many mental notes while watching their movies that a weedy, whistling noise escapes out of my eardrum. I desire their failure, because it makes anything I do an automatic success.
(1) Bay knows how to do kinetic action sequences fairly well, and pairing him with Big Battlin' Robots was a decent enough fit, and (2) Transformers desperately needed a director who had that rare mix of both taking everything way, wayyyy too seriously, and then throwing gravitas out of the window whenever a stupid action scene called for kablooeys.
Knowing Bay's previous endeavors behind a film camera, I went into Transformers prepared. I jammed my ears with jackhammer-proof plugs, I carefully put any intelligent center of my brain on temporary life support, and I walked in heroic slow-motion the day before, just to get used to the effect. Even if you're just strolling into a convenience store, if you do it in slow motion and have Hans Zimmer backing you up with a electronic orchestra, it'll bring even the toughest man to his knees and cry in admiration before you. All these things helped, almost too much - I forgot to analyze what I was witnessing, and more or less enjoyed a vapid action movie that featured giant robots crushing the hell out of a mother's flower garden.
As Drew said, if you're coming into this with little or no past vested interest in the Transformers franchise, it'll be a fun (if brainless) experience. But if Transformers means something to you - a cherished slice of childhood or even a current slice of your toy budget - then you have to brace yourself for the fact that Michael Bay respects the franchise so much that, at one point, he turns a Mountain Dew vending machine into a Transformer. Because that's how true to the source he is.
Being a Bay flick, there are miles of road between where we stand and the end of criticism that we could heap on his head and the flimsy plot. As much as midriffs appeal to the average red-blooded male, I didn't exactly come to this movie to see one wobbling at me every 3.5 minutes. I had to refrain from rolling my eyes for the tenth time that military/police forces puffed up their manly chests and went so over-the-top with an action that both the Geneva Convention and Miranda felt molested afterward. There was no explanation why the giant cube was only able to make bad Transformers (NokiaBot, natch). And if you're going to have giant robots as some of your lead characters, you don't wait until halfway through the movie to start trying to give them artificial (heh) personalities, right before they're blown up or shredded.
In fact, that was my biggest point of contention with Transformers - it really felt as if it started out as one movie, a semi-serious Armageddon-like endeavor, and then suddenly shifted midway through to focus on Those Darn Wacky Robots. Everyone begins by treating the Transformer invasion as some sort of dire threat, decoding signals and marshalling up the U.S. Navy (which, by the way, does nothing in this movie… so why show them?), and giving Jon Voight a lot of screen time that is non-Anaconda related. Then, it's as if Michael Bay did a facepalm and went, "We forgot the bloody robots! Quick! Make sure one of them is black and dies an early death!" Once it firmly becomes the Transformers Show, all the previous seriousness of the flick evaporates, and we end up with giant robots with King Kong complexes. Who also, at times, act like the Three Stooges.
It's not - by far - the worst thing that Bay's ever done, and there is plenty of gorgeous CGI eye candy to gobble up. If I was a little kid, seeing this for the first time? I might declare it the best movie ever, out of ignorance and geeky love. But I'm now a crotchety old man, coughing up my dentures and waving my cane threateningly at passers-by, wailing at great length to anyone who will stop and listen how much better things were back in the glorious 80's. Bah.
Kyle's Rating: I can survive, I can endure (and I don't even think about her most of the time)
Kyle's Review: Essentially, I agree with everything else Drew and Justin filled this review page with. Although I do wonder exactly why they keep referring to "Sam" as "Spike". In the heat of the summer, though, even the best of us are prone to mistakes so I'm fine giving them a pass on that one.
And yet... the LaBeouf. And the Fox. They called to me, much as the All-Spark called to the Transformers (see what I did there?).
Yes, I decided randomly that $14 was a small price to pay for the absolute genius found in the scenes between Sam (LaBeouf) and OMG her name RAWKS Mikaela (Fox). I don't recommend a similar purchase for you, nor do I admit this information readily. But for me: money well-spent!
Transformers, then, is being relegated by me to the metaphorical pile of films where the whole is less than the sum of its parts (although I've never fully understood that particular axiom so I forgive me if that makes no sense). I can't imagine a circumstance where I would willingly watch the entire film ever again (my friend had it playing at his house over the Christmas holidays but I spent the entire running time making out with a girl on his couch: for Die Hard or Tron I would have ignored the girl and watch the movie) but the parts I love I'll happily watch just because I only have fifteen minutes free and it's right by my television.
Budding psychologists (though surely only strict Freudians) could certainly derive endless publishable papers from my insistence that the LaBeouf/Fox scenes not only hold the only repeat viewing value but also seem like they are part of another, better film. But why waste time with psychoanalysis? The LaBeouf is an innovative genius of acting and arguably the only actor in Hollywood capable of surprising you with a performance anymore (if he pulls off "Mutt Williams" in the increasingly-disappointing-looking fourth Indiana Jones film I think the ENTIRE WORLD will do a double-take), and The Fox may have a limited range but she is ASTONISHING when allowed to play with those bounds.
Consider the scene where The LaBeouf attempts to escape his 'demonic' car on a pink bicycle, despite absolutely no in-film evidence of a younger sister in his family (although the potential inference that his cheaper-than-cheap father bought him a pink girl's bicycle in some sort of money-saving circumstance is ABSOLUTE GENIUS). There goes The LaBeouf, slinging charm at his car and displaying a taste of that "No, no, no, no, no!" approach to the role that filled YouTube with "Can Shia Act?" video essays. Then something happens (spoiler!) and he looks the fool in front of his love The Fox, whose response manages to encompass both amusement, actual caring, confusion, and status-conscious distinterest.
