Ok people... Once again Michael Bay attempts to awww and wow us with his infamous action sequences and detailed special effects. However, REVENGE OF THE FALLEN falls even farther away from the entertainment spectrum than the first one did. Granted this is a film with Mr. Bay's name on and should be judged accordingly. That being said, even with his timeless quota of being "awesome" there has to be a certain level of coherency and consistency in order for the entertainment value to remain as the dominating feature in his films. REVENGE OF THE FALLEN demonstrates this quality very poorly. Again we are dealing with a movie that dwells within a reality involving large transforming extraterrestrial robots but I continue to protest a sense of coherency and limitation within it's own world. To begin with there are a lot of new twists, elements and plot devices that appear in this movie very conveniently. Although like slender women in revealing clothing this is not uncommonly apparent in Bay's filmography. My concern peaks when I repeatedly ask questions such as "Why didn't they just do this?" or "Was that really necessary? That wasn't even entertaining" and so on. An item I questioned frequently through out the movie was the All-Spark shard that Sam (Shia LeBoeuff) discovers in his old sweater. It still contains the power to transform ordinary machines into transformers. So when Optimus Prime (Peter Cullen) gets killed, why couldn't they just use the all spark shard to revive him if it still has it's power? Also there's the scene where Sam, Mikela (Megan Fox), Simmons (John Tuturro) and... that other annoying roommate Leo Spitz (Rammond Rodriguez) go speak to Jetfire. If he's still alive why DID they need the shard to revive him? Why couldn't he transform on his own? They don't explain anything as simple as that. It's both too convenient and inconvenient to make sense even by Michael Bay's standards. By the way, I'm still wondering why the chose to have Mr. Spitz ride along in this adventure. I don't think there was another character in another Bay film that's pissed me off so much. He does nothing significant but bitch and whine the entire time, he's annoying as fuck and they didn't even work him in as competition with Mikela. Just another useless, frustrating character. He actually made Shia bearable for me, though whether that was his true purpose is unknown. To comment on the transformers themselves... well aside from Optimus Prime, Bumblebee and those two fuckball twin robots I don't really have much to say on the others because they barely have any screen time. Ironhide, Ratchet, they're all on screen for a matter of about 20 minutes. You only get one sentence introducing the new autobots and aside from Wheelie and Skids you barely see any of the others later in the movie. Aside from that what was the deal with those two fuckhead twin robots? They did the same thing they did with Jazz in the first Transformers; they reduced them to a cultural stereotype only this time to be more of a very perturbing comic relief. Going back to my frequently asked questions, there's the Matrix. This has to be the cheesiest stunt Bay has ever pulled in any movie. Sam gets shot by Megatron and dies. In... some kind of dream sequence the other Primes confront him telling him he's "earned" the Matrix whereby Sam wakes up with it fully restored, ready to revive Optimus Prime. Holy Fuckball. Once more we are visited by extreme conveniency in order for our heroes to finish their quest in ways that seem unrealistic even in the world of Transformers. I don't understand it. There's never been this type of mysticism or fantastical magic involved in Transformers and then it throws us this curveball, expects us to accept it and move on. Yes, I understand, it's Michael Bay, it's alien robots but it still manages to goes too far. It goes beyond it's own sense of reality and I just can't stomach the fact that they went to one of the lowest common denominators of copouts and expect me not to call bullshit. On the technical side this movie was... ugh. Dear God. There's actually a scene where Sam says "Megan" instead of Mikela and they KEPT IT IN. There's so much wrong with continuity it's not even worth mentioning. Also there are scenes where Simmons seems to travel from Cairo to Jordon and it takes him 5 minutes... Are you serious? Jordon is near 500 MILES AWAY FROM CAIRO with Isreal in between them no less. That's just absurd. On a slightly brighter note, a few of the battle scenes were much better than the first one. The continuity still is irregular but the scene where Optimus Prime wrecks all those decepticons in the forest is the best fight scene in that movie. That was kick ass. You know I do enjoy a Bay movie when it deserves praise; BAD BOYS II, THE ROCK and so on. I just can't find the entertainment when there's so much wrong with the movie that it confuses and annoys me rather than keeps me excited. On top of everything, the best scene that I couldn't wait for in the trailer (When Demolisher completely wrecks that highway in Shanghai) was a minute into the movie and then the rest of the movie just keeps failing to capture my interest for the most part. What lurks in store for future installments? Don't know and at this point don't care.
Know what really irks me? When I point out the same bonehead inconsistences in TRANSFORMERS: REVENGE OF THE FALLEN my friends say; "I don't care. It's a movie designed for you to turn your brain off and have a good time" However, my brain don't work that way. I find it near impossible to have a good time with my brain switched off. There's some things I liked about the movie: The Witwicky Family: any scene with them was hilarious, well acted and downright fun. I'd gladly pay to see a movie about The Witwickys without them damned robots. Jetfire and The Fallen: I got more enjoyment out of that cranky, cantankerous old robot than any other Transformer. And The Fallen was visially distinctive enough from the other Transformers to actually be interesting and any character voiced by the great Tony Todd is automatically elevated in status. I agree that the fight scene in the woods where Optimus Prime took on all those Decepticons was indeed badass and the best fight in the movie. Outside of that there's not much I liked about the movie. Part of my disinterest is that I'm just not a TRANSFORMERS fan. And I can't tell those robots apart except for Optimus Prime, Jetfire and The Fallen. The rest of them all look the same to me.
Italiano, awesome review, I have to say I agree with you almost whole-heartedly. I don't think I'd damn it quite as far as you did, but frankly if you look at it expecting a good movie you will be disappointed. I went into it expecting it to be crap, but atleast somewhat entertaining in the mix of crap. That's essentially what it was. Brief moments of entertainment covered in more crap than a cow manure facility.
You know, I really didn't have much to complain about the movie until Sam got to college and he was in his dorm getting raped by that Femmebot. I was trying to get into the movie, but that completely ruined it for me. I'm also not surprised that the Matrix was going to have to be earned some how. It was called the key of greatness or something and I knew that it was going to be retarded. The twin cars, all the pot references, the swearing for no reason, and the roommate that Sam never actually rooms with were all things I feel could have been removed from the movie without anyone being any the wiser and I don't think it would have changed the movie whatsoever.
