I’m going to stand up and say it loud, say it proud: I am so glad that I didn’t waste money on seeing this movie. You can interpret that however you like it - a friend may have paid for a ticket, or I may be indulging in pirate copies - I’ll leave it up to your imagination. But there is no way to deny that when I saw the word ‘Hasbro’ at the start of the movie, I felt a chill up my spine. Not since the days of Barbie has a movie based on a toy line been so widely anticipated.
The transformers didn’t look remotely convincing. Shia LaBouf is meant to be the next Tom Hanks - lets see him act with a dog ‘Turner and Hooch’ style, it isn’t going to happen!
At the start of the film, Shia is trying to flog all his grandfather’s stuff, what is essentially priceless family heirlooms, literally from the 1840s, to get his car payments. This ends in bad news, his teacher gives him an overly generous grade, goes home, trips over a foosball table that he has in his room, puts his gear down near one of at least three computers that are loitering around the room… I mean, hello Shia, if you’re trying to raise a bit of coin, you think maybe there are other things you can sell!?
And you’d think the movie would get very ‘Hulk smash’ with giant robots and cities being in the way. And while it does get like this towards the end, Michael Bay seems to be way more interested stuffing around with a nerd who’s trying to score action with a hot chick! Let me tell you something people, I was a nerd in high school, and if you think that the hot girl is going to realise that she doesn’t want the rich muscly football jock with the nice car and would much rather be with the nerdy guy who’s in a beaten up old smoke belching thing, clambering for her boobs and making lame excuses about seatbelts, then hey, you’re in for a shock. My encyclopedic knowledge of Star Trek got me nothing in high school!
And when you think about it, the ending couldn’t have been more creepier if it tried. What’s with Optimus Prime and the rest of the perverts loitering around while Shia gets it on with the hot chick on Bumblebee’s chest? That is very weird. That is very ‘Eight Transformers of Interest’ right there.
August 5th, 2007 at 3:34 pm
Call me odd if you want, MJ, but I loved the movie. Granted, it stretched the bounds of credibility a number of times (the final scene does come to mind), but lets face it - if we were looking for reality, would we be watching a movie about giant transforming robots that decide to duke it out on Earth? If we’re gonna go on such a radical tangent from reality, why not the rest of the movie’s impossibilities? I thought it worked, most everyone else I’ve talked to think it worked, and the common theme among those who do like it is the idea of, “Hey… it’s just a movie.”
Enjoy it for what it is - not for what real life would impose on it.
August 6th, 2007 at 8:44 am
Oh, I wasn’t looking for reality. A movie doesn’t have to have reality in it for me to enjoy it! I just watched Ghostbusters and I love that movie. But I can’t help but sit in front of Transformers and cringe. It got to the point where I had to turn it off when Bumblebee peed on that government guy, I had to come back to it another time!
Honestly, I think as the special effects have gotten better, movie makers have become very lazy.
August 6th, 2007 at 11:52 am
THAT at least, I won’t argue. But let’s be honest - it could have been SO much worse.
August 9th, 2007 at 5:49 pm
I too rather enjoyed this movie. Even some of the human centric stuff. I particularly like the soldier subplot, I liked seeing them on the ground fighting in the final battle. That was a good battle perspective.
Yeah it was mindless, but it was fun. I think I went in with low expectations, but what few I had were blown away. Transformers was ultimately better then it probably should have been.
August 12th, 2007 at 3:23 pm
I enjoyed the movie, but only because of the big screen. I went just to see the transformers, and DAMN, did I get it!
Yeah, the guy was really lame and the girl was REALLY hot, but it did get a bit lame at times. I guess it’s just supposed to be a bit of fun.
August 12th, 2007 at 8:17 pm
Well hey, even if I was in the minority, I still think it was like watching a train wreck. I honestly don’t think it COULD have been worse. It could have been DIFFERENT. Not worse though.
August 13th, 2007 at 3:43 pm
Oh yes it could have been. A couple of things could have made it much worse.
For example, plot. It actually had one. One that even, heaven forbid!, made some kind of sense. With a lot of cartoon/comic to movie translations, things like plot get lost in the effects and the nostalgia factor. Granted, this movie had both of those, but the plot itself worked on it’s own, so without it, the movie gets worse.
Another thing that could have made it worse : horrible dialog. While it is cheesy in the movie, it isn’t horrible. Think about how Star Wars Episode III was - cheesy, delivered like wooden planks, and then not always making sense on top of that (George Lucas, forgive me, for I have sinned…). The Transformers actors and voice actors and writers managed to avoid that as well.
I’ll agree it’s not the best movie in the world - but it certainly wasn’t nearly as bad as it could have been.
August 13th, 2007 at 9:54 pm
So it didn’t have horrible dialog? You didn’t think ‘Bumbleebee, stop leaking coolant on that man’ and a transformer from the west side saying his going to hang with his homies… maybe… just MAYBE… strays into ‘horrible’?
Okay Shadriss. We should agree to disagree, okay?
August 13th, 2007 at 10:11 pm
Oh it had it’s complete Cheese moments.
But you can’t think for a second that the SOURCE MATERIAL was anything but cheese. In that respect, the movie is very faithful to the original. Except updated for cheese from the 00s instead of the 80s.
August 14th, 2007 at 12:26 am
So far as Jazz is concerned, that’s true to the original character. And, for that matter, explained before he even spoke. Remember - they picked up English from the http://WWW. Bad English, in all it’s forms, is easily found there. And how else would you tell BB to stop leaking coolant on that man? Granted, the scene itself was pure cheese, but as The Adventurer points out, so was the original source material.
I’m not saying that it was a perfect movie, MJ. Not by any means. But I DO think you’re being a bit harder on it that it deserves.
August 14th, 2007 at 8:36 am
Trust me, in years to come it will be remembered as the ‘Howard the Duck’ film of the new millennium.
August 14th, 2007 at 2:51 pm
Nothing can match Howard the Duck in missing the point of it’s source material.
February 11th, 2008 at 12:54 am
Are you kidding me? That movie was awsome! Special Effects were great, the story line was consistent with the old characters. The movie was directed beautifully and had great hidden humor. Granted it had its cheesy parts, but what child movie doesn’t!? I personally can’t wait for the next one to come out! That was the best movie made from a cartoon, I’ve ever seen!