Bennett here, excited ‘cause El Presidente and I just decided to kidnap John Matrix’s daughter to force him to commit a political assassination. What could go wrong?
Caught a 3D viewing of Transformers: Dark of the Moon last night. Now, if anyone knows me, they know of my unbridled, intense hatred for 3D films. They’re dark, look terrible, give me headaches, and since I wear glasses, make the bridge of my nose even more irritated. AND THE MOVIES COST SO GODDAMN MUCH. Dark of the Moon did all of those things and more—so, so much more. Like it made me shake my head at Bay’s apparent lack of respect for his filmgoers.
Anyway, down to business. There are so many problems with all the Michael Bay films from the past, I don’t know, one and a half decades maybe? What’s his last good film—Armageddon? Whenever that was. Somewhere along the way people thought that Bay was an elite filmmaker and kept giving him work—and more importantly, gave him more and more freedom over his work. Which is really bad news. I can’t help but compare this film to James Cameron’s slow, plodding, white liberal guilt-driven, ego-fest, Avatar. And the comparison’s not due to the message, or the special effects—though there are some great special effects in Dark of the Moon as well—but for the very real and very desperate need for a goddamn editor.
Dark of the Moon starts promisingly enough, with a pretty interesting take on the 1969 lunar landing. Apparently the space race was motivated by the detection of an Autobot spaceship crash on the dark side of the moon. I admit that it’s a little forced and contrived—after all, are we really asked to believe that Earth is the center of the universe? That we matter that much? We have to swallow that Earth is the only planet that can provide the things the Autobots and Decepticons need, and then we have to believe that the Transformers have been interested in our planet for this freakin’ long (which I guess was established in Revenge of the Fallen, but still, the entire idea is so shoehorned in). But I forgave this part of the film. Suspension of disbelief or whatever. So when the Americans got up there, they took some samples, and never bothered to return due to, uh, budget constraints? Something like that. Then, naturally, the movie goes to shit as we get really, really distracted by Sam Witwicky (Shia LaBeouf), who is out of the Autobot loop. His buddy Bumblebee spends a lot of his time doing black ops stuff for the government, leaving Sam with two annoying, mini-sized Autobots and an incredibly hot girlfriend, Carly (Rosie Huntington-Whiteley). As the now-convoluted, bloated, unconnected, inane story unravels, we discover that Sentinel Prime (Leonard Nimoy), the former Autobots leader, is still up on the moon, at the crash site, in sleep mode ‘cause someone turned him off without doing the proper shut down in Windows, along with five Pillars, devices which construct a bridge to zap shit from one place to another. We are also treated to the awesome knowledge that Carly has a really awesome boss, and Sam’s parents are on an awesome road trip, and Optimus Prime likes to mope about by staying in his awesome transformed state, giving everyone the cold shoulder. So after the film gets back on track, the Autobots go up to the moon and bring Sentinel Prime and the Pillars back to Earth, thus unleashing the even stupider conspiracy plot device: Decepticons have had human agents working for them for decades for their own ends. Kind of like those servants vampires seem to keep around to do their dirty work. The Decepticons plan to bring their home planet of Cybertron into Earth’s atmosphere to rejuvenate it, which boggles my mind. Wouldn’t the two planets rip each other apart or something? I’m no scientist or anything, but I’d think the gravity from both planets would cause some major fucking up of shit.
The point is we’re playing for keeps. I think. Either the humans are going to be killed or used for slave labor—ironic that robots need humans to do their dirty work, huh? Whatever. The characters say that horrible stuff is going to happen to the humans, but they don’t really show it. Out of the hundreds or thousands of Decepticons floating about, only Chicago gets their shit fucked up, and who the fuck cares about Chicago anyway? We don’t see things done on a larger scale, we don’t see how the world is suffering under this imminent threat, and we don’t get things put in the necessary perspective. We never, ever, at any point, really connect with the characters, and frankly don’t give a shit about what happens to this planet. How are we supposed to feel tension if we don’t care? With such a mess of a plot, and such an overwhelming lack of tension, I was not at all surprised to see maybe a dozen film goers leave the theater before the halfway point. What’s more, I was rooting for the Decepticons to win—wouldn’t that kind of kick ass to see a Decepticon version of Earth? Now that would be some awesome sequel bait. I imagine a Terminator-style future, but fighting jets and robot vultures and hot co-eds that turn into some kind of robot Medusa.
If you’ve gotten this far in the review, I think you can tell that one of the primary problems with Dark of the Moon is its incredible need for editing. Somewhere along the process of making Dark of the Moon, Bay must have got it in his head that adding a sub-story like this would add to the experience. And adding sub-stories can be excellent; look at Shutter Island and its use of Teddy Daniels’ back story. That film worked very well with its back story because it has some thematic resonance with the overall tone, structure, and story. However, all of Sam’s motivations, his need to matter, his inability to find a job, his post-saving-the-world life is not needed. We don’t care, we don’t want to see it. LaBeouf simply doesn’t show the presence or the charisma here to carry this part of the film. There were so many eye-rolling moments of overacting that I really don’t know who to blame: Spielberg (executive producer), Bay, or LaBeouf. In the end, does it matter? This whole thing with Sam is just so fucking stupid. Cut it out. Make him work with the Autobots, make the Autobots the main characters. Hire a fucking editor to redo your films and redo your scripts.
How badass would it be to actually see the Autobots consider joining the Decepticons? How much do they miss their planet, and if we’re asked to believe that the Autobots have feelings and can sense pain, wouldn’t it be honest, and kind of shattering to see these heroes consider betraying the humans? That’s your damn story right there.
