Transformers

XHonusWagnerX - 7-3-2007 at 11:02 PM

I just got back from seeing it and I recomend it. A few things I didnt like (being an anal purist for the toyline) but overall it was really good.

Murk - 7-3-2007 at 11:35 PM

i've yet to hear anything negative...

clevohardcore - 7-4-2007 at 02:04 AM

I went ot see it tonight at the 10:40 showing but it was all sold out. They had 5 theaters out of 10 showing it in the local place.

Muttley - 7-4-2007 at 11:48 AM

I saw it Monday night, thought it was amazing.

DaveMoral - 7-4-2007 at 04:52 PM

Great SFX... camera was too shaky, too many humans and to be fully honest... for a film about superior technology and invading aliens... this movie was far too America oriented.

Discipline - 7-4-2007 at 07:39 PM

Just got home. FUCKING LOVED IT!!!!!

DaveMoral - 7-4-2007 at 09:52 PM

I keep coming back to finding myself ambivalent about it. All things robot and Cybertron related I loved, it's the human stuff that bothered me and bored me.

DaveMoral - 7-5-2007 at 06:50 PM

The more I reflect on Transformers the more it pisses me off. I enjoyed it thoroughly while sitting in my seat... except I got there a bit late and was stuck in the front row and because of Bay's shaky camera work I felt just overwhelmed and pissed that there weren't many clear shots of robots, just gray blurs.

I know that the cartoon was made just to sell the toys, but at least it was a subtle thing. You see the cartoon and you see the toys, as a kid you make the connection, you buy the stuff. The movie is in the same spirit, but far less subtle. There was not a minute of the 2 and a half hours this thing runs that wasn't a commercial for something. XM, GM cars(to the point that GM's muscle car Camaro Autobot actually stomps the shit out of Ford's Mustang police cruiser Decepticon), Pepsi Co(transformed Mountain Dew machine), EBay(just how many times was this mentioned), and last but certainly not least... Army recruitment. I'm sure there a whole lot more... I can't remember what brand boombox and cell phone that little silly Decepticon took form as but...

You guys see what I mean? This movie isn't even aimed at kids, or the kids of those of us that grew up with the original Transformers... it's aimed at us, and wants us to buy every gadget that was shown, the sodas and the cars we see in this thing and it's not at all ashamed about being 2 and a half hours of constant product placement. The story hardly matters. It's an after thought, kind of like the back story and resulting cartoon was an after thought for the Transformers toys... this one is just way more obvious and cynical.

Plus some of the social stereotypes it reinforces. Nerdy outcast kid can get the hot chick so long as he has the right car. Simpering African-American computer nerd fatty coward. Hot girl hacker that's not as good as previously mentioned overweight nerd. The African-American hero model takes a backseat to the white American hero model. It's just all so contrived.

They certainly raped the innocence of my childhood with this one, but this time it was by adhering too obviously to the cynical advertising formula of my childhood heroes.

Discipline - 7-5-2007 at 06:59 PM

I think you might be reading too much into some of it. Instead of focusing on the negatives, why not just enjoy it for what it was, a great movie.

BDx13 - 7-5-2007 at 07:03 PM

yo, that's a fuckin' review.

i don't remember much about the cartoons and i haven't really watched the trailers for this. what's the relationship between the cars and the real people? Is it like a Kit/Michael Knight kind of thing? Or are the cars like their own gangs just fightign each other?

DaveMoral - 7-5-2007 at 09:33 PM

The relationship of Bumblebee, the yellow Camaro who used to be a yellow Beetle in the cartoon, with the kid played by Shia Labouf is like Herbie in all the Love Bug movies. Helps him get the girl and all, playing "Sexual Healing" and stuff like that.

Then there's the robots bashing each other thing. All that's actually the strong points of the movie... that's what I wanted to see, but it took for fucking ever for that shit to start happening. The rest was advertisement.

Murk - 7-5-2007 at 09:43 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by DaveMoral
The relationship of Bumblebee, the yellow Camaro who used to be a yellow Beetle in the cartoon, with the kid played by Shia Labouf is like Herbie in all the Love Bug movies. Helps him get the girl and all, playing "Sexual Healing" and stuff like that.

that sounds like the supergays.

