Look, kid. If you don't shut up, I'm gonna strangle you with your tie, skin you and wear you as a Halloween costume.
Yesterday, Netflix vomited Transformers, Dark of the Moon into our mailbox. The reference to regurgitation being appropriate, since after freeing itself of that DVD, I’m sure Netflix felt much better. (Sorry, suckas. It goes back to you today.)
Why was it in our queue? Because the hubby and I are geeks and if it has any element of SF or fantasy, we’re are compelled to watch. Compelled by the power of nerd (and Greyskull/see, “nerds.”). We have the same problem with action flicks. Can’t not watch ’em.
Husband and I plop our butts on the couch, dinner in hand, and fire up the DVD. The movie starts, straightaway, no previews, suggesting that the movie makers don’t want to give the viewer time to reconsider watching.
I pause, fork in hand. Do I want to put down dinner, get up and get my glasses? On screen, Optimus Prime is babbling about his people being a peaceful race, the backdrop, a big explode-y robot battle on Cybertron. After a minute, I get my glasses. Can’t have anyone say my review was clouded by bad vision.
Anyway, at this point, the McGuffin, a spaceship with some kind of super-duper technology, is introduced. It is the “last hope.” The last hope gets blown to smithereens by the Decepticons, or so we think.
Cut to New Mexico, where astronomers detect alien technology on the moon. Why New Mexico, anyway? Because of the whole Roswell thing? If an alien race were to journey across the stars, New Mexico wouldn’t be their destination. The only aliens we have are human, and contrary to right wing rhetoric, usually hardworking, productive members of society.
At least it’s really New Mexico and not New Mexico masquerading as Qatar, as in the first Transformers movie. See if you are going to shoot a movie in Location A, and claim, on screen, that it is actually Location B, the footage shouldn’t include unmistakable geography from Location A. Hellooo, White Sands National Monument and Shiprock.
The alien tech on the moon, we are told, is the actual reason for the space race and the eventual moon landing. The next several minutes are devoted to news footage of the moon landing, intercut with a few original frames of film. I eat my dinner and note that whenever I hear President Kennedy speak, I think, “Hey, it’s the mayor of Springfield, from The Simpsons.”
“This is really good,” I say after several minutes. I clarify the statement quickly, gesturing with my fork at dinner. My beloved has cooked up a wonderful pasta dish, with spicy chicken sausage and a bell pepper, onion, garlic and ancho chili sauce. Deee-lish.
Meanwhile, Sam Witwicky (Shia LaBeouf), having just graduated from some Ivy League college, is looking for a job because his super rich, and super hot European girlfriend, Carly (Rosie Huntington-Whiteley) is tired of buying his groceries. Huntington-Whiteley is only on screen for a few seconds, before I start missing Megan Fox. Sam and Carly get cute, and then Sam goes a-interviewing, his parents in tow. (They’re in town and inexplicably follow his sorry ass around town.)
Sam goes from interview to interview, stammering a rapid fire stream of words at each unfortunate interviewer. Here’s where I realize I really hate Shia LeBeouf. He’s supplanted Adam Sandler from the number one spot in my list of actors that desperately need to be kicked in the head until stone, cold dead. (Mostly because, Sandler only does comedy and the occasional schmaltzy drama, so he’s easily avoided. LaBeouf pops up in stuff I want to like, such as Indiana Jones and the Crystal Skull.)
The awkward, overly-self aware, boyish shtick is cute in very small doses, and only if the character is a teenager. I.e., it worked in the first movie. Now, Sam is a twenty-something college graduate, and the constant stream of babble, delivered with too much adolescent squeak, and suggesting prolonged Meth use, is turning my brain to soup.
I pick up a book (WorldShaker by Richard Harland) and remove my glasses. Screw detail. Giant robots, like politicians, all look the same anyway.
Sam is hired by the company from hell, his new boss, John Malkovich. Workplace hijinks ensue, including a homoerotic-not scene in a toilet stall with a coworker (Ken Jeong of Community). Transformers, Dark of the Moon is a monument to wasted talent, including Alan Trudyk (Firefly/Serenity/I Am Robot) and Frances McDormand, among others. I guess the actors are hoping to get in on the merchandising gravy train. Bulbous-headed Bill O’Reilly, however, is quite at home in a movie of this caliber.
Patrick Dempsey, McDreamy of Grey’s Anatomy, makes an appearance as Dylan, Carly’s billionaire boss. I don’t know what Carly does for Dylan or why she needs to work, being rich herself. On meeting Dylan, Sam goes into insecure mode. More frenetic stammering. One word, Mr. LaBeouf: “Rehab.”
Eventually, the Decepticons unleash their horrible plan, I’m like, “Thank Dog. Kill ’em all, Starscream!” The Decepticons, we are told, plan on enslaving humanity, using us to rebuild Cybertron. Uh, okay, I mean, it’s not like the economy is getting any better. What else do we have to do?
The Decepticons then proceed to slaughter their new workforce and go all 911 on the buildings. Leading me to whine, “Can we get better villains, because evil shouldn’t be this stooopid?”
Sam and company walk through the ruins while some lame-ass, emo song plays in the background. Seriously? Even Gears of War 3, a frickin’ video game (awesome game) scores its trailers with better material. (The use of Sun Kil Moon’s “Heron Blue” being absolutely masterful.)
McDreamy, we learn, is McTraitor, in league with the Decepticons, a ploy to give otherwise useless Sam someone to fight. Periodically, I look up from my book, replace my glasses to watch the battles, but Transformers, Dark of the Moon, is such a mess, one might wonder if it’s meant to be an art film, surreal and obtuse. With lots of explosions.
In the absence of Mojo, the Chihuahua, the only character I care about is BumbleBee, the yellow Transformer, which leads me to this conclusion. Michael Bay is George Lucas’s long lost brother. Both have a middling talent with CG characters, and a pathological inability to direct real life humans.
Actual running time, 2 hrs, 30 mins. Feels endless…. But It’s a Dry Heat
THIS is why I won’t watch this movie. I loved the first one, which I suppose puts me in the “nerd” category as well. (Though I typically don’t like SF or action movies. Go figure.) It was obvious from the get-go this was going to be horrible. Vapid excuse to rake in summer box office dollars.
Actually, I think the first movie is surprisingly entertaining. One of those movies we pop in the DVD and rewatch from time to time. The second movie, however, kill IQ points. I hoped this one would be a little better. Instead, it had less entertainment value than the second.