Transformers: Dark of the Moon
For the third film in his robot alien trilogy, Michael Bay pulls out all of the stops technically to make a massive war film on the scale of “Saving Private Ryan” and “The Longest Day,” only with giant toys duking it out rather than Tom Hanks or, well, The Duke himself. (John Wayne was in the D-Day classic, “The Longest Day,” if you didn’t know.) That’s not to say he’s completely redeemed the massive junk pile that was 2009’s “Revenge of the Fallen” (I’m sorry, but 160 minutes is exceedingly too long for ANY action movie), but the film certainly promises more bang for my buck on repeat viewings in the same way Bay’s first “Transformers” film did in 2007.
Shia LaBeouf is back as Sam Witwicky. He’s graduated from college, living in D.C., and in a relationship with Carley (Rosie Huntington-Whiteley). Unfortunately, even for a guy who has been honored by the president, trying to find a job is difficult work. It’s not long, however, before he finds himself smack in the middle of the Autobots-Decepticons civil war that has been raging on Earth for years now. What he’s about to learn even throws the Autobots for a loop as they continue to engage in covert operations with N.E.S.T., an elite Special Ops unit that was created after the events of the first “Transformers.”
The screenplay is the sole credit of Ehren Kruger, who came aboard on “Revenge of the Fallen” and has inherited the franchise from previous screenwriters Alex Kurtzman and Roberto Orci, and it has a lot of ideas; not all of them are successful (am I the only ones who wish Sam’s parents had just sat this one out– they remain the most embarrassing thing about the franchise short of Skids and Mudflaps), but the majority are compelling, and most importantly, driven by the robot characters and filling in gaps in their history with humans. As with the X-Men of this summer’s superb “X-Men: First Class,” it turns out the Autobots and Decepticons were integral with another key event of the ’60s: the space race. Conspiracy theorists will go nuts about the idea that the Apollo missions were, in fact, re-con missions to explore a robot alien ship that crash landed on the moon. In addition to unheard of alien technology, a former Autobot leader called Sentinel Prime (voiced wonderfully by Leonard Nimoy) was aboard, along with a weapon that could end the war. This is the type of rich mythology the filmmakers have been trying to inject into the franchise since film one, but they finally seem to have succeeded. The first film was successful, for me at least, because of how it took the rite of passage of buying one’s first car, and turned it upside down by having it inadvertently lead to the co-mingling of two different worlds to the “benefit,” for lack of a better term, of both species. The second film was a narrative disaster; yes, the robot war is more at the forefront, but it’s an unfocused story that revels in the worst excesses of Michael Bay’s style of filmmaking. With “Dark of the Moon,” it feels like the type of all-engaging, epic story the director has been trying to tell since “Armageddon” without quite succeeding.
And yet, for some reason the film didn’t resonate with me on the whole as strongly as the original “Transformers,” or even Bay’s other successes (such as “The Island,” and especially “The Rock”), have on my first viewings. It’s nothing against LaBeouf or Sam: Sam’s story in this one is leaps and bounds more interesting than it was in “Revenge of the Fallen,” where he seemed almost resentful to be a part of the action; here, he knows he can help in the fight, and more importantly, he WANTS to help. And the romantic story with Carly is much more effective here than in previous installments; while I wasn’t one who hated Megan Fox or her character, I do have to agree with Sam, who says that he found someone better. Though remaining impossibly hot for someone like Sam, Carly (and former Victoria’s Secret model Huntington-Whiteley) just seems more engaged in the role of “the girl” than her predecessor, which only works to the film’s advantage when Sam has to make a decision to risk his own life for her when the Decepticons, and their human assets, take her hostage, setting the stage for the tremendously staged throwdown in downtown Chicago between the Decepticons and the Autobots, along with their human allies (such as N.E.S.T. soldiers played by Tyrese Gibson and Josh Duhamel) that raises the bar for any other filmmaker looking to make a name for his-self (or herself) directing this sort of large scale action scene.
So what’s wrong with this film? Well, to start, there’s the same excess of absurd “idiot comedy” that Bay has been trafficking in ever since “Armageddon”; thankfully, the parents aren’t in this long enough to affect my feelings on the film, but cameos by John Malkovich and “The Hangover’s” Ken Jeong just don’t work. And though Bay directs some of the best action scenes of his career in “Dark of the Moon” (in addition to the finale, Bay stages superb early sequences in Chernobyl and on the streets of D.C.), the pacing and energy just feels off, although that can be explained by Bay’s filming in 3D, which required the poster boy of music video aesthetic excess to rethink and alter his shooting style to the technology’s requirements. I watched it in 2D my first time out, though I fully intend to check out the 3D version to see if I feel a difference in the action’s impact; I’m thinking it will. That being said, don’t look at my “middle-of-the-road” grade for “Dark of the Moon” as anything other than just a reflection of the way the film “felt” to my on my first viewing; in a summer that’s already given us a handful of crushing disappointments (“The Hangover Part II,” “Green Lantern,” I’m looking at you), I’ll take “Transformers: Dark of the Moon” any day…especially when it feels like my opinion of the film will only go up over time.
Author’s Note: Not long after my first viewing, as well as the writing of the above review, I was able to watch “Dark of the Moon” in IMAX 3D and, low and behold, the film improved on second viewing. Bay’s use of 3D is subtle but effective, and allows one to appreciate the rhythms of his editing in this film more. Yes, the narrative and acting weak spots remain, but when Bay cranks up the action, especially in the massive set piece in Chicago, the film ranks with Bay’s best. As for its place in the “Transformers” trilogy, I still have a soft spot for the first film, but for knock down, drag out action, “Dark of the Moon” is a Michael Bay masterwork.
