Arts & Entertainment
‘Transformers’ Too Long, Too Weird
Ten reasons why spot-on special effects can't transform the film's overarching problems.
The special effects are impressive. The teenagers will probably like it. The concept had potential. But there are many reasons the latest installment in the Transformers series, which is playing at the Village Theater, failed to impress me.
Top Ten Reasons Why Transformers: Dark of the Moon Disappoints:
- Every story needs a hero, and that hero must have a clear objective. Which is?
- By my count, the movie is 2 hours, 26 minutes. A few people left the theater at exactly 1 hour, 30 minutes. Editing and better direction by Michael Bay (Pearl Harbor, the first two Transformers movies) could have “transformed” this movie for the better.
- Ridiculous dialogue such as, “What are you protecting? Colostomy bags?” Huh?
- When the ordinary world is full of baritone-voiced robots that shift into vehicles and wage an alien civil war on Earth, the doorway for the characters to set forth for the “special world” is hard to find.
- Story holes are patched with convenient and irrational explanations. When Shia LaBeouf’s girlfriend wishes to be present in a CIA debriefing, the characters allow her to stay and listen to national secrets since her father was once in the military. I once had a relative in the military. Excuse me while I book a flight to Langley.
- This film is rated PG-13. My 8 and 6 year olds wanted to go. I wouldn’t allow them. Let’s see: $10.50 per ticket multiplied by millions of American boys with Transformers merchandise, and the parents who have escorted them to the movie. Oh gosh, that’s too much math.
- Stuffed bunny gets his leg ripped off. Weird.
- Obnoxious mini-transformers live in LaBeouf’s love nest and occasionally wander into his bedroom. Weird.
- The midpoint of a movie usually explores a romantic connection between two characters. In Transformers, Shia LaBeouf sits down with his road-tripping parents. His mom wants to see him. Weird.
- Perfectly talented actors (including Frances McDormand and John Malkovich) wasted. Have they negatively “transformed” their careers?
