Thursday, June 25, 2009

Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen - The IMAX Experience Review

Rated PG-13 (Intense Sequences of Sci-Fi Action Violence, Language, Some Crude and Sexual Material, and Brief Drug Material)

Running Time: 2 Hours & 30 Minutes

Cast-
Shia LaBeouf-Sam Witwicky
Megan Fox-Mikaela Banes
Josh Duhamel-Major William Lennox
Tyrese Gibson-Sergeant Robert Epps
Ramon Rodriguez-Leo Spitz
John Turturro-Reggie Simmons
Kevin Dunn-Ron Witwicky
Julie White-Judy Witwicky
Isabel Lucas-Alice
Glenn Morshower-General Morshower
John Benjamin Hickey-Galloway
Rainn Wilson-Professor Colan
Peter Cullen (voice)-Optimus Prime
Hugo Weaving (voice)-Megatron
Tony Todd (voice)-The Fallen
Robert Foxworth (voice)-Ratchet
Jess Harnell (voice)-Ironhide
André Sogliuzzo (voice)-Sideswipe
Grey DeLisle (voice)-Arcee
Tom Kenny-Wheelie/Skids
Reno Wilson-Mudflap
Mark Ryan (voice)-Jetfire
Charlie Adler (voice)-Starscream
Frank Welker (voice)-Soundwave/Devastator/Reedman/Grindor
Calvin Wimmer (voice)-Wheelbot
Michael York (voice)-Prime #1
Kevin Michael Richardson (voice)-Prime #2/Skipjack/Rampage
Robin Atkin Downes (voice)-Prime #3

Directed by Michael Bay

Outside of the forest battle halfway through the film, everything else about "Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen" is total garbage.
We’ve finally arrived at the most anticipated movie of the summer, “Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen,” released into conventional theaters and IMAX yesterday. The sequel to the 2007 hit has been outselling “Star Trek” in advanced ticket sales and your favorite reviewer has returned from the multiplex to give you the verdict. Unfortunately, “Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen” is a massive disappointment and earns the dubious honor of being the worst summer film I’ve seen so far. The visual effects are still state-of-the-art but they’re no longer any special and while Bay certainly ups the ante in scope, everything else from the story to the characters suffers. The sexual humor extends the camp factor to an almost unbearable limit and by the time the film meanders toward its loud climax, you’d wish it ended forty minutes earlier.

SOME SPOILERS FOLLOW! After a short prologue taking place in 17,000 BC, we return to our main characters two years after the first film, with the Autobots, led by Optimus Prime (voice of Peter Cullen) joining forces with the British and American military to form NEST, an organization devoted to hunting down the remaining Decepticons on Earth. Both Major William Lennox (Josh Duhamel) and Sergeant Robert Epps (Tyrese Gibson) are part of this newly formed organization. Meanwhile, Sam Witwicky (Shia LaBeouf) is preparing to go to college and while going through his belongings, he finds a shard of the All-Spark. Upon touching it, his mind is filled with ancient Cybertronian text. He requests his girlfriend, Mikaela Banes (Megan Fox) to keep the shard for safe keeping and says good-bye to his guardian, Bumblebee. In space, Soundwave, the Decepticons’ intelligence officer, hacks a United States military satellite in an attempt to learn the location of Megatron’s corpse and a shard of the All-Spark in the hopes of resurrecting their leader. The shard happens to be heavily guarded in a NEST bunker and Soundwave sends Ravage to retrieve it. Deep in the Laurentian Abyss, the Constructicons revive Megatron (voice of Hugo Weaving), who flies into space and meet his true master, the Fallen (voice of Tony Todd), one of the original thirteen Transformers who is now looking for a Sun Harvester, a large device that can harvest the energy of a planet’s sun and convert it into energon, the lifeblood of all Transformers. The Autobots now must face their old foes, the Decepticons, in battle once more and protect Sam, whose mind holds the key to the survival of the Transformers and their hidden origins.

First let’s look at the plot of “Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen.” Unfortunately, there is none because everything is a damn near incomprehensible mess. Of course, story is never important in these types of films but if that’s true, why did Bay and writers Ehren Kruger, Roberto Orci and Alex Kurtzman spend two hours and thirty minutes telling it? What made the first film mostly work was that amidst all the mindless robot battles lay a simple coming-of-age tale of a boy buying his first car and taking that first step into adulthood. No such themes are found here and the sequel’s sense of scope begins to work against it as we’re introduced to convenient plot devices such as a large ‘rail gun’ that the U.S. military just happens to have and when Sam discovers the ‘Matrix of Leadership,’ which just happens to have the ability to resurrect a major character. Another problem is that "Revenge of the Fallen" reaches its climax about midway and after that, it comes to a screeching halt as it wanders aimlessly toward the final battle. The sequel tries to cover too much ground by piling on the mythology even when it makes no sense and requires too much suspension of disbelief.

