Review: Transformers 3D Dark of the Moon

I went to see Transformers 3D recently  for a number of reasons. 90% of audience members on RottenTomatoes liked it, while only 38% of critics did. I am always interested in creative works that have tremendous review gaps like that. As a lover of film, and someone who enjoys movies I often wonder which side I will fall on when it comes to big blockbusters. I'm also a fan of action films, a total adrenaline junkie. Really the only kinds of movies I won't watch are Horror. Not psychological horror or ghost stories, I like those. I'm speaking of what my former film professor Klaus Phillips aptly called Gorenography.
So here the visual effects alone were worth the price of admission. Michael Bay has slowed down the pace of the Autobot and Decepticon transformations and the moments of battle so you can actually follow the action with great clarity. The detail you can see in the Decepticon Shockwave is astonishing. I am posting a copy of the HD trailer and at the 2:04 minute mark is part of a scene where Shockwave is crushing a building with a  Cybertronian Driller he acquires at the beginning of the film. There are several camera angles during this sequence that are just overwhelming to the mind. I had a similar feeling when I saw Avatar, like my eyes were taking in so much incredible sensory information that my brain was having some kind of orgasm. You just sit there with your mouth slightly open at the spectacle. Luckily there's a lot of pounding bass accompanying whatever is happening to ground you. Big screen definitely the way to go and we went for the 3D. My eyes watered a lot toward the end, but I think it was because I just wasn't blinking. It would be good to rent it on digital on my computer to pause some of those more incredible shots and zoom in on the detail.

Now on to the challenges. Transformer's main problem is that the Director had complete control. It's readily apparent because it reads like an 8th grader's idea of how a modern day Hero quest should be. Not that the Director is an 8th grader, just that maybe he indulged his inner one when making this movie. I couldn't help but think it was a kind of mental masturbation on Michael Bay's part. Let's start with the character of Sam Witwicky, who throughout the movie is angry and upset and frustrated in ALMOST EVERY FREAKING SCENE. Where is the emotional range? What happened to the personality of the character? Now he's just some pissed off 20 something guy who happened to be in the right place at the right time. He has no friends, his girlfriend has dumped him, he can't find a job though he goes on interviews...in jeans. But all of that is minor and who cares right? Where we go off the rails is in the GIRL problem. I wonder what the plot was like before Megan Fox got cut. Her character had some history, her father was in jail, she was a bad girl, she had usable skills. Here, the girl doesn't really function as a person, more like a wallet, mirror, measuring stick and goal. He does LIVE with his new girlfriend whose personality consists of telling him how wonderful he is, clutching a stuffed bear and making him keep two mini autobot ex-pats outside with the dog. She pays all the bills in their shared apartment, oh and she works in a gazillionaire's art gallery where she glides around wearing outfits that cost about 5k a pop. When Sam visits her at work he discovers her boss is none other than McDreamy aka Patrick Dempsey who seems very touchy feely with his girlfriend. JEALOUSY, ANGER. Kicking his useless crap car because the Autobots don't play with him anymore. Not long after this, she visits him at his new job in a car her boss has given her as a perk, a Mercedes S class that's worth so much money that Sam again is FURIOUS, ANGRY, JEALOUS. Through it all new girlfriend is teasing, understanding, pouting and eventually not sure she can handle this anymore. You notice I don't give her a name, because it's rarely mentioned in the movie. She's referred to as my girlfriend, or "this one" as in "you aren't going to let this one get away are you?" She is clearly a trophy and not a person, something that is only heightened when we discover that *spoiler alert* Patrick Dempsey is one of the bad guys and he has been watching Sam for a long time. He hired the girlfriend to get close to him all along and she is just a bargaining chip/hostage to use to control him. This is my one big pet peeve with the movie. I wish they'd just left the female character out altogether then have her be this awful. The model that played her was beautiful, but I don't even want to be dishonest and call her an actress. No sweetie, stick to modeling. She's got that down cold.

So overall I ignored the angsty, boring personal part of the story and went with the action, epic Transformers part of the story. The supporting cast was excellent too. I'd be remiss if I didn't say that John Turturro killed  as per usual and Frances McDormand was fantastic in her brief moments on screen and then we also got the wonderful John Malkovitch as a anal retentive boss with a jones to see an Autobot. The Army and AirForce guys are back and they are exhilarating to watch. Love me some alien ass kicking, especially by puny humans with no chance of success. Game on!
So other than my massive kvetch with the whole Sam Witwicky plot line (which, come to think of it, they could have probably done without all together) it was awesome and I endorse it. My personal rating is a B-

Super 8

I went and saw Super 8 at a Matinee on Sunday and was unexpectedly charmed by it. Nowadays you expect to be slammed in the face with action so the slow intro to develop the characters confused me for a minute and then I remembered that this is how movies USED to be. You know, like when they made The Goonies, and E.T. You got to know and like the kids BEFORE they ended up in an action sequence. The quality of the film making here is not to be lightly dismissed. I'm talking about nuance, character development, and even the technical aspects of beautiful lighting, sets, shots and casting. And unlike some films it all comes together harmoniously. There are times near the end where I felt like I was in the middle of a good Stephen King book, you know  where all the action happens right before he blows the ending. (That man can NOT end a story. Who can blame him? You fall in love with his characters and don't want them to go.) You care about these kids. They're funny, and sweet and sometimes sad and broken but always loved. Set during the BMX bike era, it evokes a time when you stayed out until it was dark and no one thought anything of it. That mix of nostalgia, the bliss of ignorance and also its costs are woven throughout the film. A highly enjoyable summer film. Reminded me of nothing so much as going to "the picture show" with my family 30 years ago.

Which is a GOOD thing to remember.

I've Fallen for The Fall

I went to see The Fall by Tarsem. The film was amazing, truly beautiful, a veritable work of art.




I got goosebumps watching it, I cried, I gaped open mouthed at some of the visuals, and the music was haunting and evocative. Beethoven's Symphony No. 7 in A Major, Op. 92: II. Allegretto (Instrumental). This movie is now on my list of top 10 of all time, which is saying something. It’s about the nature of storytelling and how the listener or reader and the storyteller are collaborators in the creative process. The main character is a little girl named Alexandra. While in a hospital in 1920′s California, she meets Roy, played by Pushing Daisies’s Lee Pace. He tells her an epic story because he wants to trick her into stealing morphine for him so he can commit suicide. He is in a deep depression over the loss of a girlfriend he was madly in love with and a terrible injury he's had on set during his job as a Hollywood stunt man. When he lost his mojo, he lost the girl, who took up with a rich actor.
When he starts the story he introduces each of the characters and as he does, we see them through the eyes of Alexandra’s imagination accompanied by the sound of Roy’s hypnotic voice. He tells of the Indian married to the most beautiful squaw in the land, and Alexandra who has only ever seen an Indian from India imagines him, in his traditional Asian Indian garb with his beautiful wife. Is the story really a product of Roy’s imagination or Alexandra’s? There are times when Alexandra herself interrupts and changes the story, exerting the insistence and power of a child’s boundless hope against Roy’s loss and despair.
It’s also about the redemptive power of stories. Combine that with arguably some of the richest, most powerful, and eye dazzling imagery ever shot on film and it’s easy to see why Tarsem is considered a genius in many circles. I’ve been reduced to watching the trailer over and over on my iPod to hear the music.
Still, it’s worth it.


I also admire Lee Pace, the lead actor who plays the Black Bandit, and the young actress Cantica Untaru who is the female lead is truly magical. Here they are, as they live in her imagination, guided by the words of his storytelling.