Transformers Review
As I try to recall my childhood, Transformers exists more in my imagination than on the TV screen. Much more time was spent using my imagination to play with my Transformers than watching the show itself. My imagination was limitless and satisfied my every desire, and therefore Transformers was the best thing....EVER...as a kid. But twenty years have passed and if I was pessimistic, my imagination is sadly overshadowed by things like sex and money. As a kid, the battle between good and evil was so clearly defined as a fight between Autobots and Decepticons, but real life is never as clear. This loss of innocence is something everyone laments. So how can you objectively evaluate something that puts you in touch with your childhood innocence? You can't.
Perhaps that's why I felt exhilarated coming out of the theatre. Speaking from my gut, it was an AWESOME movie!!!!!!111!!!!one!!!!!!!!!! It was a movie that satisfied my inner child's impulses. And really, that was the kind of mood I was in considering the subject matter. It gave me big explosions, giant robots fighting, cool transformations and ultimately good triumphing over evil. What more can you expect? What more can you want?
At the same time, part of me wishes for more. I have a habit of reading reviews immediately after viewing a movie to get differing opinions. I hadn't even look on Rotten Tomatoes beforehand to get a feel for the rating (bad, 57%). Some of the following ideas were from reviews I read, and they make good points that were perhaps "clouded" by nostalgia.
*** SPOILER AHEAD ***
One common theme was that the plot was very simplistic/juvenile, but in my opinion, this is largely irrelevant for a movie like this. The subplot with Anthony Anderson and the Blonde was largely pointless and wasn't even that funny. And yes, there were plot holes and such, but it was serviceable and that's good enough.
Personally, I thought the majority of the jokes were funny, while some failed miserably. I didn't like any of the scenes with Sector 7, but I really liked the early scenes when the boy is trying to get the girl with Bumblebee's help.
A lot of people complained about the quick cuts in the battle scenes and having too many closeups. I admit some parts were tough to follow, but overall it was well done. The last battle could have been more involving though, because it just seemed like random battles were happening all over the place without much purpose. There wasn't much satifaction when one decepticon was defeated or sadness when an autobot was injured.
I think they missed a great opportunity to develop the Autobot characters (besides Optimus) further. For example, I struggled to remember which one was Jazz when they said he was destroyed. On the Decepticon side, I wished they played up the Starscream and Megatron conflict. From what I remember, it seemed like the downfall of the Decepticons was usually due to inner squabbling and pettiness and unfortunately the movie didn't reflect this.
The effect were undoubtly top notch, but I do have a small bone to pick. I thought the robots were too complicated. You couldn't really tell how they transformed from robot to vehicle. It's so much more obvious in this video.
It was great that they paid homage to the original transformers by saying things like, "Autobots, roll out", "One shall stand, one shall fall", "Lord Megatron" from Starscream, "More than meets the eye", and seeing a sword arm on Optimus. On the other hand, Optimus also says "My bad" - wtf?
*** END SPOILERS ***
Then there is the matter of Michael Bay directing the movie. Everytime there was a cheesy needless slow motion shot, I sighed. Speilberg got heavy billing as the executive producer and I think his influence is really felt for the first half of the movie. But it's all Bay for the second half.
Choosing Micheal Bay as director was controversial, but I would argue it's appropriate since the source material is for young kids and you can't expect that much more from it. It delivers exactly what a young boy would want out of a movie and Bay is a person that can deliver exactly that. By the end, the boy has the girl, car AND Transformers buddies. What more could you want?
Nothing.
Perhaps that's why I felt exhilarated coming out of the theatre. Speaking from my gut, it was an AWESOME movie!!!!!!111!!!!one!!!!!!!!!! It was a movie that satisfied my inner child's impulses. And really, that was the kind of mood I was in considering the subject matter. It gave me big explosions, giant robots fighting, cool transformations and ultimately good triumphing over evil. What more can you expect? What more can you want?