But then, even though The LaBeouf continues to adore The Fox (as he has since the first grade!), he maintains focus on his current predicament and runs off, allowing The Fox to catch up to him and become part of the action-packed plot. Genius!
Most people will assume I'm kidding. My creative writing professors, especially my poetry instructor, would burn me over hot coals for so blatantly crossing the line between 'character' and 'performer.' I would counter, in a mumbly way as I stared down at my Converse, that Transformers counts as a dayglo explosion of craft, form, and function in such a way that acting lines are abolished along with a sizeable chunk of the city, and most people leave the film believing it was really The LaBeouf, The Fox, and Jon Voight fighting robots with the help of the guy from that show 'Las Vegas.' Isn't modern cinema so ****ing cool?
In the sad circumstance that you can't personally locate the 'genius' in any part of The LaBeouf or The Fox in Transformers, the simply solution is "never watch this film again." Furthermore, if you can't imagine The LaBeouf or The Fox being mentioned anywhere near the word "genius," don't even bother watching Transformers. Sorry if your childhood dreams got wrecked or weren't lived up to, but then again I had my army of Transformers both trounce and get trounced by Super Powers, G.I. Joes, and occasionally The Hasselhoff in my big plastic KITT. So all I can say to you, quite loudly but with only empathetic derision, is: have a little imagination!
 And remember, kids: the police are evil robots out to kill you.
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- There are quite a few nods to past Transformers continuity. Among them: movie Bumblebee uses his door to hit an old VW Beetle, which is what the original Bumblebee turned into; Spike's "Oh [crap]" and Prime's "One shall stand; one shall fall" lines are from the 1986 animated movie; the Allspark serves mainly the same purpose the Matrix did in the cartoon and comics; Bumblebee's way of speaking through radio phrases resembles Wreck-Gar's quoting of TV shows; Prime says "Autobots, roll out!" like he did on the cartoon; one of his other lines ("Freedom is the right of all sentient beings") was the official quote from his toy; and Prime at one point uses an energy axe like he did in the first storyline of the cartoon, while Megatron wields a mace (which he also did in the first storyline).
- Wow, Bumblebee is a playa. And a gangsta -- his air freshener is shaped like a bee and reads "Bee-otch."
- Soundwave is now Frenzy? And, essentially, a robot gremlin? Who… cracks his knuckes?
- Based on their method of communication, Optimus Prime is apparently Batman and Bumblebee is Commissioner Gordon.
- Scorponok: Takes a lickin', keeps on diggin'.
- I love how no matter how many nerds the government recruits, it always comes down to the one guy they've never heard of who lives with his grandmother.
- Barricade, the Decepticon police car, has a motto that reads "To punish and enslave" in place of "To protect and serve."
- How does Prime know all the exposition?
- All my other quibbles with this movie aside, Peter Cullen has the greatest voice ever.
- Never thought you'd hear talk about masturbation in a Transformers movie, did you? Surprise!
- The Autobots are now the Keystone Kops…
- Bumblebee. Pees on someone. Excuse me, "lubricates." You have no idea how painful it is to type that.
- The giant robot who keeps wanting to kill everything calls us "a primitive, violent race"?
- The idea that all our technology of the last 70 years has been reverse-engineered from a captured Megatron is pretty cool, I'll admit.
- Where… did a phone get missiles and bullets from?
- Convoy! Come on, you know you want to sing it.
- For once, Starscream's not a complete wuss.
- Mountain Dew-bot!
- "I smell you"? What's next, fe fi fo fum?
- Scratch that - Starscream is badass!
Is It Worth Staying Through End Credits?
Not even a little bit for the first two scenes, but the third shows you a survivor.
Intermission! [some sources: IMDb]
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Optimus Prime is voiced by Peter Cullen, the original voice of Prime from the cartoon show. Frank Welker, the original voice of Megatron, tested for the film but was passed over; Michael Bay said, "I put his voice against our big beast, Megatron, and it was just too light. It was too much of a cartoon. He's a great voice actor, but how are you going to go to Frank Welker and say, 'Hey, I want to change your voice for our big beast here.' You can't do that." Instead we get Hugo Weaving, who has an absolutely amazing voice, yet somehow doesn't sound at all like himself in this movie. Weird. And it would've been great to have Chris Latta (voice of Starscream) (and Cobra Commander) involved, but he passed away in 1994, so I guess you can't fault Bay for that one.
Groovy Quotes
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Spike: You said that cars pick their drivers!
Bolivia: Yeah, well sometimes cars pick drivers with cheap-ass fathers.
Spike [to Mikaela]: I think there's a lot more than meets the eye with you.
Kid: This is easily a hundred times cooler than Armageddon, I swear to God!
Jazz: What's crackin', little bitches?
Ratchet: The boy's pheromone level suggests he wants to mate with the female.
Spike: How'd you know about his glasses?
Prime: eBay.
Prime: Freedom is the right of all sentient beings.
Simmons: Hey, okay. You want to lay the fate of the world on the kid's Camaro? That's cool.
Spike: I'm never giving you this Allspark!
Megatron: Oh, so unwise.
Prime: At the end of this day, one shall stand; one shall fall.
Soundtrack Review
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Two of the songs Bumblebee uses to help Spike woo Mikaela are "Sexual Healing" and "Baby Come Back." My biggest disappointment of the evening was that the classic Transformers theme didn't play over the end credits.
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This review page was last updated on 3.28.08
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