As my fall break continues, I saw the last of the big summer films today, Transformers. There are a number of reasons why this one was the last one I got too. 1) The project initially didn't interest me as I never was a fan of the toys growing up; I was a GoBots man, myself. 2) Seeing Michael Bay's name attached to it didn't give me much hope that this was going to be a cinematic masterpiece. 3) I got increasingly annoyed at the amount of publicity the film was getting; the MTV Movie Awards basically became one long commercial for the film. 4) I've never thought much of Shia LeBeouf as an actor.
Despite all those reasons, I went into the film with an open mind. After all, the film made a lot of money and I read/heard a lot of people say they thought it was really good. The general consensus was that the film was a lot of fun with kick-ass action. Unfortunately, I ended up not being able to share in that belief. For whatever reason, I just couldn't turn off my brain and enjoy it. There were too many things in the film that I found annoying.
First, was the amount of commercialization within the film, hence the title of my post. Now this film is not the first to have gratuitous product placement, but here, every scene seemed to include a brand name of some product, and a lot of times they had nothing to do with the scene. Off the top of my head I saw plugs for GMC, Cadillac, Burger King, Mountain Dew, Apple, Xbox, My Little Pony, Furby, and Wells Fargo. I'm sure I'm missing something too. Seeing these things pop up constantly became annoying after a while.
Then there was the liberties Michael Bay took with time throughout the film. In one scene it would be morning and then the next it would be pitch black and there is no context given for what happened over the course of that time. Bay just sets up action sequence after action sequence without doing a proper job of placing them in a logical or clear setting.
Shia LeBeouf also continued his streak of grating performances in my book here. He seemingly plays the same character in every film; this smarmy, rapid talked that wants you to think he's humble and just a kid, yet comes off as cocky and arrogant. Frankly though, all of the human characters came off as unlikeable to me. And a lot of them had characterization that just confused me; like John Tuturro's comedic hardass. He gets introduced halfway through the film and you're completely confused as to what his motivations are and why he's being so difficult. About halfway through the film, I was starting to think that the Autobots should just let the Decepticons destroy the planet. If these are the people representing us, perhaps we need to start over.
In addition to the confusing characters, you also had scenes that left me scratching my head too. The whole scene involving Sam looking for his glasses and being interrupted by his parents was terrible. First off, the Autobots were annoyingly impatient with Sam as he looked for the glasses. Then I found it hard to believe that these huge machines are walking around in Sam's backyard yet NO ONE seems to notice. Then there's the awkward dialogue between Sam and his parents about what he was doing in his bedroom that goes nowhere. The other scene I found troubling was the final climatic battle between the Transformers. There is all these explosions and destruction going on, yet there are constantly people wandering in the street amongst this carnage. After the first explosion, wouldn't these people find shelter or run away. I'm watching this and thinking "What are these people still doing here?"
Speaking of the final climatic battle, I was hoping this was going to be the film's saving grace. After the first 3/4 of the film was focused too heavily on the humans, I thought that I would at least get an awesome battle to close things out. Yet, even this wasn't as good as I would have liked. I think a part of the problem was that it was too difficult to discern who was fighting. Perhaps with a better knowledge of the characters, this may not have been a problem. But for me, it just seemed like two hunks of metal wrestling each other. I could never tell who had the advantage. Then the whole thing ends with a thud with Sam sticking the cube inside of Megatron. I wouldn't have had as big of a problem with that, if that solution had been posed earlier in the film. Instead, they Optimus kept harping on how he would have to absorb the cube in order to save everyone. Why should he kill himself when sticking it in Megatron was clearly a better solution?
Perhaps I am overanalyzing a film that isn't meant to be nitpicked. Unfortunately the film's flaws were just too glaring to me. I think a good comparison would be the new Die Hard film that came out this summer. It too had a lot of action and ridiculous stunts that require a suspension of belief. However, the difference between the two is that I had a lot of fun with that one and Transformers just left me with a big headache. I am glad there are those out there who enjoyed this, but I thought the film simply did not provide more than meets the eye. Grade: C+
2 comments:
I don't have a good argument against the negatives you mention. Perhaps a C+ is a bit harsh, but then, if Presidents aren't swayed by what polls say, then why should reviewers. The film is ripe with opportunities for critical inquiry. The commercialization of the film, on the screen and off, demonstrates one of the ultimate ironies of capitalism: everything is for sale. When everything is for sale, money becomes an all important commodity, which serves to perpetuate social and economic repression. The film certainly does little to help the cause of actual humans, whereas the silly people saved by machines in the film profit from adventure and gain. The action was good enough for me, but maybe I'm not too peeved because I saw the film with free tickets. Obviously I would have preferred a film with no humans, only machines, which is much of what I saw growing up with the cartoon show. None of the robots, good or bad, ever developed any real sense of characters, while the actors were unbelievable, but who believes in sentient robots anyway. It was fun, albeit a sad expression of what was once a proud morning tradition for many school children. I have to give the film a flat B rating.
I'm glad to see I'm not crazy when it came to my negative criticisms. I think as far as the grade goes, it may have been a bit harsh. However, it was the result of it being the last of the summer films I saw and I ended up comparing it to everything else I saw. In a vaccuum, I may have given it a higher grade.
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