At the same time, part of me wishes for more. I have a habit of reading reviews immediately after viewing a movie to get differing opinions. I hadn't even look on Rotten Tomatoes beforehand to get a feel for the rating (bad, 57%). Some of the following ideas were from reviews I read, and they make good points that were perhaps "clouded" by nostalgia.
*** SPOILER AHEAD ***
One common theme was that the plot was very simplistic/juvenile, but in my opinion, this is largely irrelevant for a movie like this. The subplot with Anthony Anderson and the Blonde was largely pointless and wasn't even that funny. And yes, there were plot holes and such, but it was serviceable and that's good enough.
Personally, I thought the majority of the jokes were funny, while some failed miserably. I didn't like any of the scenes with Sector 7, but I really liked the early scenes when the boy is trying to get the girl with Bumblebee's help.
A lot of people complained about the quick cuts in the battle scenes and having too many closeups. I admit some parts were tough to follow, but overall it was well done. The last battle could have been more involving though, because it just seemed like random battles were happening all over the place without much purpose. There wasn't much satifaction when one decepticon was defeated or sadness when an autobot was injured.
I think they missed a great opportunity to develop the Autobot characters (besides Optimus) further. For example, I struggled to remember which one was Jazz when they said he was destroyed. On the Decepticon side, I wished they played up the Starscream and Megatron conflict. From what I remember, it seemed like the downfall of the Decepticons was usually due to inner squabbling and pettiness and unfortunately the movie didn't reflect this.
The effect were undoubtly top notch, but I do have a small bone to pick. I thought the robots were too complicated. You couldn't really tell how they transformed from robot to vehicle. It's so much more obvious in this video.
It was great that they paid homage to the original transformers by saying things like, "Autobots, roll out", "One shall stand, one shall fall", "Lord Megatron" from Starscream, "More than meets the eye", and seeing a sword arm on Optimus. On the other hand, Optimus also says "My bad" - wtf?
*** END SPOILERS ***
Then there is the matter of Michael Bay directing the movie. Everytime there was a cheesy needless slow motion shot, I sighed. Speilberg got heavy billing as the executive producer and I think his influence is really felt for the first half of the movie. But it's all Bay for the second half.
Choosing Micheal Bay as director was controversial, but I would argue it's appropriate since the source material is for young kids and you can't expect that much more from it. It delivers exactly what a young boy would want out of a movie and Bay is a person that can deliver exactly that. By the end, the boy has the girl, car AND Transformers buddies. What more could you want?
Nothing.
posted by Nelson at 11:15 PM
6 Comments:
Hey Nels, great review, I'm glad you posted it. I'm killing time here at this conference since it's slow right now, hence a longer review. Haha.
SPOILERS!!!!
I completely agree with your pre-amble: as a movie which taps into the childhood experience, it's hard to be objective. I think things could have gone very well or very poorly for me with this movie. Basically because it would either succeed and make me happy, or so thoroughly ruin the experience as to make me very angry. Luckily, for the most part, it was the former rather than the later. It should also be noted that while the tomato meter was at 57%, the cream of the crop rated it higher at 73% I think. I low 70 seems appropriate.
So my thoughts on your thoughts.
1. Sector 17 WAS SO STUPID. I also thought that the actor (Turturro) was trying to be Pacino, but since he's actually a moderately famous actor in his own right (learned this later), I guess he wasn't. Sector 17 just seemed incredibly lame and unnecessary. They could have achieved everything they wanted using just the Secretary of Defense. It ended up playing out a lot like Independence Day and Area 51.
2. Shia LeBeouf was really funny and definitely a likeable character. Because Megan Fox is ridiclously hot it made the jokes even funnier.
3. I found the battle scenes very chaotic and kind of abrupt. When Optimus beheads Bonecrusher you want to cheer, but at the same time, it was like "wow, Optimus just owned you"...there was virtualyl no struggle, but I guess that's because Optimus is the boss after all. Similarly, Megatron pwns Jazz. Nice one-liner too. "You want a piece of me!" "No, I WANT TWO!"
