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NotInWater returns a little disoriented from his trip to the DARK OF THE MOON.
To start this review off, I enjoyed the first TRANSFORMERS. It was a stupid, but fun introduction to what could have been a great franchise or a solid stand-alone film. Then REVENGE OF THE FALLEN came out and just sucked every bit of life out of me for close to three hours. As I explain here, I absolutely loathed the second movie. It later was said that the second film was during the writers’ strike, and they didn’t have much of a script to go off of. Michael Bay is not a story teller (much less a creative thinker in terms of story), so having him come up with stuff on set off the top of his head would explain why it sucked so much. Here, DARK OF THE MOON had writers, so I had the tiniest bit of hope that this movie wouldn’t suck as hard as the last one. And for the most part, it didn’t.
Most of what I despise about RotF is gone—not all, but most. Gone are the racially insensitive twin bots. Gone are transformers with testicles. Gone are the humping dogs. Gone is Megan Fox. Even with these cut, the movie still isn’t much more than safe-for-work teenage fetishism. To clarify, before people start going off in disgusting directions, I mean this movie is everything a teenage boy loves: explosions, robots, and 3D shots of girls’ asses.
I could go over the story, but there really isn’t a point. Decepticons are coming to Earth with something that crashed on the moon—which is why we had the space race in the 1960s—and the Autobots have to save us. The plot—a word I use very loosely—has some twists and turns, but none of it is convincing. You already know that half the red herrings are complete BS just by watching the trailer. And I really don’t think Michael Bay truly cares. Probably because he knows that his audience just comes to see shit blow up.
And, boy, does Michael Bay blow shit up good. Michael Bay has never been a director you go to for story. Yeah, THE ROCK and the first BAD BOYS had good stories, but those were back when Bay had a leash. The last sixty minutes is just Chicago getting the hell kicked out of it. Buildings being destroyed, cars and planes and choppers exploding in the sky, transformers getting torn in half and blown to bits—it’s all beautiful.
One of my biggest concerns was the 3D. In order for 3D to work, every shot needs to be about three seconds long for your brain to process the two separate images into a three-dimensional image. If you’ve seen a Michael Bay film, you’ll know that three seconds is an eternity to Bay. He cuts his movies fast and relentlessly (which is also a complaint I usually have with Bay). I think Bay even at one point didn’t want to make anything in 3D because it would force him to chill out and set up his shots differently. Spielberg (executive producer on the TRANSFORMERS franchise) convinced him to do DARK OF THE MOON in 3D, and Bay actually got help from James Cameron on directing in 3D. It definitely shows, as DotM’s 3D is great. But, I think it’s already gone to Bay’s head, as he claims, “There has never been a live-action show that has pushed the bounda.... Sure, Bay, sure. . . except, you know, AVATAR.
Something Bay really had to change from his normal style for this 3D movie was his shooting style. With the three-second minimum for shots, he actually took time with the action to show everything in fewer shots than normal. I really wish Bay made this transition sooner. He’s always known how to blow shit up, but sometimes you couldn’t see everything blow up. That’s hardly ever a concern with the set pieces in DotM. Bay went back to his cinematographer from BAD BOYS II (which wasn’t a “great” movie, but still probably one of Bay’s most entertaining films), who was able to frame everything nicely.
But as much as I praise the action, it doesn’t make DotM good. While the amount of absurdities is brought down tremendously from the previous film, my face ended up in my palm more frequently than it should have. There’s still the annoying mini-bot voice by Steve Buscemi from the last film, except now with an equally annoying mini-bot to have witty dialogue (read: annoy the shit out of you) with. Sam’s (Shia LaBeouf) parents make an appearance and are still full of wisdom (read: annoying as hell). John Turturo’s still here, only with a sidekick, Dutch. This is exceptionally sad because Dutch is played by geek legend Alan Tudyk, only to act like a complete idiot. Speaking of good actors acting like idiots, Academy Award winner Francis McDormand (FARGO) and Academy Award nominee John Malcovick (BEING JOHN MALCOVICH / RED) come on for a while just to make asses of themselves.
