TRANSFORMERS: REVENGE OF THE FALLEN Post Release

I find myself completely baffled trying to envision how this could be that bad.

For the record, Devin gave the first movie a favourable 7.5.

Not a good sign.

So I'm assuming Bay still hasn't discovered the "wide shot"?

I was hoping this would be another Bad Boys 2, but it looks like I'm wrong.

Devin,

Is it possible that a second viewing would help at all?

Same here. Oh well.

I'm not totally surprised by Devin not digging it. It looks cheesy as hell in the previews.

Not to put words in his mouth, but why would anyone want to rewatch a film that's that long and that lousy?

Well, on rare occasions a second viewing simmers the dislike after the 1st viewing. Again, rare but it does happen.

I just got through reading Devin' Facebook updates and I already have the answer to my question.

So if this tanks, what will be the Bay's next career move? He really should consider filming a real movie again.

Do you really think this film even has the slightest chance of tanking?

I'm avoiding the commercials for this because each viewing makes me LESS excited for the film. It looks like a remake of the first one. Robots, sand, greasy Megan Fox -- they're all back!

I'm game for another, longer even more ridiculous Transformers 1. Transformers had all kinds of mad, fantastic absurd things to love.

It doesn't look as cheap as Wolverine

I do hope it tanks. Transformers (and to an extent Star Trek) represent the aspects I hate the most about modern film making. Films based on name-recognition with a bazillion dollars thrown at them with some half decent comedy to make it accessible. No real drama, characters or story.

No drama or characters in Star Trek? Really?

"that becomes something of a problem in itself, given Bay's relentless exploitation of imagery from 9/11 and the Second Gulf War..."



This is a comparison I made back when the trailer was released.
As a non-American I couldn't care less, but do you guys find it offensive that he "exploits" the events of 2001-2007 so that the associated images feel even more unreal to the American audience by brainwashing and mixing them up with ridiculous robot action? I still remember the "Hollywood" pledge that those images would not be used... haha yeah right.

I sincerely hope you're kidding.

that is a quote from a review, not mine. But I too found the similarities somewhat blatant.

That last sentence in particular was mainly directed at Transformers. In general terms, I'll accuse Star Trek of lacking substance. I'd say I liked it less than most on the boards though.

So I guess Armageddon was lucky it came out before 911?

Just to elaborate on the 9/11 topic:

Bay often uses the US military to boost his movie's hardware on display and he probably has tight connections with the PR guys over there.
Add to that that he depicts settings that are reminiscent of actual battlefields in the war on terror right now (Afghan war) but without any of the heavy political or psychological thinking and consequences normally associated with it.

I dunno does a filmmaker have the creative freedom to just use all of this shit, drop it into his work without context or thinking about how this could affect how those images could morph in the public's concience?
Or does he have at least a small responsibility?
In a way he is reinterpreting those imagery to be as heroic and cool looking as possible, is he not? I think he really is doing the US military a big favor in polishing those images up with Hollywood aesthetics and pop-culture. Some might even call it propaganda.

I remember visiting the US and seeing this nice little Hollywood-style US Marines commercial on the screen:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lDZ2fMHTvwk

EDIT: Sure Armageddon had the "stock footage of people looking up to the sky as shit blows up" angle, but it missed the heavy militarization of the heroics.

Didn't 48% of the country vote republican? There's a market for ridiculous gung-ho crap.

It's no secret that Bay has a long standing and excellent relationship with the military. The US military LOVES Michael Bay and he himself freely admits that he will never paint them in a bad light as long as they provide him with the hardware for his movies. Remember, the military let's him use all this stuff for free. No company in the world could afford to pay for the costs of manpower and fuel on display in some of his movies.

So yeah it definitely is military propaganda and it is crazy what the military PR consultants will demand of a script before signing off on hardware. You'll never see a soldier in a Michael Bay film, struggle with the psychological pressure of warfare and whatnot.

Last time he tried that, we got Pearl Harbour. Fuck that shit.

"Hey, Bitches? Yeah, this is Frank... Yeah, just read what you posted and maybe you'd wanna reconsider that".

