Movie Review : Transformers

Fri Jul 13, 2007 12:37 pm    



Though I have repeatedly heard accolades for Michael Bay's Bad Boys, I was in a stoic state of doubt as I entered the theatre to appraise his latest "action-packed" enterprise, Tansformers. More importantly than this omnipresent doubt was my disbelief that anyone (let alone the director who brought us such cerebral events as Armageddon, The Rock and Pearl Harbor) could do true justice to the license which brought me so much joy as a grubby little suburbanite.

Much to my surprise and two hours of clenched fists later, I have been relieved of my doubts and realize that I am pleased with the results. I still think Bay looks like some sort of new age musician. I am also assuming that anyone with a greasy, feathered mullet would.

Coated in a sickly varnish of special effects and action movie clich?s, Tansformers isn't "more than meets the eye" by any account. I got exactly what I paid for; my favorite brand of giant robots going toe to toe and tread for tread on the big screen in full stereo sound. The effects were splendid and the characters do just fine. I would like to make a formal request to all directors out there to please, PLEASE, cast Megan Fox in more of your films. She is certainly a "well-rounded" actor. Plus, she rocks some fine ass tats.

Tansformers does a decent job with plot timing in finally leading into all-out battle between alien robots, which is what we paid to see. Think Aliens, where you get to meet the characters for the first hour of the film and then spend the next hour watching them being ripped limb from limb by a horde of human-hungry mutants. All in all, the humanistic element isn't too annoying and though we see very little mortality on the side of the humans, that isn't necessarily what we paid to see. There are plenty of slashers out there for you little splatterfiends. Having said that, this is also no G.I. Joe where everyone escapes with life, limb and strategically implemented parachute. Stormtroopers these ain't.

Although the voice acting is decent (Peter Cullen, the original voice actor for Optimus Prime does his thing to great effect), if these weren't transformers and were replaced with, hmm, let's see, Bruce Willis as the tough-as-nails gunnery sargent, Brad Pitt as the stubborn rookie and Steve Buscemi playing comic relief as the bug-eyed sidekick, this film would have failed. Big. However, these are Autobots and we came to see them kick some Decepticon ass, rock the fly ass wheels and maybe even bust with a little Capoeira. Well, I did anyway.

There are some goofy moments when our alien robot friends are a little too animated (that's for the kids) and when the plot's varnish wears thin. Let me put it this way, if Jazz isn't the Transformer version of the "token black guy" - I mean, he speaks the dialect and is even the first Autobot to get fragged - I will trade in my comic book collection for a pair of pink ballerina slippers and change my name to Fredr?ch.

All nick-pickery aside, I got to see what I came to see:

Giant robots fighting? Check.
Megan Fox bent over in a skirt? Check.
The sound of Transformers transforming, you know "chokchockchokchokchok?" Check.

Tranformers purists, stay clear. Every other normal kid with a life outside of fan boards and masturbating over Tranformer superdeformed manga toys, let'er rip! Just don't expect the Autobots to rescue you from the love story that is the engine upon which this ride was built.

Watch your chassis, fellas.