Saturday, June 27, 2009

Transformers Revenge of The Fallen - A Review


Aside from a few scenes that I found were badly filmed or edited, I really enjoyed Transformers. It was an excellent summer pop corn flick about alien robots fighting each other on Earth. From Michael Bay, no less.

Bay is the Lord of explosions, the Guru of expensive, mindless actioners. With Transformers 2, he re-establishes himself in this position masterfully.

T2 will not win any oscars but it may get a few MTV awards for most badass character or best lips. The film is totally brainless fun with heaps of useless visuals and extremely loud noises.

And it's loads of fun!

Peter Cullen, the voice of Optimus Prime, gives another stellar speech as the introduction to the thin story drags on. It is long but his voice is just so friggin' fantastic you just don't care.

The story itself, if anyone cares about such things in a Michael Bay film, is actually meatier this time around.

Energon is the source of power for the Transformers. In order to have ultimate power, Decepticons landed on Earth 17000 years ago and set up a machine to harvest Energon from our sun, destroying it in the process. But valiant autobots fought the Evil ones and contained the machine in a secret location. Or something like that.

Enter Sam Witwicky(LeBoeuf) who finds himself the bearer of the clues that will lead the Transformers in our current time period to the secret location. Only Sam is not interested in helping his metal buddies anymore. He just wants to be normal and do Megan Fox all day long. Who can blame him?

The film is a race to find the ancient machine and culminates in a climactic battle between good and evil that will decide the fate of both mankind and robot kind alike, as well as that of the Earth itself.

I honestly think there are more explosions and destruction in T2 than in all Bay films combined.

And as I man who grew up watching Transformers, it was awesome!

There are however a few cons to all this fun.

First off, Megan Fox.

Yes, she is hot. She is also useless. Most of her shots are close-ups of her lips which she obviously pouts on command. She acts like she's always walking on a runway, alone, acting overly sexy.

It's too much of a good thing and since she has nothing else to do in this film, I feel she could've been left on the cutting room floor, probably on a think red cushion eating strawberries or something.

Another disappointment is Mikaela's(Fox) competition for Sam's heart in the beginning of the film. I won't spoil it but it was really stupid, not to mention a total ripoff of another franchise of robotic proportions...

The two Autobots, Skids and Mudflaps, were very annoying. Why the street/black talk? Totally useless and abusive of an overused stereotype.

Something big happens about 2/3 into the movie, after which the pacing slows down considerably. Many critics are taking points out for this but I think it was important to do it the way they did.
In such an intense action film, a slowdown at this particular moment allowed for some emotional moments. To take it all in, to realize what had just happened.

It is big.

But since it's a Bay film, the predictability of the script kicks in as the film picks up in pace, as the puzzle's pieces come together, as the movie makes its way to the final scenes.

T2 is longer, louder with better editing and overall better performances. We also have much more robot on robot action and although many new Transformers show up, it doesn't suffer from overcrowding like such films as Batman & Robin or X-Men The Last Stand by focusing on mostly Optimus, the new villain and Sam.

Star Trek was better in every way but Transformers Revenge of The fallen is an excellent summer film. Hopefully #3 is coming and will be just as good.

7/10

Friday, June 26, 2009

Entertainment News of the week

Not much news for this second week but one big item that I will limit myself to as I think it deserves all the attention.

Item 1: Michael Jackson has finally travelled to Never Never Land.

I have a huge amount of respect for Michael Jackson. Always have and always will.
He was a giant of the music industry who I grew up with, enjoying every single piece of music he came up with.
It saddens me to no end to realize I will never see him in concert, to know that I will never hear a new Michael Jackson song.
It is a tragedy that he leaves us during a moment in his life when he was trying to get it back together, touring, singing and dancing for our enjoyment.

He would've made so much money.
He would've been out of trouble.
He would've been back on top again.

He was Michael Jackson.
He was the King.