Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen

Continuing with my complete repertoire of "Transformers" movie reviews—there are three and I ran out of patience after two—for the next couple of "Take Out the Trash" Days.

 

Can Steven Spielberg convince Martin Scorsese to direct a "Transformers" movie? How about Greta Gerwig? I'd like to see an Aaron Sorkin-scripted Transformers movie (Transformers: The One About the Thing). I must be going through Post-Barbie Depression.

 

"Boys With Toys"

 or

"We Just Dropped Ten Tons of Dead Robot in the Middle of Nowhere."

 

As I recall, my three biggest beefs with the first "Transformers" movie was a) it was your basic racial bait-and-switch movie where the story of a repressed class is sublimated by having the story told through the eyes of a bankable star not of that class, b) the action sequences were ultimately boring and c) Michael Bay made every woman look like a hooker.

Other than that, I didn't mind it as some things were done quite well, indicating that Bay might actually become a filmmaker some day, as opposed to being a well-organized ring-leader and money evaporator.

But Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen* shows no such progression, and is quite a deal worse than the original. The problems with the first film have not been resolved, and the filmmakers have moved on to ignore more weighty problems like coherent writing, clear visual story-telling, or having a point besides making money and providing jobs for friends.

By now, the five-story high Auto-bots have become known to the military (thanks for noticing) if not the public at large, and should be working arm in cog to ward off alien attack, become an early, early warning system, vaporize garbage or at least become part of the motor pool. But it appears their job is to sit in one those ubiquitous governmental underground bunkers, stay out of the way of lucrative weapons manufacturers and kvetch about the government in charge. In other words, they've become part of the legislative branch with the major difference being that they actually go into battle themselves.**

And their nemeses, the evil Decepticons? They're doing much the same thing, except oiling their wounds, going back to the drawing board and plotting revenge. It would appear they have a long-standing grudge against Earth and its inhabitants, which is why this pan-galactic epic battle seems to be centered here, rather than some other arm of the Milky Way. Maybe we really are the Center of the Universe...and it attracts trouble.***

Speaking of self-absorbed monomania, Sam Witwicky (Shia LaBeouf) is off to college, with more beating of breast and patting of wallet by his braying parents (Julie White, Kevin Dunn) who were a welcome relief last time, but are now just wacky walking punch-lines.

Then there's the only reason fathers are taking their children—Megan Fox who's achieved a reputation as a Hollywood hottie and probably did a lot of practicing having a cold trying to get out of her contract-mandated participation, and might have done if she were a better actress. Fortunately, she's not required to do much outside of your typical Almay or shampoo commercial, until the latter part of the film where she's required to run in front of large gasoline explosions. I'd be worried for her as her mascara doesn't appear to run at all, but she doesn't lose so much as a false eye-lash.

The movie is built of the spare parts of a lot of past Studio franchises, and as with most out-sourcing a lot of the pieces don't fit. The Decepticons have a tier-structure (the Decepticon Overlord at one point even says "And you will, my apprentice"), a magic bling must save the day, Sam has trouble saying the "L" word, and there are magic scribblings that they have to go to an expert (John Turturro returning to good comic effect), in order to stop the evil erector sets from setting off a device hidden in the Pyramids that will stop the sun (I'm not sure what that would be but I suspect it's some triangular Maytag ice-maker). Take Transformers, strap on "Indiana Jones," plug in "National Treasure," screw on a pneumatic "Star Wars," some "Gremlins," program in some "DaVinci Code," stir a few thousand times to make it incomprehensible and drop it with a huge clank on Independence Day.

Ultimately, it's a big mess with Bay setting up a swooping crane shot for every line of dialog, and the screenwriters setting up their expositions over explosions so you can't hear all their mumbo-jumbo. The only time the movie comes to life is an extended sequence on campus when Sam, possessed by a piece of the evil Decepticon-maker freaks out in a classroom and goes all "Beautiful Mind" scrawling encryption's on his dorm-room wall, while also avoiding the predatory come-on's of a sorority sister, who's actually a Decepticon in drag. At that point, the movie becomes giddy and fun with complication piled on complication and LaBoeuf displaying some of the manic energy that makes him interesting to watch.

But that's ten minutes out of two and a half hours of a loud, obnoxious version of "Rock'em, Sock'em Robots." And that's the bottom line of this mess. It was made for the necessities of the Studio making it, not for any artistic need to tell a story. Just as the Studios plan a few years ahead to make "tent-pole" franchises to strategically shore up dividends in the Summer and Christmas, this movie was constructed of sequences dictated by locations cheap enough to shoot in. That, unfortunately, is how the Bond producers have been manufacturing movies for the past two decades: having run out of Ian Fleming titles, they check to see where they can save the most money and set their movies there, and write the script around the location (Hitchcock would utilize locations for material as well). The problem is there's more to a screenplay than "location, location, location." The Bond series perked up only when they had Fleming's "Casino Royale" to provide that film its spine and heart.

