3 stars for fights, 1 star for film

Rating: 4/10 (9 August 2007)

Do you want your childhood raped again for financial gain as appose to being immortally honoured? Before this film came out I overheard people saying that it would be made for all those in their late twenties/early thirties who remember the original cartoons and that they couldn't possibly mess it up, could they? Well enter big budget movie maestro Michael Bay and Steven 'can I have my fingers in anymore pies' Spielberg and more CGI than your eyes can take and you have the most disappointing film of the decade. Made for thick people who are easily distracted by colours and pre-pubescent boys who will almost certainly have hard-ons at the sight of the cars, the girls and of course the robots it is two hours of CG-action and very little else. Id tell you about the plot and the story if it had either, I don't remember any of the characters names, except the bumbling Malcolm in the middle type lead Sam (played by Shia LaBeouf) and I only remembered the robots because I had the toys as a kid. Mostly the film couldn't decide if it was an action or a comedy and uncomfortably spliced the two which became a little jarring at times. Considering they are an advanced alien life forms millions of light-years ahead of humans and don't forget 'robots in disguise' a particularly cringe worthy scene is played out in Sam's garden as all five autobots turn into the metallic equivalent of the three stooges and instead of just turning into vehicles they stay as robots and try to hide in bushes, hilarity ensues when a dog wees on one and optimums prime treads on the roses with a 'whoops my bad'. Sadly there is also a couple of slightly mild racial moments like when a soldier in a battle is trying to contact the pentagon and gets through to an Asian call centre and Autobot Jazz has been remodelled as a homeboy all street and full of b-boy attitude. The continuity is appalling to say the least, one example being: soldier 'Sam run up and set off this flare on the roof', Sam 'I cant do it', soldier 'you can you're a soldier now, go' Sam 'ok', soldier on radio 'all incoming planes look for the green flare' Sam gets to the roof and sets off a red flare which to me is just plain laziness its almost like the filmmakers are going 'the idiot audience wont notice and if they do we'll already have their cash so who cares'. Of course flare colour aside I think the army might notice ten twenty foot robots scrapping without a sign and if not are they actually going to be of any use to us? Sitting through this film I felt like Malcolm McDowell's Alex from 'A Clockwork Orange' where they hold his eyelids open and making watch horrific images at breakneck speed. The inner geek in me loved the robots smashing the living crap out of each other but the inner child and outer film fan was so disappointed. Left open for sequels (I heard a rumour they have already green lit 2 & 3) they will make more films because the films sell the toys, and you can blame Mr.Lucas for that, Transformers is the final nail in the coffin of the movie blockbuster, soulless eye candy that's only goal is to fill its pockets, taking money and returning empty promises. One of the tag lines is 'some have come to destroy us' which could as easily be related to the executives behind such films, now all we need are the ones that 'will come to save us'. Basically it's a shame this film couldn't transform itself into a half decent movie because disguised in there somewhere I'm sure there is one, instead we are left with a missed opportunity of Cybertronic proportions.