In the end, the target audience isn’t going to care. Outside of the theatre, all I heard were people yelling one another other over how “awesome” the movie was. I heard one person even say that it was the best movie he had ever seen. I looked over, and it was a high school kid, so I let it slide—he probably hadn’t seen much. While the movie is terrible at points, it was entertaining. I was able to laugh at the more ridiculous moments (in both action and things we’re just expected to believe—like Shia LeBeouf scoring that chick) and the action was beautifully staged. Plus, the 3D is pretty good. While I can’t throw a recommendation to people to hate Michael Bay, I will say it’s an entertaining popcorn flick for anyone who can look past terrible storytelling and Bay’s frat-boy humor.
Comment
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Comment by Paul Monroe on July 17, 2011 at 10:11am -
I agree with those who say that the two Transformers sequels make the first movie look like a really great movie - which it almost is, even though it is very entertaining.
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Comment by NotInWater on July 7, 2011 at 5:00pm -
@ThatBoyK-O It's more like 100 minutes of the 154 minutes most people don't like. I loved the whole battle in Chicago, but other than that, there's not much else. After watching it again, (luckily I don't have to pay for movies after opening weekend. Yay for working at a theatre) I just found myself bored to tears by everything leading up to the Chicago scene. Aside from the last 45 minutes or so, the movie is terrible, horrible, and a piece of crap.
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Comment by ThatBoyK-O on July 7, 2011 at 4:46pm -
I didn't have a problem with Wheelie I thought he was funny..I thought Brains was funny too but a few of his lines weren't funny and could have been cut..the parents didn't bother me because they weren't in the movie but a minute long (dont know why people act as if they had real screentime)...the action is by far the best and has raised the bar in cinema...and whats with all this frat-boy comparisons? hmmm must be nerds writing these reviews or something? I have to wonder why because someone said "this is the best movie ever" they must be in high school. I think that is their opinion and that is real snobbish for this person to say. What? you think you're better than him or smarter than him or something because he likes the movie and you don't. I don't like the Harry Potter movies because to me they are boring my girl loves them though different taste different opinion it's called being human...and if anyone says this movie is terrible, horrible, and a piece of crap they need to be rounded up and sent to the darkside of the moon lol because they are being a little too dramatic come on cut it out guys..It's crazy to me because the negative things some of you bring up is only about 20 minutes at the most worth of screentime in a 154 minute movie...I really just don't understand most of you people problems with the movie..it was fun and entertaining..guess I don't see eye to eye with critics because most of the movies they like (Harry Potter part 6, Super 8(yeah bored me), The King's Speech(one of the most boring movies I have ever seen I liked the speech at the end though because I'm a historical war nut) I find boring and the movies I like they hate (just different taste I guess)...If you haven't seen DOTM go see it for yourself..I'm an action movie junkie so it catered to my taste loved it can't wait to watch it again..
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Comment by The Dubya on July 3, 2011 at 11:49pm -
@Chaos Jumper
Marry meeeeeeeee...
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Comment by NotInWater on July 3, 2011 at 7:42am
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@Chaos Jumper - The movie is a terrible piece of crap. It is a shame such a great special effects team is wasted on such a bad film, but oh well. I hate the first hour and a half, but I love the last 45 minutes. I didn't care about anything, it was void of all emotion. But I just looked at the last part as a fun exercise in CGI. I enjoyed the last act of the film in the same way I enjoy going on YouTube and looking up stunt reels or test fights or whatever.
Just to clarify, I think it's an entertaining film for certain people. I was entertained for the last portion of the film, but I hate most of it.
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Comment by Chaos Jumper on July 3, 2011 at 7:09am -
I would have to go with The Dubya; however at a much lower appriciation for the large piece of crap than even him. It wasn't even a Transformers movie. It was more like watching a commercial for a better Transformers movie and Michael Bay trying out for a director's chair with Friedburg and Seltzer. With all of these annoying characters, unquestionably unconfortable humor and things that just piss me off, as a movie goer, I was about to leave the theater. And then the action scene came in and I was entertained for about 3 seconds and thought to myself "Why should I care?" and just kind of groaned until I figured out the Michael Bay formula for these pieces of garbage and found myself bored. Although the action was loud and a bunch of CGI bashing each other could be interesting, it never gave me a type of emotional, or intellectual, understanding with the overall no]n existant script Michael Bay made up right after he made all the CGI characters and told Shia Labuf to act much more annoying that even in the Second one. Until now, I have never looked at an action scene and say "Could you move it along?" and thats what I said to the movie before I actually went to sleep for a second and then the titles rolled.
