Who keeps letting Michael Bay make movies?

Rating: 3/10 (6 July 2007)

Well, as a long time IMDb user, I've always come here for generally fair and even reviews on films. Normally you get the general ups and downs reviews and I find most movie web pages give an accurate representation of what to expect. However, after anticipating this movie greatly, and seeing the rave reviews on IMDb, I eagerly set out to the movie theater with a few friends.
I could barely contain my laughter during the most serious parts of this film. Never have I seen a plot so butchered by poor directing, and even WORSE dialog. There were two aspects of this film that I liked: 1) The transformations. Watching the robots morph back and forth between vehicle and killing machine was absolutely incredible. The CGI was impressive. 2) Shia Labueff gave a very good performance.
The rest of the film was awful. The plot is filled with holes. And the never-ending unnecessary small plots are confusing, unnecessary, and often left unfinished. The action sequences were always on the BRINK of being cool, but then would stop or cut away before you saw anything. The robots fighting to closely to actually see the reality of what they were doing to each other, and the needless shrapnel, smoke, and fire often obscured what could have been some epic fights. The needless plugs for BOTH political parties and views on Iraq, and one for one of Bay's own films were disgusting. Characters whom play significant roles rarely are given a name, and only 1 of the transformers(prime himself) has anything beyond a three scentence dialog. Most simply shout things like "Want of piece of me!" or "I wanna blast him!" However, if I had to sum up this movie in one word it would be Cliché. Bay manages to use EVER cliché I could imagine. They range from the clichéd high school movie: a 27 year old high school juniors who is a jerk to his girlfriend; A sociology teacher who doesn't like his job; an eccentric mother who says awkward things in front of her son. To the flag waving army movie involving marines who "just want to see their daughter for the first time," or like to "remember weekends," to whom 'losing isn't an option.' All the way down to the stereotypical overweight African American, who shouts things like "stay of my gramamas floor," and enjoys eating donuts. The list goes ON AND ON AND ON.
So, I IMPLORE you, wait until this film is out on video to see it. Save your 10 dollars. At least then you can watch the cool transformations over and over again and skip the rest of the movie.