Saturday, February 2

movie review - Transformers

well, i finally got around to watching the July 4th summer blockbuster movie of 2007. i missed my opportunity to see it for free when i was on vacation in Arizona last year and my work decided to take an afternoon off and go see it without me. bastards. however, i still didn't have to pay to see it, as my roommate purchased it and i just watched his copy.

boy am i glad i didn't pay money to see it.

let me start off by saying that my expectations of this movie were LOW. about as low as they can get short of me going into a movie and not hearing one word about it. i had heard that if you went in with an open mind and just went along for the ride, it was a fun movie. and hey, i've gone into other Michael Bay movies with an open mind, just along for the ride, and i ended up liking them ok (well, not all of them - i'm looking at you The Island). so i figured i'd be ok. also, as i was never a HUGE fan of the Transformers (short of having some of their toys), i wasn't worried about the movie raping my childhood memories.

all that said, this movie was an abomination.

they basically took the plot of Independence Day and added in aliens that were on our side. there are so many problems with this movie that i can't even begin to describe them here. and i'm not talking logistical problems, or problems like "why don't the bad robots just smash the tiny humans, why do they insist on shooting at them like it's a fair fight?" or "why did they feel the need to sex up the movie with the young, hot Australian blond that's some sort of communications expert?" (though there are plenty of those problems) - i'm talking about writing problems, pacing problems... just PROBLEMS. all i can tell you is what i liked:

- seeing and hearing the Transformers come to life
- seeing the battles between the Autobots and the Decepticons
- the out-of-place humorous sequences in the movie that actually made me laugh despite how ludicrous they were (like the scene at his parents house with the Autobots in the backyard)

everything else i hated.

i almost turned the movie off several times along the way, including as early as about 10 minutes into it and as late as an hour and a half into it. i hardly EVER dislike a movie so much that i want to turn it off, especially when i've devoted an hour and a half to it.

what continues to amaze me is that i went in with an open mind and STILL hated it. if Ghost Rider didn't come out last year, Transformers would have easily been the worst movie i saw of 2007.

all that said, the movie was still an exhilarating ride. i might not say no to watching it again if i absolutely had to.

1/2 star out of 4

-k

1 comment:

John said...

Worst review EVER. Like Independence Day with friendly aliens?!?!?!? Where was the Air force President then? Or how about the drunk father who redeems himself? Or stripper wife? I don't see any of those popping up anywhere. Sadly disappointed. SADLY.