But there's no point and no inspiration to Tranformers: Revenge of the Fallen, there is only contrivance, and the makers were scraping the bottom of the scrap-heap to do that. The old "Transformers" series used to kill off characters to encourage kids to buy their new lines of toys. One can imagine the day when Revenge of the Fallen will overcrowd the dumpsters of America, as well.

* Reviewer Jim Emerson had the foresight to alphabetize it as "Transformers: ROTFL"

** Hey kids! There are new Auto-bots based on Smart-cars, but instead of speaking French, they're street-cred hipsters and are as annoying as a weekend with Jar-Jar Binks. In fact, these characters aren't only annoying they're vaguely racist (!!??), but then there's a major disconnect with this movie about its audience. It's aimed at kids, but amid all the cussing and humping dog jokes, I could see more than a few parents putting their heads in their hands at the questioning up-turned faces of their kids. It's also aimed at the kids who played with "Transformers" in the 70's and...haven't yet evolved. They were the ones "huh-huh-huhing" at off-color humor. Hollywood has yet to learn that the AICN crowd are a fickle bunch and won't necessarily "open" a movie for you. But then, a goodly number of current directors are fan-boys themselves.

*** At one point at an attempt at depth one of the characters says of the robots: "If God made us in his image, who made them?" Hasbro, Einstein! And probably in China.

Monsters vs. Aliens

Okay, I know this isn't a horror film. It's an animated comedy for kids...but it has monsters and aliens and the monsters are based on actual horror movie monsters, so.... 

Written at the time of the film's release...

 

"The Ginormica Monologues" 

It's the perfect wedding day for Susan Murphy (voice of Reese Witherspoon, cracked on the boil): she has the perfect dress, the perfect church, and the perfect groom in fat-headed weatherman Derek Dietl (Paul Rudd). But it's all in the timing.  

Just after a little pre-nuptial spat about honeymooning in Paris or Fresno, the bride-to-be gets squashed by a meteorite. At the altar, everyone comments that she's positively glowing...but...glowing green! Then, she goes from meteoric to all metaphoric, by growing enormously, dwarfing her puny groom and scientifically smashing the church to splinters. I kept waiting for the parents to say "our little girl's grown up!" but no such luck.*

Pretty soon, the Army led by General W.R. Monger (a gruff Kiefer Sutherland, having fun) fires hypodermics in her butt and Gulliver her to the ground, where she awakens in one of those cavernous U.S. installations we only wish we had, with a bunch of other monsters Monger's captured since the atomic testing days of the 50's. There's the Missing Link (Will Arnett), a Blob named B.O.B. (Seth Rogen in a bit of typecasting), and the insane Dr. Cockroach (Hugh Laurie), as well as a giant Japanese moth creature called Insectizoid. Kept prisoners by the government, they are finally called out as a last resort when Aliens, led by the evil Galaxhar (Rainn Wilson, like you've never heard him) attack the U.S. ("...they only seem to ever attack here,"** intones a Brokawed-paletted news anchor) after humiliating the President (Stephen Colbert...typecasting again).

Dreamworks and the directors (Conrad Vernon and Rob Letterman of Shrek 2 and Shark Tale, respectively) do a nice job of plumbing the envelope of the monster-crowd giving us versions of Mothra, the Fly, the Blob, The Creature from the Black Lagoon and the 50 ft. Woman, and instilling the politically correct message that these aren't monsters but "special" people...er, things...entities (whatever). Indeed, the entire movie plays like a therapy session for Susan to embrace her empowerment and not to see her change as an accident of Nature, so much as...a happy accident of Nature. Hey, empowerment is empowerment even if you do go up 30 dress-sizes. 

The animation? Extraordinarily simplistic in a weird way. Susan looks like one of those big-eyed Keane children, and most of the men seem to be variations of Nixon (except for Derek, who looks uncannily like Conan O'Brien). The monsters are varying body-types and primary colors, so you can tell who's who when they're flitting across the screen (which they do a lot). 

Still, there is good planning going on, so one is never at a loss for where one is, and where the danger lies. In a totally made-up universe that can be a problem. And the 3-D effects are impressive, starting with a Dreamworks logo gag (heh), and a gratuitous paddle-ball sequence, although the 3-D-ness, sometimes comes off as having the dimensions of a pop-up book. But, the process has come a long way, and is frequently, deliberately eye-popping. It's not enough to recommend seeing it in theaters, though, so hopefully when it comes to DVD, they'll include the 3-D version, with glasses.

