Monster Movie of the Week: GIANT EFFING ROBOT EDITION: Transformers (2007)

TRANSFORMERS (2007)

Director: Michael Bay

Genre: Sci-Fi/Action

THE MOVIE

The next best thing to giant monster movies is giant robot movies. Especially when the giant robots can physically change themselves into various vehicles and hardware. Michael Bay’s Transformers, of course, is based on the 1980’s line of robot toys and it’s accompanying cartoons and comics in which two factions of giant alien robots land on earth and assume alternate shapes based on common earth forms to hide themselves hence the tagline “Robots in disguise.”

In this reimagining of the original Generation 1 story, the Decepticon faction is already on earth as the movie begins and searching for information regarding their missing leader Megatron, who apparently disappeared here in search of the Allspark, a cube that grants sentient life to machines. The heroic Autobots attempt to head them off. The Autobot Bumblebee assumes the form of an old Camaro and arranges to be sold to young Sam Witwicky, who is unknowingly in possession of an item that will locate the Allspark (and trying to sell it on eBay.) Bumblebee befriends Sam and introduces him to the other Autobots before both are captured by agents from a mysterious government agency called Sector Seven which is in charge of monitoring Transformer activity on earth and are actually holding both the Allspark and Megatron’s frozen body in a secure location. Meanwhile the other Decepticons learn the location and both they and the Autobots converge there for a final battle.

Why does a robot need to have teeth?

As someone who knew and loved the original Transformers cartoon as a child I have to say I was very nervous about this movie. The robot designs I had seen were decidedly different from the simple cartoon designs and liberties are taken with some of the characters and there are many omissions of classic characters (like Soundwave) in favor of original or redesigned secondary characters. That being said, having seen the movie, I am very satisfied with the result. Michael Bay’s Transformers is a kinetic action packed reimagining of the “Transformers” I know and love.

Steven Spielberg produced this movie and his influence can be felt in the touching relationship between Sam and Bumblebee, which has shades of E.T. Sam himself is actually fun to watch and is one of the most realistic depictions of a teenager I have seen on screen (he would make a perfect Peter Parker/Spiderman.) Optimus Prime (Voiced by Peter Cullen who provided his voice in the G1 cartoon) and the other Autobots are beautifully brought to life and their transformations are very cool to watch often complete with the trademark sound effect you may remember from the cartoons. And, of course, the movie is filled with balls-against-the-wall action like a James Cameron Terminator movie on steroids.

MONSTERS/EFFECTS:

There are about twelve different Transformers in this movie. They are all much more alien and intricate then the classic designs and are composed of thousands of small moving parts. Their faces are composed of small metal flaps and lids that move to read emotions. For example, their eyes are colored bulbs (blue for Autobots and red for Decepticons) and they have little metal lids above and below the eyes that move in a particular way to convey different emotions. It’s all fodder for slow motion BluRay viewing.

While the Autobots are well realized in the movie and are all given lines and plenty of screentime, the Decepticons do not fare as well and this is my only real gripe with the movie and probably comes from being overly familiar with the characters in the cartoon. Of the Decepticons, most of the screentime goes to Blackout (the kick-ass giant military helicopter,) Scorponok, Frenzy (the small gremlin-like robot that can turn into a boombox,) Barricade (the police car,) and towards the end, Megatron. Starscream, Bonecrusher and Brawl show up later and are relegated to cameo roles. You never really get a sense of who the Decepticons are and how they work as a group. This is a particular loss when it comes to Starscream who was always a genuinely interesting character on the cartoon because of his constant Shakespearean power struggles with Megatron. This would have been a good and very obvious opportunity to make the Decepticons more than just hulking brutes. On the side, as a purely fanboy complaint, I wish they had gotten someone to do Starscream’s voice who sounded like the late great Chris Latta who had one of the most recognizable voices from the cartoon. His raspy high pitched voice was the essence of Starscream.

The most radically redesigned character in the movie is probably Megatron, who no longer changes into a gun to be wielded by others (thank God) and has a purely Cybertronian design as he does not assume an earth form during the course of the movie (his alternate form is a Cybertronian jet.) When he was first leaked on the net I hated his design because it is very pointy and alien and weird but I’ve grown used to it and now I quite like it (although it looks like crap in profile.) Megatron is voiced by Hugo Weaving in the movie but his voice is so electronically processed and deepened that I couldn’t even recognize him but that’s good because he is appropriately big and scary in this movie.

The effects through out the movie are eye-popping and hyper realistic. Bay is a big fan of using practical on set effects and explosions whenever possible and it gives Transformers a sense of realism that is missing from a lot of purely studio shot CGI effects films.

MONSTERS FEATURED

Optimus Prime - Semi truck

Bumblebee – A ’74 Camaro then a 2009 Camaro.

Jazz- Pontiac Soltice

Rachet-some sort of hummer ambulance (WTF?)

Ironhide-GMC Topkick

Megatron-Cybertronian jet

Starscream-F22 Raptor more or less like his G1 appearance

Barricade-some sort of Mustang derived police car (yeah, that’s low profile.)

Blackout-a big military helicopter

Brawn-a tank (kind of superfluous to the movie.)

Scorponok –a mechanical scorpion with no robot form

Frenzy-transforms into various small electronics

Bonecrusher-a clawed minesweeping military vehicle

There are some other “accidental transformers” as well as a pissed off Nokia phone.

HOME VIDEO AVAILABILITY

Widely available in both DVD and BluRay.

MOST MEMORABLE SEQUENCE

I loved Optimus Prime’s highway fight with Bonecrusher. So good and so like every Godzilla movie should be.

SEQUELS

Transformers Revenge of the Fallen 2009, which is about as hot a mess as you are likely to see in a big Hollywood movie.

Transformers: Dark of the Moon (2011)

SEE ALSO:

Transformers: The Movie 1987

TRIVIA:

The Soundwave problem:

Blackout, Barricade and Frenzy were originally going to be called Soundwave at different times in a nod to the original iconic Decepticon who turned from a giant robot to a tiny cassette player. Barricade and Blackout both “eject” smaller Decepticons much like Soundwave (the Barricade action figure actually features a small Frenzy figure that can be removed from his chest a la the original cassette figures) but fan reaction to such a great departure was so intense that they changed the names (and presumably the heads.) Frenzy changes into a boombox but is only about seven feet tall and very different in character from Soundwave, so the filmmakers decided to name him after one of the robot cassette figures.

Soundwave appears in the sequel Revenge of the Fallen, in which he spends the entire movie in orbit making sweet love to a satellite.

TRAILER

Patrick Garone
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