DaveMoral - 7-5-2007 at 09:44 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by Murk

Quote:

that sounds like the supergays.

I got a laugh, it would have been more funny and a better homage had they just kept Bumblebee as a Beetle. They did give that a little nod by having Camaro Bumblebee parked next too a yellow Beetle in the used car lot that the kid bought him at.

MyOwnWay - 7-7-2007 at 09:31 AM

I saw this movie yesterday and loved it. A little slow during the human interaction parts but overall the movie was fantastic.

That long ass review DaveMoral wrote, I noticed most of those things as well. Typicaly that shit would send me in a rant as well. But this time, I just enjoyed it. My daughter as at home so it was just the boys and I. I wont go into detail for those of you who have not seen it, but some of my favorite parts were the digs (negative jokes) they said towards the government. They were subtle but it made me laugh out loud.

DaveMoral - 7-7-2007 at 10:25 AM

Quote:

Originally posted by MyOwnWay
I saw this movie yesterday and loved it. A little slow during the human interaction parts but overall the movie was fantastic.

That long ass review DaveMoral wrote, I noticed most of those things as well. Typicaly that shit would send me in a rant as well. But this time, I just enjoyed it. My daughter as at home so it was just the boys and I. I wont go into detail for those of you who have not seen it, but some of my favorite parts were the digs (negative jokes) they said towards the government. They were subtle but it made me laugh out loud.

All of that was mostly at the end though... Most of it was apprently saying "even when the government screws up royally they save the day."

I think the thing that bothers me with alot of action movies of this type is this... there's literally no assessment of the human cost. Like massive robot battles on the streets of a rather large city, no assessment of the cost even though office buildings get annihilated.

Quote:

Originally posted by Discipline
I think you might be reading too much into some of it. Instead of focusing on the negatives, why not just enjoy it for what it was, a great movie.

That could be, sure. It could also be that because of a different world view I see some of the things I would have missed just 5 or 6 years ago. I'm a little more sensitive to some of this stuff these days, especially when it comes to corporate advertising and social stereotyping.

defstarsteve - 7-8-2007 at 02:01 AM

Dave I respect your point of view, and while there were a few product placements, in our day and age, this is to be expected, but if you watch that movie thru the eyes of a 10 year old fan boy, that movie was amazing...

"Life is pain. Anyone who tells you different is trying to sell you something," and they were trying to sell us 2 hours of escape from our pain.

and everyone is trying to sell you something every minute of everyday... be it a t-shirt, a can of soda or a religion,

every key stroke you make someone out there is paying attention, and from those key strokes they are trying to find a way to place an ad in front of you for something they think you might want, even if you dont.

mass marketing is what we live in today, and like violence and sex you have to look around it to see the bigger picture.

and my bigger picture was 50 foot alien robots destroying each other and it looked damn real, and got me out of work and hanging out with my family tonight...

yes there were flaws, but you can't make a movie about 50 foot alien robots and not have some issues on reality, but I am not going to rush out and buy mountain dew, and nokia phones.

my only beef is it's going to take forever for the 2nd part to come out and it will probably suck, and still feel rushed.

and Jazz was one of my fav's growing up so that part sucked,
but overall come on...it has to be cheesy and over the top anything less and it would have been just a video game....
which I will be getting so I can teach those autobots a new lesson in pain....hahahhahahaha
long live megatron

DaveMoral - 7-8-2007 at 02:11 AM

No, I enjoyed it while sitting there. Great escape. But reality sets in eventually, and I wasn't happy with the reality of the movie itself.