* ...and I'll bet the attendess threw puffed rice, (badum-bump!)

** Personally, I think it has to do with our Immigration Policy. "Okay, you can destroy the Golden Gate Bridge...once, but promise you'll never do it again and we'll consider granting you amnesty."\

Looper

Written at the time of the film's release.

Killing Time
or
Maybe You; Möbius

The trouble with time-travel movies is the really good ones (that is, the plausible ones—if such a thing exists) require a flow-chart to make any sense, and once you're doing that, you take a lot of the fun out of it. That would be the problem with going back in time—you'd be spending so much time making sure you didn't disturb anything and cleaning up after oneself that you'd hardly have any time reliving the past in the present if you hope to have any future. As one of the characters says "This time-travel crap, it fries your brain like an egg."

Fortunately, Rian Johnson (who made the rather precious Brick, and the entirely commendable The Brothers Bloom) has already done the muck-work for Looper, a tough-as-nails-time-travel noir set in the year 2044, where thirty years hence (2072) time-travel will be invented...and instantly made illegal. 

Well, if time-travel is outlawed, only outlaws will have time-travel, and so organized crime uses it—not to increase their fortunes, but to dispose of their garbage. "You can't dispose of a body in the future," narrates Joe (Joseph Gordon-Levitt in the long explanatory opening voice-over). "I dispose a body that technically doesn't exist." 

The future-hoods (dressed like Leone gunfighters) kidnap a "disposable," throw a hood over his head, hog-time him in a vest lined with silver bars, and toss him in the time machine, where he quickly appears in 2044, is just as quickly "whacked" and the silver mined as payment by the executioner, called a "looper"—local-time kids, who are given rich rewards, a steady cache of drugs, and rental of a woman of his choice. They live like sociopathic kings in a Karl Rove dream-scape, where the meek don't inherit nuthin'—the middle class are roaming the streets pushing shopping carts, while the killers drive jet-cycles.

Overseeing this mob is Abe (Jeff Daniels), recruited from the future to manage the loopers and keep them in line, which includes a rather draconian retirement policy (don't these guys read their hiring contracts?) that forces them to "retire" their older selves when they are sent back in time for disposal—you get your gold-watch at the start of your career and gold lined cement overshoes at the end.  
That's the set-up.*  

Things get complicated, when Joe stands in his chosen field, waiting for the body-to-be to show up on the blood-tarp, and when it does, there's no hood, and when he looks into his target's eyes, they're his. Joe has to kill himself from the future.

You know that already. You've seen the set-up, read the poster.** But the implications, why that is, why "Old Joe" shows up with no hood, and what comes next...and next...and next...and then back...then next, would be revealing any of the surprises the film has in store. It's enough to say that, in surface detail, it's quite an ingenious little ride, and the plot-holes are kept cleverly out of sight and out of mind, and one has to assume a lot, such as evidently time-travel only exists as a form of going back to the past, and not forward into the future, as one of the characters does it "the old-fashioned way" (by growing old).

And one has to accept a lot of "fuzzy mechanism" mumbo-jumbo for things happening to Joe that ultimately affects "old Joe"—for instance the rather painful form of communication between the two, that is further demonstrated in the extreme by another looper (played by Paul Dano), which is just a damned clever device, but also grisly to the queasy point. Lots of violence...in some interesting forms, and one of the alarming things is how fast people get shot in 2044—you appear and (BOOM!), and director Johnson is doing some very clever things with the camera these days that aren't so derivative of other directors. That's good. His sense of time and timing in editing is still as razor sharp as it always has been, and he's not afraid to mess with aspect-ratios for effect. The ideas are good, and one thing Johnson has always had is a clever way with dialogue, which is where Looper shines, time after time.

* ...except for one little tidbit of information that some of us have mutated to have telekinesis, but it doesn't amount to much—"no superhero stuff." says Joe "We can float quarters. That's it."  Yeah, but... It wouldn't BE there if it wasn't necessary. And it is, but only semi-so.

** And if anybody is wondering why JoGo-Levitt looks weird in this movie, it's because he's been given a prosthetics make-over so he has Willis' nose, eyes, lip-line, and thinning hair and does a rather inspired Willis-routine throughout the movie, especially in an interview with Abe where the resemblance and mannerisms are uncanny. 

Super

A look back at director James Gunn's rather heretical view of the super-hero genre from 2010.

