If you would have told me a few months ago that I would have liked Transformers: Dark of the Moon, I would have laughed heartily. Yet, I begrudingly must say that this Transformers movie is a staple in action cinema and … a pretty good movie to boot. Well, maybe I won’t go that far ...
I was going to write full reviews of the preceding two movies but out of laziness and an inability to sit through the entirety of both, I did not. I can summarize though. The first was a decent action movie wrapped around some of the most annoyingly cliched characters ever put to film. It was passable. The second was an insult, not only to the senses but also to anyone who has ever found any movie (Weekend at Bernie’s not withstanding) thought-provoking. TF2 was a train-wreck, mostly in story, but that was quickly talked off as a by-product of the writer’s strike that year. That would make sense then if the entire film was ad-libbed on the day of shooting.
I guess at this point, we can forget about any notion of a Transformers movie based on the rose-colored glasses of nostaglia that many hold for the original animated series and film. The most we can hope for is a decent movie which does not dig the series’ grave any deeper. Yet, with Michael Bay still at the helm and writer Ehren Krueger taking over the duties of crafting terrible dialogue scenes around the still-awesome robot destruction, something magical happened. There is an old saying that goes “even a broken watch is right twice a day.” I will expand that to “and even Michael Bay can craft a solid film once in a while.”
Sam (Shia LaBeouf) is still pretty bratty at the onset of the film as he is looking for a highfaluting job after graduating college and getting a medal from the POTUS. He feels he should be more important since he played a part in saving the world a couple of times. Cry me a river, dickface! His girlfriend Carly (Rosie Huntington-Whiteley, and a marked improvement over Megan Fox) works for some rich a-hole in Washington, D.C. His parents are still annoying and in the middle of everything. So … yeah. Sam is feeling insecure and that’s our A-story.
The other plot point, as if it mattered, centers around an Autobot ship that crash-landed on the moon many decades ago. It carried Sentinel Prime and his great invention to stop all the feuding that now the Decepticons want which the Autobots must thwart from acquiring. This, of course, leads to all of the action, explosions, mechanical carnage, and senseless civilian causalities that the first two films made famous. The final sequence (and by sequence, I mean the final third of this damn near three hour movie) is set in Chicago where the Autobots and Decepticons duke it out and cause a shitload of property damage to stop the impending destruction of … the Earth or something.
To be fair, my chief complaints about the first two films were corrected here. The characters are not as annoying and one-dimensional, the action is kicked up a notch, and even the story has a few twists that are quite overplayed, but still effective. The biggest compliment that I can give to the film is that I could actually tell what the fuck is going on. It was widely reported that Bay had to tone down his ADD-inducing, camera-whipping-around style for the sake of the 3D effects which means that the only headaches you will get is from the 3D. And even the 3D was the best I have seen in theaters. Granted, I’ve been limited to Piranha, Saw, and Drive Angry so I might not be an expert but the effects in general and especially the 3D were worth the trillion dollars I’m sure this thing costed.
Still, even with the addition of high-class actors like John Malkovich and Frances McDormand, this is not a Nolan or Coen Brothers film. Just like before, it is still way too long, features far too many meaningless characters, and is still hung up on Sam and his girl of the week as they sort through their problems as opposed to 150 minutes of robots kicking ass. Like I said, we’re not going to get that movie until a decent reboot happens but this is still a movie that defies all of the negatives going against it. I walked into the theater, with my sad 3D glasses in hand, waiting to completely hate this movie. Yet, between the cast, the effects, the story, or just sheer fucking luck, a good movie actually prevailed.
I hesitate to write a review of a Transformers movie this positive. It goes against the fiber of my being. It may destroy the shreds of credibility I have in this biz. But, regardless, it is the best Bay film in a while and the best Transformers movie ever. I will go watch Inception now. If I hate it, you know something is amiss.
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