TRANSFORMERS: REVENGE OF THE FALLEN

First of all, I actually DO realize that TRANSFORMERS: REVENGE OF THE FALLEN is a film about giant alien robots beating the crap out of each other. I get it – it’s not supposed to be CITIZEN KANE 2: ELECTRIC BUGALOO.

Even so, it is still a very bad film. Possibly a contender for worst of the year.

The “story” cannot be summed up or even partially described. In fact, I dare anyone – even members of the production itself – to describe the storyline of this film. Phrases like “incomprehensible” or “indecipherable” or “mercy kill me with a hatchet” spring to my pulverized mind. Even the Flying Spaghetti Monster would have difficulty touching a single plot point with his noodly appendage.

But it isn’t the fact that the film is just DUMB in terms of having giant robots fight each other. No, the film is DUMB in terms of basic filmmaking attributes like plot and character development, editing, and screenwriting. Let’s look at a couple of ridiculous moments to illustrate the point:

1. At the beginning of the film, our “hero” Sam Witwicky (Shia LeBeouf) grabs his old jacket from the first film, and a shard from the energy cube falls out and onto the floor … and then the shard immediately burns through two levels of his house! So apparently Sam has a special jacket that is able to contain the power of the shard. Interesting. It’s never explained at all.

2. At college, Sam is molested by a beautiful but predatorial classmate. During one of their kissing sessions, the girl turns into a Decepticon robot. Then she disappears. Of course, this makes no sense whatsoever, since the Transformers are machines that transform into other machines … they do not have flesh. The point quickly evaporates from the film without explanation.

3. There is a long, protracted “comedy” segment in the early part of this very bloated film involving Sam’s parents eating pot brownies and freaking out. It’s not funny, remotely realistic, or useful to the rest of the film. It’s what we call padding, something quite unnecessary for a film that runs for two and a half hours.

I could go on for days like this. This is sloppy filmmaking at its most incompetent. The script appears to be fashioned from three or four different screenplays, which was then assembled haphazardly by blind lepers in the darkest basement of the WGA. The film barely has a plot, yet it takes forever for the characters to start doing anything important. And once you get to the important plot points, you discover that it wasn’t really all that important anyway. Characters speak in dialogue farts, coughing up information they could not possibly have in order to continuously explain the plot. Absolute laziness on the part of the THREE PROFESSIONAL SCREENWRITERS credited for this abortion. Incredible.

Even worse are the absolutely misguided attempts at humor throughout. Humping dogs (not once, but TWICE!!), Transformers with testicles, REEFER MADNESS-styled freak outs, and robots humping the leg of Megan Fox. I kept waiting for Optimus Prime to grab his nutsack and scream out: “Hey Megatron, suck my camshaft!” Maybe they’re saving that for the next film. Remember that sick feeling when you first saw Jar Jar Binks step in a pile of shit on Tatooine, and then have an animal fart in his face? This entire film causes that feeling again and again. It’s TRANSFORMERS by way of Skywalker Ranch.

Speaking of Jar Jar, this film might be the most racist abomination since that digital idiot from PHANTOM MENACE. In particular are two robots named Mudflap and Skids. They are two jive-talkin’ niggerbots, basically. One has a gold tooth! And neither of the robots can read! Isn’t that fucking HILARIOUS???? I love it when we can dump this kind of brainless, racist, gloriously-empty trash into the laps of twelve year-olds! MORE MORE MORE!!! 

When archeologists wonder what happened to Western Civilization a thousand years from now, their collective answer will be two words: Michael Bay.

I can almost hear the groan of fanboys … “But Ray, what about those awesome special effects?” Who gives a shit? We live in a day when almost anything can be realized with computer graphics. So why would anyone use that as an excuse to justify a film like this? I don’t care about realistic metal robots smashing into each other when the rest of the film is amateurish and intolerable garbage.  What does it matter when the view of those flashy and very expensive special effects is obscured by director Michael Bay’s God-awful framing and sense of space?? You cannot tell what’s happening in each battle thanks to the terrible direction and similar design of each robot. If you want to save ten dollars on a movie ticket, throw a bunch of car parts into your dryer and watch them tumble around … you’ll get virtually the same effect, and the same amount of thrills.

This is the worst movie experience I have had since that horrible HALLOWEEN remake a few years back, if not ever. Frankly, something like this makes me hate movies altogether, as well as the people who make and support it. I imagine that, if THE MATRIX was real, it would use horrific and mind-numbing shit like this to lull the people into a catatonic state. 

It’s time for movie fans to stop giving Bay and his minions so much slack. This is pathetic, lazy, stupid, and incompetent filmmaking on every non-technical level. This is easily one of the worst films of this year, and anyone who disagrees simply knows nothing about film. Period.