Review: TRANSFORMERS: REVENGE OF THE FALLEN
Rating 5/10
Writers: Ehren Kruger, Roberto Orci, Alex Kurtzman
Director: Michael Bay
Cast: Shia LaBeouf, Megan Fox, John Turturro, Ramon Rodriguez
Studio: Paramount
TRANSFORMERS: REVENGE OF THE FALLEN is ridiculous, which doesn't make it automatically bad. You expect a fair amount of absurdity from a big budget summer movie based on a children's toy directed by Michael Bay, the man who gave us the unbelievable (but very enjoyable) summer movies THE ROCK and ARMAGEDDON. Two movies that are both a part of the prestigious Criterion Collection (technically not a sin, regardless of what some film fans think). With a movie like TRANSFORMERS: REVENGE OF THE FALLEN, no strong sense of reality is needed, just blow shit up cool at a fast pace, give us some mildly interesting characters so we care a little bit about them when they're in danger (even though we have a good idea how it's going to turn out) and don't overdo the loud stuff to the point of redundancy. After that last sentence you probably see where I'm headed, especially if you saw my 5/10 rating. TRANSFORMERS: REVENGE OF THE FALLEN is an undeservedly ultra-serious movie that features robotic human characters and plenty of loud action scenes that quickly begin to feel routine, and ultimately, becomes tragically boring by the time the final battle comes about.
TRANSFORMERS: REVENGE OF THE FALLEN has plenty of action sequences, but they are too similar to one another to keep the film interesting. This robot hits that robot. That robot hits that other robot with help from his friend. The main robot fatally hits the villain in Egypt. Nothing from the many robot fight scenes in REVENGE OF THE FALLEN stands out as inventive or memorable with REVENGE OF THE FALLEN's action quickly pushing past the point of exciting into annoying.
Too many and too similar action sequences aren't the only reasons for the strong stale feeling that lingers throughout TRANSFORMERS: REVENGE OF THE FALLEN's 147 minute running time. The running time alone is a major problem; a movie about transforming robots shouldn't be two and half hours long, there simply isn't enough there. Also, the second TRANSFORMERS has basically the same story as the first TRANSFORMERS film, with a few moderate, but not significant, changes. In TRANSFORMERS, Sam Witwicky (Shia LaBeouf), along with his lady friend Mikaela (Megan Fox), the military, and the Autobots have to prevent the Decepticons from obtaining the Allspark, which has the ability to create and destroy life. The change with REVENGE OF THE FALLEN? The Decepticons are after Sam, instead of the Allspark, due to Sam gaining critical information from the powerful device. We've seen this all before and there isn't enough depth to a story like this to still be interesting on a second go-round.
I tend to like the films of Michael Bay as highly-stylized unapologetic action movies that offer solid brainless entertainment, but with TRANSFORMERS: REVENGE OF THE FALLEN, Michael Bay overdoes it, even for Michael Bay. I have considered the possibility that maybe I have changed, and maybe REVENGE OF THE FALLEN is on the same level with previous Bay films. However, I doubt this, as I recently watched my Criterion DVD of THE ROCK (yeah, that's right, I own it) and still loved the movie; and I also wrote this review moments after eating Fruity Pebbles while watching cartoons in self-made He-Man underwear, which makes the idea of me outgrowing Michael Bay very unlikely.
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