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| They Hooked Up? Poor Brian Austin Green. |
Besides filming this as another one of his Victoria’s Secret commercials—we actually get a porno-style introduction of Carly as the camera gives us a close up of her butt as she walks up a flight of stairs—we suffer through Bay’s social beliefs which are so superficial and stereotypical that I have to question if he actually looks at the world this way or if he thinks his audience looks at the world this way, which would be quite insulting. I’ll only touch on this briefly, but I think this comes down to Michael Bay’s lack of any sort of complex thought. And I mean any. I won’t go into the problems that Revenge of the Fallen suffered from, but things haven’t gotten much better here.
Bay constantly informs his characters with stereotypical ideas—and how the hell does this work with alien robots? It makes absolutely no sense. Megatron is introduced in Africa, clothed in a pseudo-African cape, evil and in poor condition, a none-too-subtle association of villainy and tribal barbarism with Africa. There are loads of Transformers who have, for some reason or other, Earth accents from different regions. Why? What purpose does any of this have other than for some kind of comic relief that doesn’t ever get explained or explored? What does it all mean to the Autobots—alien lifeforms—that they can speak English but will only do so with certain accents? Instead of providing us with characterization, we’re given sketches of characters that are only informed by ethnic stereotypes. Former Russian cosmonauts are shown as degenerate gangsters. Ken Jeong has a small role as Jerry Wang, a high ranking person at Sam’s job, and is once again emasculated (see the Hangover franchise), only this time, he’s explicitly associated with a homosexual bathroom encounter. It goes on and on like that.
Women, as Bay sees them, once again take the role of than eye candy or as stereotypical cardboard-cutouts. There are three female roles, two of which are major. Carly is a major, but she was obviously put here as eye candy. And while Huntington-Whiteley does a serviceable job, she doesn’t elevate the character at all, and kind of fades into the background in favor of the spectacle of robot on robot violence. The other major female role in the film is performed by Frances McDormand as the US National Intelligence Director Charlotte Mearing, a hard-ass alpha-type who refuses to be referred to as “ma’am.” I don’t understand that, firstly. She is presented as inept, condescending, intolerant, and inflexible, a common descriptor for cardboard-cutout types in military-themed films, sure, but when she occupies one of the two major female roles, it becomes rather insulting. Additionally, as the film progresses, her ineptitude becomes more and more apparent and she ultimately steps back from any leadership role and meekly submits to the commands made by Simmons (a very funny Jon Turturro), a retired special agent. Is this Bay’s idea of a real-life, strong, female character? A role model? Why in the world would anyone want to be her? The third female role is minor in comparison, as Sam’s mother, Judy (Julie White), has like two scenes. And what is she given to do? She lectures her son about relationships all while ignoring the obvious bigger picture and larger problem. Cue eye rolls and head shakes.
But what does Michael Bay do well? He films action, right? The action sequences here are really nice to see. The special effects are, for the most part, flawless. The sweeping angles, the clarity of it all is quite nice, even though I removed my 3D glasses about halfway in. If action’s what you’re coming for, then you got it buddy. But there are problems with these scenes, too. First, remember, you don’t care about the stakes and the things going on that inform the action sequences, so you feel almost no connection to the dangers surrounding the characters. If you don’t care, then, well, you don’t care. There are also moments when you wonder where the hell everyone got to. Seriously, people just disappear from the screen and show up in the nick of time with shit that makes no sense. Bay seems to be attempting to juggle all these characters and plot points but in the end they all come tumbling down.
There was one amazing standout scene in Dark of the Moon that I’d like to mention after all this text has been wasted on the horrors of the film. A small team of military personnel, headed by Epps (Tyrese Gibson) and Sam, infiltrate Chicago and navigate their way through a toppling building. The characters are searching for a high point from which to launch their attack, and when the Decepticons attack the building, the humans are thrown all over the place. I have to give serious credit to Bay on this: it looked incredible, and I found myself sucked in. But that type of feeling is so hard to come by, and it’s sorely missing from the rest of Dark of the Moon. Even stranger, I got the sense that Bay was aping the styles of J.J. Abrams and Zack Snyder. In some scenes, Abrams’ close-up, shaky cam style is seen, and his lens flare fetish pops up in the titles; but since Bay filters that style out with his own, it looks rather nice. On the other hand, Snyder’s horrific mark on the film industry is apparent in this film; when’s the last time you saw an action film without that preposterous, silly, contrived slow motion sequence? Just give it up, Hollywood! It worked okay once, but for God’s sake, let it die!
Another thing I’ll give credit to is the fact that this is a pretty big departure from the other two films. The story has progressed, new things are introduced, but similar themes connect the franchise. I am a proponent of sequels—I think they can be excellent as long as the films depart in a significant way and enlarge the world the first film introduced, rather than restrict itself to running in circles. But in the end, Dark of the Moon is simply a collection of scenes that don’t link up, that don’t connect with its audience, and whose action points are well done, but without the contextual depth that makes them immersive or interesting. Additionally, Bay’s lack of respect for women, and his inane need to racialize alien life forms ultimately drags this film down. Its overblown plot, lack of interesting storytelling, horrible sense of direction, and long ass running time make me want to beg you to prevent yourself from seeing it. But you’ll see it anyway. I do concede that it is significantly better than Revenge of the Fallen, so take that how you will. Me, I’d rather get impaled by an Austrian-propelled steel pipe.
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