I just saw Michael Bay's Transformers last night and have been shaking my head since I left the theater.
Where do I start on a review of this movie?
First off, the effects are top-notch. The transformations are incredible, the robots look great. Some of the best effects I've seen in years.
However, the movie's called Transformers....we're all here to see gigantic robots battle it out....why the hell are all these annoying humans in the way? It seems Michael Bay and the screenwriters didn't think we'd care about the Transformers characters. The giant robots are written more as an afterthought and comic relief than as actual heroic characters. Optimus Prime & company should be the stars of this movie, not some nerdy kid and his scantily clad lust interest.
I can go on and on and pick this movie apart. I know it's a big budget effects movie, and don't get me wrong, some of my favorite movies are some of the cheesiest movies of the 80s (Rambo, Robocop, The Last Dragon). Transformers is a mish-mash of previous Bay/Bruckheimer movies, including stealing the music from other films (I actually heard the Terminator 2 theme during a battle as well as music from Armageddon).
This movie was a trainwreck, poorly written, confusing (how can such a simple plot be confusing?!), over edited, over produced, over self-important.
Michael Bay has established himself as a director who used the same tricks in every movie (sunsets behind military vehicles, romance during insane action violence, cheesy one-liners (I'll take Stallone or Schwartzenegger one-liners any day), horribly executed comedy at all the wrong times, car crashes on LA freeways...the list goes on and on.)
Transformers reminds me why I don't own any Michael Bay movies. If you've seen his movies, there is nothing new. Well, except for giant robots.