It doesn’t help that the characters aren’t all that engaging and Shia LaBeouf seems to have lost much of the wit and charm he had in the first film. Still, I can say that Sam remains the most fleshed-out character, which is no surprise considering he’s always at the center of everything but it’s hard to care about his mission because there’s just no emotional investment. When he suffers a fatal blast from Megatron that leaves him near-death, we don’t feel any grief because we know Bay will find some way to bring him back or there’s no “Transformers 3.” This film reaffirms the fact that Megan Fox absolutely cannot act. When her character Mikaela first appears, she’s wearing ultra-short, cut-off jeans and leaning suggestively on top of a motorcycle. This led to all the male audience members to start whooping and hollering. Yes, we get it, Fox is really attractive and I don’t dispute that but here, it’s just overdone way too much as we’re constantly reminded of how good-looking she is. During the final battle, there’s debris and dirt flying everywhere but amazingly, Fox’s white jeans remain clean throughout that entire sequence! I certainly would like a pair of these special pants as it would sure save on quarters at the local Laundromat! Both Duhamel and Gibson’s characters are now little more than cardboard cutouts with their macho-man banter, taking part in the action yet adding little to the plot. Sam’s neurotic parents, played by Kevin Dunn and Julie White, continues to steal the show in one of the film’s more humorous bits when White’s character accidentally eats brownies that are filled with weed while visiting Sam’s college campus. John Turturro also reprises his role as Reggie Simmons, who now works in a Brooklyn deli since the U.S. government has disbanded Sector 7. Unfortunately, his character is now more annoying than ever and we’re even treated to a shot of his bare buttocks in a thong. Seriously, Bay, was that even necessary? Joining the cast is Ramon Rodriguez (last seen in “The Taking of Pelham 123”) as conspiracy theorist Leo Spitz but he soon wears out his welcome with his incessant screaming that I wished one of the Decepticons would just step on him.

As for the Transformers themselves, they’re still relegated to supporting characters but the film suffers from what I call “X-Men 3 syndrome” as a gaggle of unknown, uncharacterized robots just suddenly pop up to wail on each other and little else. Outside of Optimus Prime, Megatron and a few others, all the other robots are interchangeable, and they exist only to fight because someone decided that’s all the core audience is interested in. Some of the new Transformers wear out their welcome fast, such as Jetfire (voice of Mark Ryan) with his grumpy old man shtick or Wheelie (voice of Tom Kenny), who ends up latching on to Fox’s leg and humping it. Those are minor gripes compared to Mudflap and Skids, two of the worst racial stereotypes I’ve seen in a film since Jar Jar Binks in “Star Wars Episode I: The Phantom Menace.” Both of them have gold buck teeth, speak in street slang and get this, they admit that they’re illiterate! This is the twenty first century and its amazing films have to fall back on these offensive caricatures just to provide a cheap laugh. Just when it couldn’t get any worse, Bay fills the entire film with a constant barrage of campy sexual humor that makes “Batman & Robin” look like an Academy Award-winning masterpiece. We have dogs humping each other, Megan Fox landing on people’s crotches, and testicles on Devastator. The audience just ate it up, laughing throughout at the most inane and banal of jokes. The one thing I can positively say is that the special effects and action scenes don’t disappoint but even then they begin to grow tiresome. Bay has refined his technique in making the fights more comprehensible and the highlight would be when Optimus Prime takes on Megatron, Starscream, and Grindor in a thrilling forest battle but when the all-out rumble begins to take place in an Egyptian desert, you’re just too exhausted to even care about the outcome anymore. Roger Ebert says it best, ‘If you want to save yourself the ticket price, go into the kitchen, cue up a male choir singing the music of hell, and get a kid to start banging pots and pans together. Then close your eyes and use your imagination.’

Critics agreed with everything I have mentioned as “Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen” currently holds the lowest rating of all the high-profile summer releases: 22% on Rotten Tomatoes. I know I hold an unpopular opinion with this film and I’ll probably get bashed for it but that’s something a critic, even an amateur one has to deal with it. So far, the box office gross stands at a record-breaking $60.6 million for a movie opening on a Wednesday, surpassing 2004’s “Spider-Man 2,” which earned $59.8 million that same day. There is no doubt now that the film will open at number one at the box office and the final figure might be upwards of $150 million. Last year, “The Dark Knight” was the highest grossing film of the year and had emotionally resonant characters and an intelligent script that asked interesting questions of what a man would do to save a city, the likes of which is rarely seen in a high-profile summer picture. I can’t help but think of Joshua Starnes' review on ComingSoon, where he wrote that 'the people the film was made for won't notice; they'll like it for what it is. Which, on consideration, is probably the saddest thing of all. As long as you're willing to accept crap, you're not likely to get anything better.' At first, I thought it was too harsh of a statement but after seeing this garbage on the big screen, it’s apt. Nonetheless, it doesn’t matter what I or other critics think, because the film will still make millions of dollars but as you’re watching, keep Starnes' statement in the back of your mind. If “Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen” has already sunk this low, I can’t imagine how the third film will turn out.

Final Rating: 1.5 out of 5

"Fate rarely calls upon us at a moment of our choosing."

Addendum: Having seen "Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen" in IMAX, I am here to report that there are only two scenes shot with full IMAX cameras: the forest battle between Optimus Prime and the Decepticons and when Devastator rampages across the Egyptian desert.