3. I was actually shocked that they didn't introduce Megatron until last like 40 minutes of the movie it seemed. They probably should have a done a lot more work elaborating on what a bad ass Megatron was in order to make his scenes seem that much more menacing. He's basically introduced and then is dead within the next 40 minutes. I also think this would have helped illustrate that the Decepticons only follow Megatron because he's the most powerful and fearsome (hence the pettiness and squabbling). The way it's portrayed they have no character.
4. "By the end, the boy has the girl, car AND Transformers buddies. What more could you want?"
Exactly. Well said.
Anyway, time for lunch now.
Transformers FTW!!!!1111!!!one!
(lol)
Possible spoilers....
www.digitalspy.co.uk/movies/a58430/two-transformers-sequels-in-pipeline.html
I think when you guys said that the movie delivers what a young boy would want, well, how can you not include a secret organization like S7? You must've remembered as a kid all of those popular shows with some form of secret organization. It allows for both the feeling of "cool" and a feeling of "a kid just schooled you, you not-so-tough organization." So while not exactly important to the plot, I totally believe it helps the movie to bring back our childhood days.
2. Actually, yeah, I didn't mind him, but my labmate wanted to punch him in his face :/
3. Fight scenes == Awesome. I think when there's too much focus on the transformers fighting, esp in CG, any mistake will ruin the experience. At least teasing us with flashes of them fighting will help prevent that. I also liked how they at least made some form of a gun out of Megatron. They tried to give a background of how Megatron is uber evil - there was a scene when he speared a transformer running away... Yeah, Starscream vs Megatron wasn't really illustrated, but I dunno how they can fit that in there within the already long 2hrs+ movie. At least there was the "you failed me once again, starscream."
4. I agree.
Oh yeah, actually, the one shall stand, one shall fall line only reminded me of an old fighting game called One Must Fall (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/One_Must_Fall)
My response:
1) I still think the scenes with Sector 7 were unnecessary. Matt's right in that the same thing could have been achieved with just the Secretary of Defense and his organization (ie the gov't).
2) I think Shia did a good job. He was likable and relatable.
3) When was Megatron a gun? I think they could have fit in more development of the Autobots and Decepticons if they cut out all the Sector 7 stuff.
4) I guess the "Nothing." I have there in the end is not needed...i put it in afterwards, because when I reread it, I thought I was too hard on movie.
The "One Shall Stand, One Must Fall" line is from the movie.
I guess you hit the nail right on the head with the point that it is hard to be objective with something related to your childhood. I used to have a Optimus toy and I remember spending days playing with it. Optimus was awesome and I probably glorified him completely in my mind. For me Transformers was something you could not touch. So, it was with great anticipation and anxiety that I awaited the movie. I knew that it was going to rock due to the CG ( we have made great leaps in that area) at the same time I was afraid to see the movie destroy the childhood image of my favorite hero. In short, I guess the movie fail to captivate me the same way the cartoons did. I guess I have grown jaded with time or I have overglorified Transformers. I agree with Matt that S7 was useless, and that there should be more development with Megatron. After all, I thought Transformers was about Megatron versus Optimus.
This comic strip pretty much summarized my expectation for the movie:
http://www.pvponline.com/article/3413/thu-jul-05?y=
I know it is a kid's movie, but I wanted way too much. :(
I saw transformer's tonight!!! I liked it.
In response to Nelson
1) No further comment, as it'll be pointless if we're all set in our own mind what the movie should and/or could have been like.
3) His arms morphed into a large cannon.
Heh, I think you gotta read more carefuly - nowhere in my comments did I say the line wasn't from the movie - I just simply stated it reminded me of that game (when I heard the line in the movie).
Overall response:
I guess in my mind, having seen so many various versions of transformers (original, beast wars, beast machines, and yes, even the new transformers cybertron crap), there was no need to develop Megatron. He was evil. Who else spears someone running away and laughs. The main beef I have with the whole Megatron thing is when he revives, he just says "I am Megatron" and starts rampaging.
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