Transformers

[diomedeh2]

Well I went and saw this movie last night, kept an open mind, tried not to judge it, and it was still really bad.

 

Honestly, what happened to Jon Voigt? When did he become a terrible actor? Wow.

 

The "adult" humor in the movie was really over the top as well. I understand one comic relief, but Bay tried to throw in like ten or so. Way too much. How many jokes can you milk out of Sector 7? 100? 200?

 

The action sequences were way too insanely shot as well. I honestly had no clue who was fighting who, what, where, why, and when at any given point, except for Optimus Prime, and only because his fights were so isolated. And even in his fights, I had no clue as to what was going on because the camera work was so poor.

 

And really, how many more movies do we need to see with a group of stereotypically techno-savvy college-aged nerds and the one hot gal that somehow works closely with them who is smarter than anyone the Pentagon employs? And what the heck even happened with them?

 

I think I could really go on and on about this movie, but I won't.

 

Highlights for me:

 

The fight in that village in Qatar with the scorpion shaped Decepticon (Blackout?). I really enjoyed the tracer bullets coming from the attack ships. That was cool.

 

The JJ Abrams trailer before Transformers. I'm hoping it's something along the lines of Lovecraft and Cthulu. That could be sweet.

[dadofandrew]

Reading through this thread, I understand how Al must feel at times.

 

I'm not even sure what you mean, Robert, but thanks for thinking of me.

 

They're laughing all the way to the bank, that's for sure.

[cweber39]

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Honestly, what happened to Jon Voigt? When did he become a terrible actor? Wow.

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When he started acting, Jon Voight is a terrible actor to begin with.

[SeriesFinale]

And yes, that's your opinion.

 

Voight is tops in Midnight Cowboy.

[UeckerAddict]

When he started acting, Jon Voight is a terrible actor to begin with.

 

Midnight Cowboy? Deliverance? Coming Home?

 

Come on, he's had his moments.

[EAsports28]

If it helps at all, they do explain the history between the Autobots and the Decepiticons in the movie, and the robots do refer to themselves as members of those groups.

 

It was pretty good in my book, lots of jokes, some were misses, but a lot were hits. LaBoeuf didn't annoy me as much as he has in other movies. I'm just praying he doesn't ruin Indy 4.

[MessiahRp]

--SOME SPOILERS BELOW--

 

 

I watched it after cringing over knowing what they had done to the original Gen 1 Transformers but I tried to keep an open mind. It turns out my major issues were not related to my fondness for the original afterall (although I wasn't pleased about that not too subtle jab of having the Camaro Bumblebee ram it's door into a yellow VW bug at the car lot).

 

1. There is very little dialogue between the TF. You had a brief interaction to give the names of the Autobots but other than a very brief and head scratching encounter where Megatron says Starscream failed him again (which made no sense in the context of the scene), none of the other Decepticons were even named. The only reason you knew who Scorpinox was was because of all the previews that said so. From the movie you'd never know the names of the tank or chopper robots.

 

2. All the Decepticons are silver and some of the Autobots too. Very little ingenuity in this concept and impossible to know who was fighting in a large majority of the scenes as they were blurry and fast paced (maybe a way to cover the CG flaws?) and the lack of color made it even more difficult to identify the robots. I only knew it was Jazz that was killed and ripped apart when Optimus said so at the END of the movie.

 

3. There's an entire scene that stretches an incredibly long masturbation joke out. For that scene alone, I am not going to let my 8-year old see this. He's not quite ready to know about that stuff yet and while many 20 somethings from the original G1 generation are going to this, there are also a lot of Armada and Energon fans that are younger kids and they could have left this out and probably upped the quality of dialogue in the movie a ton.

 

4. Including the military personalities doesn't make a whole lot of sense nor does the idea of hiding in a city (where, BTW more casualties would occur). They both seem like distractions as it was the Robots that do each other in. Having the military launch a failed attack is fine but getting to know people that have nothing to do with the conclusion of the fight just took dialogue time away from the robots that really needed it and carried the film.

 

5. As for above I heard the transforming sound once. One time. In the very beginning scene where Scorpinox transformed. That was it.

 

All in all the movie gets a 2.5 out of 5 stars. I put aside all the issues with the G1 disses but Michael Bay doesn't seem to know how to make a coherent movie plot and lengthy dialogue work, so he resorts to explosions and more explosions.

