Transformers (2007) movie review

Here's what you need to know; Sam Witwicky is having trouble attracting the ladies, and reckons his new car, a 1975 Camaro, will improve his chances, little does he know what he's about to find himself embroiled in, as a US military base is wiped out by an unknown enemy, and mysterious beings begin raining from sky, he discovers that his car is in fact a Transformer, and that an ancient, alien war is on its way to Earth, one that will leave the fate of Humanity hanging in the balance.
Backstory time, 10 years ago I watched a film, and that film was the coolest thing 11 year old me had ever seen, that film was Transformers, and it introduced me to a franchise that I've held close to my heart ever since. But while I went on to love shows like Transformers: Prime and games like Fall of Cybertron, my love of the films waned significantly, as I was becoming more critical of films, and I was realising that they aren't all that good. Fast forward to now, I bought the original movie from 1986 on Blu ray, and watched it a few times, and then I started listening to Steve Jablonsky's score for the 2007 movie, which I already had on Blu ray, along with the rest of the series, because I knew this day would come, the day I go on a Transformers kick. What surprised me was how little of this film I actually remembered, which if anything just means I can watch it fresh, so does Transformers suck, let's find out.

The film, in all honesty, probably has the best opening that a transformers film could have, as we have a little prologue where Optimus Prime pontificates about the Allspark, and we see probably the coolest scene in the film right out the gate, as a Decepticon wreaks havoc on a Military base in Qatar,though this scene is actually a perfect metaphor for the rest of the film, including the warts, oh those warts. This is actually a somewhat interesting film for me, as while the common consensus is that this franchise sucks, there are actually good things about this film, there are also bad things, but we'll get round to explaining later. This film's characters leave me somewhat conflicted; let's start with Sam, the film tries to make Sam believable as a dorky social outcast who can't get ladies, and it does it well, the problem the film has however is making him likable, as it struggles to differentiate endearing and annoying. Some of the humour in the film works, and some of it doesn't; the parents for example are not funny, they're awkward and annoying, and while that was probably the film's intention, it does it too well. The same can be said of Megan Fox, whose name in the film I don't remember, some of her humour works, and some of it's really awkward, and then you have the inconsistent delivery, which only makes the awkward worse. A problem that sadly isn't unique to Megan Fox is shallowness, the film struggles with developing its characters effectively, Sam is exactly the same character at the end of the film as he is at the start, and while the film weaves an interesting past with a family artefact of his, that doesn't make Sam any more compelling, it's just a plot convenience if anything, the film tries to give Megan Fox a backstory that's morally muddy, but it still fails to make her character any more compelling. The line between funny and annoying is also walked by John Turturro, who plays a Sector Seven agent on the tail of the Transformers, but it's a problem that applies to everyone in this film, so going case by case would be a waste of time. The standouts in my opinion are the soldiers, they were very conventional soldier characters, yes, but there was a good sense of comradery between them, and they actually put up a fight against the Decepticons, making them not completely useless. The film juggles several plots for its absurdly long runtime of 140 minutes, and it's at least consistent in its flaws, as they all suffer from poor attempts at comedy and shallow, poorly developed characters, it's cool to see these three main plots converge in the finale, though there is a distinct divide between the three in terms of being engaging, and none of them are free of the film's flaws. You have the story with Sam and the Autobots, then the story with the Secretary of the Defence, the unrealistically hot Australian hacker and her basement dwelling video game playing super hacker trope friend, then the story of the Qatar airbase soldiers being stalked across the desert by a giant Cybertronian scorpion. All of these stories work on paper, as we see a civilian, government, and military perspective on this invasion, the problem is in execution, as the film at times seems to think that it's a comedy, and it's poor characterisation leaves the film severely lacking in emotional weight, the stakes in the more intense moments are weak as hell, and when a supporting character is killed, quite brutally, in the film's finale, it's a frustratingly hollow moment. Add onto that an abrupt ending and you have the essentials of a dumb movie.

