I saw this on opening weekend with a group of friends and was the outcast because of my unique thoughts about this extremely overrated debacle of a movie. Many concede that it was "great" and few lament that it was an injustice to the famed "Robots in Desguise". Well, I for one will not be afraid to say that this is a BAD movie. So, I'm going to say it: "This is a BAD movie." But I won't ask you to settle for that. here's why...
Here is my review. It's divided into 6 critique areas. It will contain no spoilers.
INTRO: A fast and furious montage of explosions that lets you know what the next 2 hours will consist of - action (and nothing else). You quickly realize that this film is void of a plot, character developement, and any real storytelling. It's simply about the effects. The entire rising action, better yet, the entire MOVIE is plagued with this attitude. I call it an "attitude" because this was done purposefully. And ironically, It has NO purpose. The fake characters you're introduced to, the CGI reels, and all the "fluff" have no point. The only purpose is to blow stuff up and make it look cool. But this isn't the worst of it...by far. Wait till you get a load of the other 60 mintues...
PLOT/PACING: A concievable "plot" does not exist in this film. The "story" is only a means to show off their CGI robots - you can call the story-line laughable to be nice about it. "But wait!", many have said. (and this is the only defense people can make for this film's incompetance). "Transformers isn't about the STORY. They didn't care about the plot, they just wanted to make an awesome ACTION/SUMMER flick". So, is this the excuse we give to writers to make crap, hire artists to draw their crap, then earn money on it? Well, I'm not buying it (no pun intended). If people continue to accept this, we will have many more bad movies to deal with in the future. All films will be written by people who've created worthless/meaningless stories and then surrounded them with animation. Contrary to pupular belief, it IS possible to show off your cool special effects AND tell a story. Iron Man, X-men 1, Spiderman 1 and 2, Independence Day, War of the Worlds, Star Wars 4, 5, and 6, Mission Impossible 1 and 3, Die Hard series, King Kong (and the list goes on). These were good movies with awesome action that told great stories. Transformers, on the other hand, is refuse.
ACTION: I bet you're thinking that this is where I'm going to give this movie some positive remarks. Well, you're wrong. As far as I'm concerned, the action in this movie was nothing I hadn't seen before. They blew stuff up and made Auto-Cad images fight each other. This is 2008, we see special effects in every movie that hits the big screen. Just because it's oversized robots this time, doesn't make it any different. And I'm sorry, but if you don't have a good story surrounding your fireworks sequences, I just don't care about it. Is there a reason for the fighting, explosions, or action? No. It's mindless. And so are these writers.
CHARACTERS: If I actually remembered the names of any of these people, I wouldn't deserve to review another movie ever again. The main character was a drunk-punch comedian, and the leading actress was a brainless beauty. Even though I didn't care for the Boy, he was the ONLY thing that added charisma to this film. He's just exploding with idiotic personality. But the Girl was dissapointing. You never understand her motives, affection for the Boy, or her actions. She was so underdeveloped and deprived of any depth of a real person, I thought she was going to burst (in pinata-like fashion) into a cloud of confetti. Now...the robots. They killed this movie. The MAIN attractions were idiots. I thought they from a world of superior technology and science. They were so Americanized, crude, inappropriate, and down right dumb, that it was just unbearably ridiculous. I'm sure the writers were going for comedy, but I wasn't laughing WITH them, I was laughing AT these morons. Optimus was the only one with half a brain but he was too busy supervising the other "adolescent Transformers". This is intended to appeal to kids, but If I was a kid, I would think these were the dumbest heros hollywood has ever tried to con me into liking. This even beats Robin from the 90's Batman films. And we all just LOVED him...
CONCLUSION: This so-called "great" ending was a feat of "revolutionary" computer engineering (sarcasm). The ENTIRE thing was CGI. I don't even think the PEOPLE were real. They probably stopped paying the actors halfway through the filming of the movie and let polygons/textures finish this thing. Ok, I know. You do have to draw the robots, but at least flip some REAL cars, blow some REAL explosives. I'm not saying it was cheesy, but nothing was completely convincing. Anyway, it all came down to Optimus VS Megatron. It was ok, I guess. I didn't really care about either one of them.
SYNOPSIS: Intended to be a summer/action flick, this movie delivers CGI and slapstic comedy. A true story and plot have been sacrificed in order to feed the masses special effects and "water-cooler moments". The characters weren't believable, came off underdeveloped, and annoying. The ending was a computer reel that played out with big explosions and rock music. Overall, this movie fails. A lack of story and logic brings this beloved cartoon adaptation way down. I give this movie a BAD rating.
It's safe to say you can pass this rental up. If you're ever forced to sit through a viewing, just be glad that it's free. A few of you may have liked it, I'm glad and very happy for you. That means your money didn't go to waste. I would have rather purchased 10 double cheeseburgers with mine.
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