Transformers Review

HIGHS

• I went into this movie with one expectation: to see giant robots tear shit up. And that expectation was most definitely fulfilled.
• Unlike the Star Wars prequels, the Transformers movie was not a bastardization of my childhood. I would say they did a pretty admirable job or transferring the material to a live action, real-world format. What would sound pretty hokey on paper, was made to seem as credible as possible on film.
• Pound for pound, probably the best special effects ever seen in a film. You will believe the robots are real. Exceptional work across the board.
• The movie had a good sense of humor about it. A tad hokey at times, but never too much so. For the most part the jokes really worked and the dialogue wasn't painful. A relatively consistent tone was maintained, even when things got crazy.
• As far as summer action movies go, Transformers makes Spider-man 3 look like amateur hour at The Apollo.
• I distinctly remember a point in the movie where the action was so intense that I could feel my heart pounding in my chest. That's gotta count for something.
• I read a quote from Spielberg the other day saying that Transformers was "a movie Michael Bay was born to direct." I guess he was probably right about that.
  

LOWS

• This IS a Michael Bay movie, so the script isn't perfect. There were a lot of plot points that could have been flushed out better. If the quality of the story were on par with the action scenes, this would be some cinematic gold.
• The majority of the Decepticons were introduced fairly late in the film and seemed kind of rushed. I didn't feel that the notion of a "war between Autobots and Decepticons" was ever fully realized. Felt more like a localized threat, rather than a global one.
• What is Michael Bay's fascination with flares?
  

Torrey's Opinion:
5- Strongly Recommended
4- Recommended
3- A Mixed Bag
2- Sub-par
1- Don't Bother

Random related fact: It took approximately 38 hours for the animators at Industrial Light & Magic to render one frame of the CGI animation to portray the Transformers. This breaks the record set by Weta Workshop for The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers (2002), where it took 20 hours to animate a frame of CGI to portray the Ent, Treebeard.