 

I likened the people that enjoyed the movie to kids that enjoy Christmas lights. They're nice to look at but they can get old really quick and shouldn't be the main focus of the real story behind the holiday. Same thing here.

 

This easily could have been better but the script is bogged down with teenage sex innuendo and explosion sequences and fails to understand the value in separating the identities (looks and personalities) of the robots who are the star of the movie and will be the draw for sequels.

 

Rp

[DuWayne Steurer]

I likened the people that enjoyed the movie to kids that enjoy Christmas lights.

 

Man, pardon me, but that seems somewhat unnecessary. Someone can have different tastes without having to take backhanded jabs at a person's intelligence because they have a differing opinion.

 

I like all kinds of movies, be they arthouse flicks, indie deals, action/adventure nonsense, and all the rest. (Save chick flicks). That doesn't mean I have to be slackjawed and drooling to enjoy a Michael Bay picture.

[endaround]

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That doesn't mean I have to be slackjawed and drooling to enjoy a Michael Bay picture.

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No, but it helps!

 

Haven't seen the movie, but did catch part of the making off on HBO and saw Bay waste more money doing things in live action than in CGI. Bus ripped apart by CGI robot? Bus was real.

[MessiahRp]

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Man, pardon me, but that seems somewhat unnecessary. Someone can have different tastes without having to take backhanded jabs at a person's intelligence because they have a differing opinion.

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You're right. I probably should not have thrown that in there. I do however question how anyone can enjoy a movie where the characters are so vague, the dialogue is as non-existent between the key characters and in which the action sequences are the only focus of the movie.

 

Rp

[sgtcluels]

I went in with really low expectations. And it wasn't a bad movie, wasn't a real good movie either. It's exactly what Michael Bay does, makes pretty chase seasons with horrible jokes and well... no plot. The only Bay film I've actually liked is the Island. And the chase scene was out of place.

 

And I've had enough with the stupid flashy light slow to fast close up thing. It's almost as horrible as his previous slow mo walk!

 

I'd give it a "3 out of 4" simply because it exceeded my low expectations.

[DuWayne Steurer]

Ok, several points here.

 

I'm not a Mike Bay fanboy. He is what he is, a Summer Blockbuster director. He knows it, we know it, there's no reason to be surprised when we get a movie from him that's a little light on character development, but heavy on action.

 

When I go to a movie, I pay to be entertained. With that in mind, I go with an extremely open mind, with the whole idea that I'm going to kick back and relax for a few hours, and not be overly critical about what I'm about to see. There's a legion of Transformer fans, as well as self appointed movie critics (not to say that's a bad thing) who were going to hate this movie, no matter what. Their minds were made up before they went in.

 

Point in case, I am not at all a fan of Pixar, but we went to Ratatoille this weekend, and I decided to watch it instead of hating it before I actually saw it, and enjoyed it.

 

Ok, that doesn't mean Transformers was a good movie (by certain standards), I guess it just means that I can enjoy just about any movie for what it is, instead of disliking it for what it isn't.

 

Was Jon Voight's character overly cheesy, over-acted, and poorly written? Sure. After sitting back and thinking about it, I have a hard time deciding if I was supposed to take him serious, or if he was the "comic relief guy who's supposed to be in charge".

 

Jon Turturro was really out of place in this movie, and didn't do a good job with what (little) was given to him to work with.

 

As for the action/combat scenes, I guess the "herky jerky can't tell what's going on or tell who's who" doesn't bother me, because I think combat, by it's very nature, is extremely chaotic. Sure, in the context of the movie, it's nice to know as a viewer what's going on, but to be honest, I did not have a hard time picking out "who's who" during the action scenes in this film.

 

There's faults with any film, some (way) more than others. Every viewer has different tastes. I know some people like to say that for certain movies you have to "turn off your brain" to be able to enjoy it, but I don't think that's really accurate. Like I said before, when I pay to see a movie, I try to really enjoy it for what it is, not for what it fails to be.

[diomedeh2]

Like I said before, when I pay to see a movie, I try to really enjoy it for what it is, not for what it fails to be.

 

I agree with what you're saying completely, and I went into that movie with as low of expectations as I could, and I still left highly disappointed.

 

The storyline had so little continuity and flow that it made it really difficult to enjoy. At least the Rock and Independence Day had some cohesiveness. This movie felt like it was made with the sole intention of cashing in (hence the insane amount of product placement shots).

 

And the comic relief again...way too much.

