The Wrong Kind of Shakespeare

Rating: 4/10 (18 August 2012)

"Out, out, brief candle! Life's but a walking shadow, a poor player that struts and frets his hour upon the stage and then is heard no more: it is a tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing." This quote from Shakespeare's "MacBeth" best describes Michael Bay's loud and confusing reboot of the Transformers franchise.
The basic plot begins with the voice of Optimus Prime (Peter Cullen) telling the audience the history of Cybertron and its fall, with the Allspark, the energy source that powered the planet somehow ending up on Earth. Megatron (voice of Hugo Weaving) tries to catch it but misses and lands in the Arctic Ocean, where he will be found in 1897 by Captain Witwicky.
The movie opens to Special Operations soldiers landing at an American airbase in Qatar. We meet Captain Lennox (Josh Duhamel), Tech Sergeant Epps (Tyrese Gibson) and a few others. We also see a Blackhawk helicopter. It refuses to answer hails from the air base, so is escorted to the base and allowed to land where it transforms into a Decepticon that destroys the base.
Cut to an awkward Sam Witwicky (Shia LeBeouf), descendant of the aforementioned Captain Witwicky. He's likable but constantly picked on at school and laughed at.
I won't explain the whole movie but soon Sam has a secret protector in a yellow Trans-Am later revealed as Bumble Bee. He also had Megan Fox interested in him for some reason. Then, he meets Optimus Prime and the other Autobots, including Jazz (Darius McCrary of "Family Matters") and Ratchet (Robert Foxworth of "Falcon Crest"). They explain that his great grandfather has the secret location of Allspark imprinted on his ancient spectacles.
From exciting auto chases to thrilling fights to the freeing of Megatron from beneath a secret base under Hoover Dam to a city-wrecking finale, director Michael Bay keeps the action going, which is what fans want.
That said, the movie is ultimately forgettable. LeBeouf gives a credible performance. John Turturro is his usual over-the-top self, but the rest of the cast is flat. Jon Voight looks completely lost. Kevin Dunn and Julie White as Sam's parents are embarrassingly clueless.
Then, there are the questionable and wasted roles of Maggie (Rachael Taylor) and Glen Whitman (Anthony Anderson). Bernie Mac's cameo as a used car salesman had more weight in two minutes of film reel than Taylor and Anderson in the entire movie.
And a special acting hell must be reserved for Megan Fox. She's hot but she's plastic. She delivers her lines as flat as a board. Listen when she tells LeBeouf "No matter what happens, I'm glad I got into the car with you" and, later to a wounded Bumble Bee, "I'll drive, you shoot."
Other problems? The CGI was excellent but Bay's shaky camera style gave me a headache.
The sound department did a fantastic job...during the non-action scenes. During the fighting, it was just deafening. And the music felt ripped off from other movies.
As for the Decepticons, what happened? It was next to impossible to tell them apart. They had absolutely no color. Starscream is an F-22 Raptor, yet we see Megatron transform into a jet as well, making people think he is Starscream. Brawl is a tank but his shells have less pop than the grenades the Army hits him with.
I mentioned plot holes and stupid scenes. Too many to name, but here are a few:
Autobot Jazz, as voiced by McCrary, sounds ghetto.
Bay eliminated the cartoon's best conflict, namely between Starscream and Megatron. Save for one last of admonishment, we don't see any conflict between the two Decepticons. We also don't see Soundwave, Megatron's true second-in-command or Laserbeak, both of whom would have been better than Barricade or Scorponok.
Lennox, Epps and the U.S. Army do a better job at stopping Decepticons than the Autobots. We have to believe that Lennox and company use 40-mm grenades to put down the likes of Brawl.
The finale has to be the most inane. The Decepticons attack S7, the secret base under Hoover Dam. To keep Megatron from getting the Allspark, Lennox sends Sam and Bumblebee, with the Autobots to the center of a major American city, knowing the destructive, human-hating Decepticons are in pursuit.
As you can expect, downtown is wrecked. Occupied cars and buses on the highway are destroyed. Bridges are knocked down. Scores of people are killed or injured. Thousands flee in panic. Air Force jets and helicopters are shot down to crash into skyscrapers or onto crowded streets.
When all is said and done, however, we see Sam's parents giving an interview where the reporter asks them about alleged alien invasions. They deny anything happened. Optimus Prime then narrates that the Autobots hide in plain sight, in secret.
So, no one in the city had a cell phone with a camera? Did all these innocent people die horrible deaths by invisible beings? It all gets covered up?
Bay assumes the audience is stupid and will buy it. Judging by ticket sales, he's probably right.
If so, then Shakespeare's quote of sound and fury most likely applies not to him, but to us.