Robot's Make Me Cry (Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen (DVD))

Member Name: utero

Product:	Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen (DVD)
Date:	27/06/09 (79 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Some good effects, Rainn Wilson

Disadvantages: The story, the comedy, the plot, the acting, the character choices, the dumbing down etc

I lived my childhood, therefore stuff like Transformers, The A-Team, Mask etc were part of toy's and TV viewing. When the big screen live action Transformers rolled out a couple of years back it was ok, it was never going to be entirely faithful to the original cartoons. The effects were incredible, the story ok but there were also some problems, namely transformers doing stupid things such as playing hide and seek around the main human characters house.

Well if you hated that part of the original film then get ready for Revenge Of The Fallen. This time Michael Bay has taken everything that was crap about the first one and turned it up to eleven for over two and a half hours.

Now please be aware that there may be some spoilers in this opinion, I can't help it because there is so much in this film that is terrible and very little that's actually good.

Firstly it's obvious that this film was written on the back of a fag packet and then revised as they went along, filling in the gaps to hold the big bangs together. The plot seems Sam Witnicky (or whatever he's called) leaving behind his hot girlfriend Megan Fox to go to college. A shard of the cube from the first movie falls out of his shirt that shows that he hasn't washed it in a very long time. This creates merry mayhem in his house as kitchen appliances transform into a scene that feels like a rip-off of Gremlins without the dark humour. Once at college he starts acting funny like he's having a fit, drawing out symbols that must mean something. Meanwhile the Autobots are helping the army thin out the Decepticons who then assault the earth and resurrect Megatron with relative ease all in the name of getting the real leader of the bad guys back to earth, all this by stealing the sun apparently. It really is all over the place and has no cohesion yet three screenwriters have their hands on this.

However the real villain of the piece must be Bay, in the past his films have rode a fine line but usually eared on the side of entertainment thanks to some good casting. Of course I don't count Pearl Harbour amongst those. It seems on this one no one really reigned him in and his excesses are exposed in full glory.

Where oh where do we begin. For starters the effects are great but when the transformers are in fighting mode it just becomes a giant blur on the screen, the majority of the transformers have no individuality so you have no idea who is who and what the hell is going on. So the action doesn't work and like Terminator a few weeks back, all manner of big pyrotechnics get incredibly tedious if there's no story behind them. It's also obvious the one thing Bay likes more than an explosion is the military so were treated to gun-ho bull non-stop.

Next is the bizarre choices with the Transformers and trying to pass things off as humour. It's been a decade since Jar Jar Binks lit up the Star Wars universe with inane stupidity. Well now this film brings some of that flavour back with two autobots who in some quarters have been deemed a little racist. Yes these two twins can't read, speak in street slang that will have outdated this film by next week and have dangling gold teeth etc. They are shockingly bad and offensive to peoples intelligence, of course they're for the kids but I'd like to think that kids are smarter than this. Then you have the likes of Bumblebee crying, yes I kid you not. At a later point in the film we encounter an old transformer who speaks like he's a extra from the cast of Oliver and at one point farts a parachute. Now if you think that's bad then nothing can prepare you for the jaw dropping awfulness of seeing a transformer with a giant pair of swinging testicles - seriously has it come to this?

On the human side Shia La Beef is bland and just walks around shouting Optimus and looking embarrassed at being asked to spaz out on a couple of occasions. Megan Fox is obviously incredibly looking but as an actress I predict she'll be on TV within five years. It seems Michael Bay just stops short of working in a tracking shot that starts in her underwear but there's a general amount of sleaze on screen, which doesn't set the right tone. Then there's La Beef's new college roommate who is the custom comic relief and sadly doesn't bite it in the final act. Also do we really need to see John Tuturro in a thong on the big screen - that deserves an 18-rating on it's own.

Oh I almost forgot to mention the transformer which act's like a cross between a Looney Tunes character and Joe Pesci from Goodfella's.

There really is only one good thing in this movie and that's Rainn Wilson playing a pompous college professor, but he's only it for five minutes tops.

The film could easily have had an hour taken out of it and it would have made no difference to this obnoxious mess.

This summer has so far been shocking with the majority of the big hitters all substituting story for effects. The only exception I've seen is Star Trek. These films won't have any longevity like the summer blockbusters of previous times. There's a reason why people still buy the likes of Ghostbusters, Jaws, ET and Jurassic Park. It's because they're good stories well told. I wish studios would start following Pixar's lead in making a complete package rather than cobbling something together held only by a large effects budget.

I came out of this film in a rage as it not only pisses on something I loved in my childhood but that it has the audacity to treat it's audience as having no intelligence.

Revenge Of The Fallen is an insult to cinema.

Summary: Robots can't disguise this tragedy