Something that very strangely gets sidelined in this film is the Transformers themselves, the film delivers disappointingly little when fleshing out the Transformers, the basics; Autobots, Decepticons, Cybertron, Allspark, are glossed over in a few exposition scenes, but the film falls far, far, far short of doing the story of the Transformers justice, and sadly, that's just the tip of the iceberg. The weak characterisation and poor comedy that plagues the film's human characters, inexcusably, carries over to the Transformers too; Bumblebee probably has the most distinct personality of the Transformers, which is really bad given that he can't talk, Jazz is simply 'cool' as in vague, vacuous cool, Frenzy's a twitchy little shithead, and is admittedly pretty entertaining, and Iron Hide is the heavy weapons specialist, 'nough said. The Decepticons get it the worst in this film, Barricade gets a funny visual wink and nod, Brawl has the strange issue of the writers not knowing what his name is, but what really sticks in my side is Starscream, easily my favourite character in the Transformers franchise, who has literally no personality in this film, none of the character's sliminess or cowardice is present in the film, Blackout gets given more personally than him, and all he says is "All Hail Megatron." But despite this film's injustice towards Starscream, it's nothing compared to what they did to Optimus Prime. Peter Cullen voices Optimus Prime, and not a single ill word can be spoken about that combination, it's timeless, and there are moments when Optimus Prime really gets to shine, he has a great monologue in the film, one that emphasises his values of freedom and his compassion towards humanity, but even with Peter Cullen doing the voice, the wisdom and nobility of Optimus Prime struggles to shine through, instead we get a character that spouts the same clumsy writing as the human characters, and the fish out of water scenario, in addition to being about as standard as you can get, is just unbefitting of the character, as is the line, "Sorry, my bad," it just seems off. Megatron doesn't fair much better sadly, like Optimus Prime, there are instances where he shines, but then there are times when he's just a bad guy, the malicious, tyrannical monster is there, but with none of cunning. Apart from mutilating one Autobot and having the obligatory fight with Optimus at the end, he doesn't really do much, which is made even sadder by the fact Hugo Weaving is really good with the voice, and again, like Optimus, there are slithers of Megatron buried in there somewhere beneath the shallow characterisation and clumsy writing, he has a great line about Optimus fighting for the weak, the film just needed more. Make no mistake, this isn't as bad as Thunderbirds, where they replaced the Tracy brothers with boy band members, or Godzilla, where they replaced Godzilla with whatever that thing was, this film gives you the basics of the Transformers lore and doesn't completely shit on it, I just wish they focused more on the Transformers, rather than Sam and his awkward parents, or the US Government not knowing what country to go to war with.

So far I've been, shall we say, unkind to this film, but I did say that there are good things in this film, and that at some point I'd get round to them, well sadly I'm not done criticising yet, so be patient. The film, as previously stated, is long, really long even at 140 minutes, and a film with a runtime like that can still be great; The Dark Knight, which came out a year later and was 10 minutes longer, was amazing, but where this film slips up can be quite adequately summarised in the first 10 minutes of the film. We are first shown an action sequence with Blackout wiping out the US Army in Qatar, this scene is action packed and exciting, and is one of the times when Steve Jablonsky's excellent music really comes into its own, the scene doesn't outstay it's welcome, but what follows is a complete detachment from that scene, both in terms of story and, more importantly, in terms of tone. We go from people dying and the Army being powerless to stop it, emboldened by Jablonsky's music, to Sam being stupid in a class room, while being laughed at by the cool kids who think that sextant is a funny word, in addition to being really immature, given the previous few minutes of death and destruction, the tonal shift from that death and destruction to childish immaturity is really jarring, and this isn't the only time the film does this, as it bounces from awkward high school comedy with Sam, to political thriller with the Secretary of Defence, to war film with the soldiers in Qatar, it's like three films got smashed together, and it really hurts the film's pacing. Equally damaging to the film's pacing is the previously mentioned poor comedy and poor characterisation, which make getting invested in the characters a challenge, leaving only the serviceable sci fi thriller plot to drag it out of the dirt, one that's bogged down by awkward humour, what's truly funny is how all of this film's flaws stack on top of one another, making it harder and harder to like the film the more you think about it, wait, how many paragraphs in am I? That's not a bad note to start talking about the good on, yes, despite 2 and a half paragraphs of negatives, it's now time to get to the positives. In terms of presentation, the film is a mixed bag; and for once I speak not of visual effects, which are actually kind of flawless across the board. The CG effects are fantastic, the Transformers look really nice, their transformations are massively intricate, as are their robot modes, with so many moving parts that it's honestly staggering that it looks as good as it does, and this film even uses practical effects in some shots, which is both unexpected and really nice, but that's because I'm a sucker for practical effects, so seeing a physical, real Frenzy aboard Air Force One, before again seeing the CG one scampering across the ceiling and taking out secret service guys, reinforces the illusion that these things are supposed to be physical.