"The Weed of Crime Bears Bitter Fruit"
or
"Boltie!  NO!"

There will be four major super-hero movies coming out this Summer (starting with Thor next week, Green Lantern, X-Men: First Class, and Captain America: The First Avenger), plus a smattering of graphic novel adaptations and such. Next year, The Avengers, Spider-man, Batman and Superman movies will be released. Comic Books are hot in the movies because they're easily digestible, easy to adapt, and they skew young in the audience demographics.

It's just too bad that so many of them are terrible, and they've created a lazy back-lash of "Oh, I'm so sick of super-hero movies" to any blogger who can put two words together. Sure, you're sick of them. Too much of anything gets dull after awhile. 

So, stop going to them. That's not so hard. With great power comes great responsibility. Super-hero movies have a lot of power right now and you're responsible.

Meanwhile, there is an antidote to all this nefarious meta-human poisoning, a tonic to the wish-fulfillment fantasy that the genre unquestioningly presents: Super, written and directed by James Gunn, former Troma writer-director. Notice that it doesn't say "Super-hero," as that label doesn't really apply—it stops just short of the "hero" as the "vigilante" aspect of the crime-fighter takes center-stage along with its brother-in-arms, revenge.

Frank D'Arbo (Rainn Wilson) is a short-order cook/man-child and the best thing that ever happened to him was marrying Sarah Helgeland (Liv Tyler), a waitress at the diner who's just come out of re-hab and is trying to get her life back in order. Things are fine (at least from Frank's perspective) until Sarah runs off with Jacques (Kevin Bacon), a sleazy drug-dealer and then Frank melts down.  Despairing, angry and confused he's inspired by a religious station's superhero program "The Holy Avenger" (played by a smirking Nathan Fillion) and by having his brain "touched by the finger of God," to set his spinning-out-of-control life back on track by taking on a vigilante role as The Crimson Bolt—his only weapons being his innate sense of "right" (no drug-dealing, no pedophilia, no butting-in in line) and a large pipe-wrench. There are no fancy moves, no elegant acrobatic abilities pulled off with ease, just a schlumpfy guy in a leotard blundering into situations and clocking people with a big spanner. Realistic, right down to the cranium-cracking that such action produces. It's funny, but also slightly cringe-inducing as you see the damage that such blunt trauma can produce. At that point, the "heroism" aspect becomes secondary to the thuggish behavior such actions create—the line between "do-gooder" and freakish assault becomes blurred and squishy.

Squishy being the operative word here. Gunn is from Troma, the cheerily exploitative grind-house that's created such films as The Toxic Avenger, so no holds are barred in the presentation of violence with its resulting blood-splatter and meat-manufacturing. When "The Bolt" increases his armory with guns, pipe-bombs and accelerant, things turn explosively ugly. And that's where Super has it all over such juvenile exercises in juvie crime-fighting glorification as Kick-Ass.  However much that film tried do disguise its brutishness with smooth moves and well-choreographed stunt-work, it played fast-and-loose with the consequences of such actions, making it all 'look cool" and distracting from the carnage. There's nothing smooth about this film; it's down and dirty and doesn't even look heroic so much as desperate and geekish, the results of adrenaline mixed with no skill whatsoever. There's more danger in Super than anything simulated in Kick-Ass.

Things get complicated. "The Bolt" starts to attract attention from the press and the local police, particularly one detective (Gregg Henry) who puts one and one together and connects the addled D'Arbo with the increased attacks around town.  Then, "The Bolt" gains a side-kick, the cute chick Libby (Ellen Page) at the comics store where he does his research. A comics junkie, she also has a hyper-intense fantasy jones that makes her latch onto D'Arbo's crusade with an unhealthy zeal, becoming his junior partner, Boltie. It's an unhealthy relationship, as Frank tries to mentor Libby ("That's inappropriate, Boltie!") in her adrenal-rush to take things too far. And they go too far, to the point where Super jumps the genre line to become more like Taxi Driver than a super-hero film.

Super is not rated, simply because it wants to skirt the issue of taming the gore and present its message uninhibited by catering to the unfathomable whims of the MPAA. So, the violence is squishy and upsetting, the language is pervasive ("Oh, maaan! The Bolt-mobile is kinda fucked up!") and the places it goes only occurring to those who are seriously aware of the psychological twistedness of the genre (like Alan Moore). It may look funny and goofy, but caution is advised if you're easily traumatized, or holding out for a hero. Super isn't playing games or taking hostages.

"This is how you fight crime...sit here and wait for it to happen?  It's so BORING!!"

Tomorrow: a look at Gunn's latest.