 

And I also concur on the city sequence. The whole purpose of that movie was to cause insane amounts of destruction, not tell a story.

[bjkrautk]

And the comic relief again...way too much.

 

Not to mention, some of their material was entirely inappropriate for a family audience. (You can probably guess the scene I'm thinking about.)

[MKE alz]

I've only skimmed the thread, but I don't think I can bring myself to see the film. I've heard it's a human story with robots while Transformers should be a robot story with humans. This just feels all wrong to me.

 

I'm pretty sure there isn't a way to make this movie live action - make this movie commercially viable and satisfy the hardcore fanboys.

[uecker9]

My cousin, Brian Cantwell, was a digital artist for this movie and quite a few others. Not a bad resume for a kid from Ashton Wi.

[RayKingsForemanGrill]

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I do however question how anyone can enjoy a movie where the characters are so vague, the dialogue is as non-existent between the key characters and in which the action sequences are the only focus of the movie.

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Because growing up with the toys as a kid in the mid 80s and seeing a fully realized version of Optimus Prime kicking tail in a live action world took me right back to being a 7 year old kid again, and it was a great escape...

 

As someone trying to break into the filmmaking business, do I aspire to make films like this? No. But do I see anything wrong with something visually stimulating that makes me happy for 2.5 hours on a Friday afternoon? No...

 

As others have echoed, not everything has to be The Godfather, or Citizen Kane... you need the Michael Bays of the world, too...

[Point Beer Is Best]

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When he started acting, Jon Voight is a terrible actor to begin with.

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What are you talking about? He was awesome in Zoolander!

 

"Look at you - you're dressing up as a Mermaid!"

[TerraceReserved]

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"Look at you - you're dressing up as a Mermaid!"

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"Merman pops, Merman!"*

 

*that very well may be the wrong line, but I think it's close.

[diomedeh2]

As others have echoed, not everything has to be The Godfather, or Citizen Kane... you need the Michael Bays of the world, too...

 

While I agree with this sentiment, I think people are too quick to play this movie off as just "another" Michael Bay movie in which all you have to do is turn off your mind. I grew up with Transformers, I was a big fan, I have the nostalgia thing going, and yet "really bad" is the best description I can come up with.

 

Bay's "clever" way of using original TF tag lines (more than meets the eye came up at least 2 or 3 times in the movie) was just lame and his half-hearted attempts at constant humor were just unnecessary. Again, I really enjoyed ID4 and the Rock. I thought both were completely engrossing and highly entertaining movies. This one, on the other hand, lost me at (insert opening scene).

 

And one other point that was really lame...Shia LaBeouf's reaction to Megan Fox being a "criminal." So ridiculous. He's known her for, what, 6 hours? And now he's upset that she didn't tell him about it? Really? And Sector 7? What in the world is Sector 6 then? Even if it's meant to be ridiculous, some amount of reality is appreciated.

 

I have to reiterate that the best part of that movie, for me, was the yet-to-be-named JJ Abrams trailer that could possibly be some form of a Cthulu movie. That was fairly exciting. And the whole Ethan Haas website alternate reality gaming stuff is fun too.

[RayKingsForemanGrill]

diomedeh - I agree with you largely - shia, in general, had some way over the top corny stuff... and much of the writing was bad...

 

But still, for me, the Transformers were cool (although the attempts at humor were bad)... But I look forward to the next episode of Megatron Vs. Optimus Prime... I think a movie with a lot less sill exposition and a lot more action will be very good... and they can do that now... they've set up the history...

[Big Reed]

sooooo, for those of us who never watched the transformers, or read the comics books how would this movie rate?

 

is it better than the homer Simpson movie? assuming we've never watched tha t series either.

 

better than fantastic 4 ? assuming we never watched the cartoon series or read tha t comic either.

 

better than Spiderman? we did see the two previous spiderman movies.

 

My 11 year old wants to see the movie. given a choice of Spiderman, Homer and fantastic 4, this is the movie he wants to see. is it worth my money to go see it at a theater or wait until it comes out in DVD?

[RayKingsForemanGrill]

Spiderman 3 is awful.... and even though I enjoyed it, I would not take an 11 year-old to see Transformers...

[Katuluu]

Reed, Transformers isn't appropriate for an 11 year old, unless you are prepared to have "the talk" with him afterwards.

 

Labyrinth was re-released this week with a remastered print, go take him to that. It's at least a good movie.