What I mean by mixed bag is editing and cinematography; some of the cinematography is excellent in this film, even if a lot of it stinks of Michael Bay, but I guess he knows that the only way to make a sunset more beautiful is to silhouette a MH-53 helicopter against it, I'm telling you, it's downright pornographic. On the subject of pornographic, this film is directed by Michael Bay and stars Megan Fox, and we all know what that means; a lot of shots of ass and midriff, I don't really know how appropriate that is for a film based on a kids show, and if anything it's one of the Michael Bayisms in this film that borders on obnoxious. My biggest issue with the cinematography is the shaky cam, which the film uses a lot, and doesn't go very well with the fluid, gorgeous cinematography showcasing the CG Transformers. The opening sequence with the attack on the base has this problem, while also showcasing that Bay knows how to make an action sequence that isn't completely incoherent, the film uses a lot of hand-held camera shots, which look good alongside the delicious mounted and tracking shots, but at the justifiable expense of the shaky cam, which is just plain bad. The editing is mostly solid, save for the film's weird habit of reusing footage, in fact in the first 5 minutes there's a scene where they use the same shot, as in literally the same shot, twice in the span of 15 seconds, they use another 2 shots from the base attack, as well as a shot from a car chase later in the film, again during the setup to the finale, maybe it's something only an aspie like myself would spot, and I will admit that it doesn't destroy the viewing experience, but it's just something I noticed. Another thing that I think is solid about this film is its music, with a score composed by Steve Jablonsky, granted it's not the most original musical score in existence, especially if you've seen any films with scores by the likes of Hans Zimmer, but the music can be effective in this film at times, I like it. And on a note that I honestly can't knock the film for, in the finale, when the Autobots and Decepticons finally throw down, it's entertaining, granted it's very mindlessly entertaining, there isn't any grace to it, similar to the good parts of a Roland Emmerich film, but I guess that's exactly what a kid would want to see in a film about giant alien robots fighting each other, I know, I was there. It honestly is a lot of fun watching this film's finale, it's big, dumb and action packed, as Transformers are flying and driving around and pounding each other into scrap metal, it's not particularly stylish or flashy, in fact it's kind of a mess, but it's fun, I can't deny that. And the film's ending, while abrupt, does leave the film on a positive note, following the cool battle.

This may be the longest movie review I've ever written, but I suppose I've just got a lot to say about this film. Transformers is a very interesting film for me, because I don't hate it, nor do I want to hate it. The film is not good; it's overly long, poorly paced, has bad writing (kind of like my reviews,) has underdeveloped and weak characters, a muddled plot, and only a surface level representation of the Transformers. But the film has excellent special effects, some excellent, if baseline music, some excellent cinematography, shaky cam notwithstanding, and some really fun action, as the Transformers kick the piss out of one another in the film's climax. I do have fun when I watch this film, it's a completely serviceable movie; not good, but not bad enough that you want it to die in a fire, I hear that comes later. Transformers is a perfectly competent, if dumb movie, and it's not a complete waste of time to watch.