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“Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen”
Rated: PG-13
Starring: Shia LaBeouf, Megan Fox, Josh Duhamel, John Turturro
Directed by: Michael Bay
Runtime: 150 min.
Rating: D-
-Get audited
-Push-mow my parent’s lawn
-Endure a root canal
-Punch Michael Bay in the face
These are just a few of the things I would have rather done than suffer through the dreck that is “Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen”.
There are bad movies that can be fun to sit through. These types of productions are laughably bad and make cracking jokes at their expense a simple affair. The newest Michael Bay effort surpasses the ability to wisecrack and heads straight to levels of near torture.
Nothing in this film works. There should be wall-to-wall action throughout but instead the film contains a nap-inducing middle third with mostly dialogue and little to no robot head smashing.
This extended length of humans conversing is brutal. The dialogue in the film is incredibly half-hearted. One-liners get set up and characters just do not deliver jokes. Instead they offer up an observation about what is happening around them instead of a knee-slapper.
The humor that is contained in the film is tragic. Profanity is the big running joke. Characters and robots pepper in obscenities to try and obtain laughs. The six year olds in the audience even stopped chuckling at these attempts.
Then there is the case of the robots named “Skids” and “Mudflap”. These “urban” robot twins spew out dialogue that could have only been written by someone whose urban-culture is garnered from “Fresh Prince of Bel-Air” re-runs. One of the robots even rocks a gold tooth and they are main characters here. They do not just pop up for a brief cameo, this absurdity lasts throughout the film.
The plot is inconsequential as it plays out like some second rate idea they scrapped from the first film. The minds involved with the film’s creation must have felt the same way, as they were assumedly more interested in showcasing explosions and Megan Fox running in slow motion.
But Fox is not the only character who gets the slow motion treatment. The film could have been an hour shorter if Bay did not put every other scene in slow motion. The public gets it Bay, the slo-mo means intensity. They do not need to be beat over the head with the effect.
Cutting out the slow motion would have helped to cut the running time, but besides the film being the length of a World War II epic, there are just too many other problems within to salvage this wreck.
Any of the goodwill Michael Bay may have secured with his first installment of this series (which this reviewer enjoyed) is all but gone.
If anything is right in this world, the director will be stuck doing B-movie horror remakes for the rest of his career.
Luke McCormick can be reached at 536-3311 ext. 275