Guess that's why I prefer Star Wars to almost anything else, can't place products in a galaxy far, far away.

tireironsaint - 7-8-2007 at 02:23 AM

I cannot see the appeal of this kind of movie. It screams of trying to force my generations childhood on them in a shitty way. I loved playing with the Transformer toys when I was a kid, but I always thought the cartoon was a pile of shit. I dunno, I've been reading and hearing reviews of this thing where people seem to either love it or hate it, but even if I hadn't seen one negative review about it I would never pay money to see this and I very seriously doubt that I will ever make it through watching the whole thing even if a friend rents it and puts on when I'm around. I just have absolutely no tolerance for these things that rape my childhood for a selling point and provide nothing but brainless entertainment for those willing to throw away cash on them. I'm not saying I hate every movie that sets it's sights low and has no message, let's face it, the vast majority of movies are only trying to get our dollars at the door anyway, I just can't stand the complete lack of originality and shameless commercialization present in these blockbuster bullshit movies like this. Leave my childhood alone and spend your billions on something worthwhile, Hollywood.

defstarsteve - 7-8-2007 at 02:41 AM

Quote:

Originally posted by DaveMoral
No, I enjoyed it while sitting there. Great escape. But reality sets in eventually, and I wasn't happy with the reality of the movie itself.

Guess that's why I prefer Star Wars to almost anything else, can't place products in a galaxy far, far away.

if lucas could find a way to do it he would...
and he helped create this mess...
and I am a huge SW geek....but if he could have slipped a coke can onto palpatines desk he would have...or e.t. into the senate, who would have sold us recees pieces.

and saint, brother, we both know there hasn't been an original idea in hollywood in so long, and to see and hear optimus prime, the same guy from the og cartoons on the big screen, well it was just bad ass....

me and my wife and son, sitting at the drive in, playing transformers along with the movie,

there are few moments in your life when you can connect so well with a child on their level, and that is what is going here for the most part. the reconnection of what you liked as a child. Kids are pushed in so many directions in this day by people bigger than them and for us to come down to their level and share with them not only something they like, but something we actually like as well, they gain a stronger trust for us as an adult and as a parent...
it's that whole common ground with the younger generation without having to fake it bullshit that most parents try to pull...
I can't remember a single time growing up my parents not only enjoying a movie I liked but sitting and playing with me on the floor with my toys and taking a real intrest in who was a hero and why,

but I feel they are not trying to sell you anything more then a few hours of fun, and trying to get you to remember big ass robots blowing shit up is pretty cool. everything else is just background noise.

tireironsaint - 7-8-2007 at 02:56 AM

Steve, I hear you and I definitely know EXACTLY what you mean about connecting with your kids, I just have an instant hate for this kind of movie from the get go and there's no way around that. After the time I got to spend with my daughter just recently, I'd take any way I could to make every connection I could with her and I don't begrudge anyone whatever it takes to do that for themselves, but thankfully for me this kind of thing isn't the way for me and mine. I'm not interested in converting anyone to my way of thinking on this, just stating my own personal take on it all and as I said, I see nothing for me at all there.

DaveMoral - 7-8-2007 at 08:10 AM

Steve, I don't think Lucas would have disrupted his vision to sell product. Not Coke at least, and definitely not Reeses' peices(he did slip ET into the Senate in Episode 1). The guy fought to have those movies be his through and through. People tend to forget that those are independent films. He's a brilliant fucking marketer being as he made the connection between action figures and movies inseperable... but even with the poor quality of the prequels you can't really say the guy was doing it just to sell any number of products that he's got going. Be it toys, comics, video games or novels. He had an integrity of vision that he refused to cheapen by slipping things in that didn't belong. Such as product placement. He could have done it too, he could have put a Coke add on Coruscant in the in-universe alphabet but didn't.

Let me turn to another franchise from my childhood that was given new life this year. TMNT. I loved that movie, and I can't think of anything in it that bothered me. They even made that one seem like it was supposed to be connected with the original three live action movies with Spinter's trophy room. The first of those three had product placement out the wazoo. Especially for Domino's pizza. They didn't go that route with the new movie. Funny thing is, the cartoon I grew up on was made to sell the action figures. Maybe this movie was made to sell action figures, but it kept with a certain integrity by not having the Turtles sell product in an overt way. I didn't even see that many promotional tie-ins for this stuff. Not only was Transformers a long ass commercial, it had commercials using Transformers on TV. GM commercials using it as a promotional item. I mean, I haven't even seen commercials for action figures based on this movie... just GM commercials. Coupled with the PG-13 rating of the movie, and it supposedly just barely missed getting an R, tells me that this is aimed not at our kids but at us and is trying to sell us cars and electronic gizmos rather than trying to get us to buy our kids some toys.