The racist robots just make me want to see it more. I hope you have better arguments than that in your review, mister!

Nah he knows I'm right. Actually in most instances the military's costs are reimbursed by the movie makers, but Michael bay gets it for free as long as he films training exercises. So they won't just roll out the hardware for no purpose.

You can find lists of the movies that were approved by The Pentagon for military assistance and it's no surprise they rank among the cornier of the stuff

frankly, for all his military fetishism, Bay doesn't seem to be some conservative blowhard waving a standard - look at the way he ("hilariously") caricatures Bush in Transformers or the prominence of Kennedy in The Rock and Armageddon. But this is getting off the subject of robots.

Color (oh ho ho) me worried about the racist robot depictions, especially with Michael Bay's track record for vaguely racist sassy black characters.

Also, I hated Star Trek on the first viewing but started to really dig it my second go-round (cause I knew when to duck out to piss (Sulu-swordfighting) and what parts to ignore) but then again it's not nearly three hours long like ROTF...

WOW you must piss really fast cause I remember that swordfight being pretty short.

[joke about short swords/asian penises]

IT IS OK I AM ASIAN

Ok, i need more detail on that Devin. I can't believe this.

Devin's tweets on this were discouraging but funny. Moriarity's were less specific - he basically said listing a screenwriter for the film would be a huge fiction in itself. But that was true for the first one, too, so not anything unexpected.

Crap. I had planned on seeing this next week. Still might, but lowering my hopes quite a bit.

Ummm, not true. I believe the extras on my plastic Megatron DVD case version of Transformers has a military liason talking about how the government is recompensed for the use of their soldiers and vehicles.

orci and kurtzman are basically Buchenwald, so that bit's not surprising - I love the first Transformers and about 90% of the bad with that movie lies not with Bay but with them

I now have a morbid curiosity to see the stereotypical racist Transformers Devin was twittering about. What the fuck, Bay?!?

Agreed. This strikes me as something that might need to be seen to be properly loathed.

I really am shocked. Especially at the SO LITTLE ACTION comment.
And are the racist transformers those new breakout "twin" characters?
I saw a tv spot and LOL THEY HATE READING.

Maybe problems due to the lack of a script? Bay almost wrote the thing himself during the strike.

That is ONLY the case in situations were the military wasn't supposed to be out on exercise anyways. There was a 1 hr doc on these pentagon script supervisors last year. Transformers was the main focus there. Most of the stuff was given Bay for free as he simply filmed training runs and exercises for most of the stuff.

I think this is the most surprising negative thing to hear. Why would anyone make a film about huge robots fighting and tone down the fighting?

Little action??? How could that possibly be the case ... incredible.

Specially Michael Fucking Bay.
When he made countless remarks about how many robots and action scenes were in this movie.

Is this a Van Helsing situation? Bay made Transformers a huge hit, so he gets carte blanche on the sequel and this is him at his worst unrestrained self?

I haven't really followed this but are you telling me there are racist robots, ghost robots, a robot with a cane and twin robots? Not to speak of the robot that pisses???

Somebody must've sniffed too much of the white powder methinks.

Well I guess they're trying to make it like the G1 cartoon.

How could anyone be surprised by this?! The first one was a piece of shit. Yet its robust box office and surprisingly good reviews surely convinced Bay that he had the green light to turn up the stupidity dial even more. I'm betting all those bad jokes aimed at 8-year-olds (who should know better even at that age) in the first TRANSFORMERS are at least doubled this time around.

Yeah, but last time we got Bay totally unrestrained, we got Bad Boys 2. Maybe the rest of the film is so long and meandering that the action scenes ended up feeling short.

Eh, no point in discussing this further. I'm out of the thread and look forward to reviews.

Well, I'm gonna go see this at the IMAX to have my colon perforated by ONE WHOLE EXTRA MINUTE of robot action.

It'll be the single drop of LSD in a 2.5 hour glass of ordinary water that'll make it awesome.

Lack of action is the comment that surprises me. Shit. Which means this is just gonna be a longer version of the first Transformers movie for me.

Yes. Did you see Postal? I'm no Bay fan but at least he's not being deliberately offensive, I don't think.