When I came out of this, I almost had to fight someone because I said "That was just an f&*k you of a piece of garbage" so there must be people who liked it; however, I'm still trying to ponder why. Most of it is a Friedburg and Seltzer tryout with Transformers forced into the thing so that people would go into it and the last 45 minutes-an hour was just emotionally empty, intellectually insultive, obnoxious and just plain dull. It is such a F&*K you of a film that I thought it was almost worse than the second one. Sure the step and fetch it bots were not there; however, Michael Bay thought it was so tedious to make his characters almost as annoying as those two by embarassing themselves in this while still trying to say "Its a Transformers movie! See those two aren't here! I learned my lesson!" At least Transformers 2 had that one scene I kind of cared about, this had absolutly nothing but a formula that got old extremely fast. F**K You Transformers 3 and I hope to God Michael Bay ends this immediatly! Transformers 3 was just incipid and 4 miles pass the borderline of, for me, offensive to race, sexuality, gender and just as a movie goer in general.
It more than likely is a personal thing because people have opinions. People like Super 8 and I don't. People hate Inception and I think it is one of my favorite films of all time. So I dispised this movie and someone wanted to fight me about it because they thought that I was wrong. Its a weird world we live in when we have to argue about bullcrap isn't it? Thats all I have to say about it, until the worst of list comes out, and that was how I saw it. It is different for everyone, I'm just on the left side of the spectrum.
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Comment by The Dubya on July 2, 2011 at 2:24am
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Well like I said, there's just FAR too much unlikeable about what he does in his movies that I honestly don't think I COULD just sit back and enjoy the action scenes no matter how good they are. I mean even something like Sucker Punch; sure the story was crap and the characters were just there to do stuff, but it wasn't SO goddamn blatantly in your face with the offensiveness and laziness that it just turns me off from not only the film, but also the man who made the decision to put it in the film, because clearly it reflects an ugly part of his personality. And from what I've been hearing, it's not AS awful as Mudflapz and Skidz, but they'd still fit right in if they wanted to.
I guess it just comes down to a personal thing. I can handle your average everyday bad movie. But these are just...unpleasant. There's just far too much mean-spirited ugliness going on for me that it unfortunately makes me despise even the things that might be worth a shit.
I GUESS I'll check out the actiony stuff on Youtube (bootlegged and all :P) or when it comes on TV just to see what all the hubbub was about, but there's no way I'm being caught dead in a Transformers playing theater for a 3rd time.
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Comment by NotInWater on July 2, 2011 at 1:33am
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@The Dubya Basically. I wasn't a fan of the first hour and 45 minutes of the film, I hate the humor that Bay goes for, but the bits of action sprinkled in kept me going through it. But the last 45 minutes are pretty damn amazing.
It's not NEARLY as bad as Revenge of the Fallen. It's still bad. But the pay off is pretty awesome.
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Comment by The Dubya on July 2, 2011 at 1:04am
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So the basic consensus from all the so called "fans" of this "movie" is to ignore 2 hours of the movie and just focus on the OMGLOUD explody shit during the last 30 minutes. Because THE thing I hate about these movies is that Bay puts WAY too much emphasis ON his retarded and mean-spirited frat boy douchebaggery to the point where I just hate every fucking obnoxious thing involved in the movie and don't give a shit about all the empty and uninspired explody bullshit that "the story" "builds up to."
To me, it sounds like this is having a Disaster Movie/Vampires Suck effect. The last movie was SOOOOO unforgivably wretched that it literally had no where to go BUT up. As Korey so eloquently put it, Dark Of The Moon is a nice bile movement instead of Revenge Of The Fallen diarrhea.
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Comment by Russell on July 1, 2011 at 6:45pm
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man great fucking review, you hit the nail on the head with Bad Boys and The Rock, both were great movies because Michael Bay was being held down!
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