"Transformers 2": A Movie of Extremes"
Michael Bay almost has a film style all his own; he has a great knack for visual flair and for making things go "boom." His certain style tends to overwhelm a lot of character development, story and dialogue in many of his movies, but when he turns his visual style up, his weaknesses can be covered up to make an entertaining film.
That said, he was probably the only guy to have made a live-action version of "Transformers" work. The very idea of small machines morphing into giant fighting robots that wage war against each other in shallow-for-a-cartoon-plots is silly in general, but the pure bombast and special effects Bay brought to the 2007 original made it much like the rest of his filmography: light on cinematic substance, but full of escapist fun.
The first film's success led to the inevitable sequel, "Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen," and this sequel pushes the limits of how far Bay's big bang theory of filmmaking can carry him. Bay's range appears to be total extremes: on one end, he can make the film so over-the-top with the visuals and pyro, that people will either be left breathless by it or numbed and bored by it, while on the other end, it can be a clunky mess, crude and obnoxious that it turns people off. When he finds the right mix, he is great, like in "The Rock," and when he's at his worst, you get stuff like "Pearl Harbor" and "Bad Boys II."
One thing about "Revenge of the Fallen" is that it is never boring and dull. On the contrary, it borders on sensory overload. This is a film that shows Bay's style of filmmaking at both extremes. When the movie works, it works extremely well. When it doesn't, it starts to fight "Pearl Harbor" for the title of his worst film.
You might think the filmmakers could come up with any sort of excuse for a rematch for the alien refugees from the dead planet Cybertron, and not have to worry about convolutions, but writers Roberto Orci, Alex Kurtzman and Ehren Kruger give it their best shot to make the Continuity Police's heads explode. For the sake of completion, let's at least try to write a reasonable description of the plot:
Two years after their victory over the dreaded Decepticons, the Autobots, led still by Optimus Prime (still pitch-perfect Peter Cullen) now team up with a special U.S. task force, headed by Maj. Lennox (Josh Duhamel) and Sgt. Epps (Tyrese Gibson) on a mission to find and wipe out any further Decepticon forces on Earth. Meanwhile, the hero of the last film, Sam Witwicky (Shia LaBeouf) is preparing to enter college and hopefully lead a normal life, with his only major problem being maintaining a long-distance relationship with his mega-hot girlfriend Mikaela (Megan Fox).
Unfortunately for Sam, an encounter with an errant shard of the since-destroyed Allspark has implanted crucial information of an even more powerful source of energon, the energy that gives the transformers life, hidden on Earth. When this knowledge is learned, the Decepticons double their efforts to find Sam and the Allspark shard, with which they plan to resurrect their leader Megatron (Hugo Weaving). From there, they will use this source of power to allow their ancient elder, a creature known only as "The Fallen" (Tony Todd) to finish the job he started millennia ago: to destroy the Earth. It is up to Sam, Mikaela, the Autobots and a few of their old friends and enemies to stop the Decepticons in time.
Really, typing any more specific details of the plot will make this review go on forever and wouldn't do justice to an overly-complicated plot designed to make an excuse to show the second big budget screen adaptation of "Rock 'Em, Sock 'Em Robots." "Transformers 2" almost has to be seen by human eyes to see how incredibly dense, juvenile, self-important corny and at times flat out insane the so-called plot really is. And that's if you take out the elements of the story that directly contradict the events of the first movie. Not to mention, the story also opens about a zillion cans of worms and questions that Bay and company can't be bothered to answer. But, if one has extreme patience, about 90 minutes in, an elderly ex-Decepticon (Aging robots? See what I mean?) sits our heroes around the proverbial campfire and sorts the whole mess out, and it ALMOST makes sense. At least, it makes enough sense to sort out why the good guys have to stop the bad guys.
The fighting scenes are the highlight, of course. Bay and his effects team go all out to make the fights bigger and more action packed than before. Aside from the grey color scheme of the Decepticons making the Giger-like aliens hard to differentiate and a pretentious use of "serious" slow motion, the fights are fun and pleasing to watch. Audiophiles will have a field day with the sound effects used. The soundtrack is pretty decent with Linkin Park providing a new song and support for the score, while Green Day's new hit "21 Guns" becomes a bit of a recurring theme for Sam and Mikaela.
The humor is a decidedly mixed bag. The funniest bits are early on when a mortified Sam tries to cover for his overbearing (i.e. "stoned") mother (Julie White) and overprotective father (Kevin Dunn) in front of his bemused campus mates, and his crazed reaction to the images in his head is awesome. Less awesome is the juvenile and borderline embarrassing scatological humor used throughout, involving dogs, humans and even other transformers. And despite the "PG-13" rating, this is a kids' movie at heart, a little less profanity would be desireable.
The stupid plot can be excused, somewhat, because it all sort of comes together near the end, the low-brow humor can be pushed aside, but two things nearly sink the whole film. One of them is Sam's new conspiracy theorist roommate Leo Spitz (Ramon Rodriguez), who is not only annoying, but useless; he makes Anthony Anderson from the first movie tolerable. Thankfully John Tuturro redeems his irritating turn in the original with a funny moment or two year, namely involving the blatant abuse of Leo with a taser gun.
Even worse are the two new star Autobots, Mudflap and Skids. Never mind the natural allegations of racial stereotyping they've already attracted; putting that aside, these two joke characters are unfunny, hog the screen and are a general nuisance. Their biggest laughs come when Bumblebee throws them out of a hiding place, and then Devestator (nearly) eats one of them.
The really bad part about the toilet comedy and the unnecessary (non) comic relief is that it takes away the original's sole focus: the relationship of Sam and Mikaela (as well as Bumblebee, who is really shortchanged). Their relationship's growing pains are quickly rushed through in order to get to the next action sequence, which glosses over a surprising disguise the Decepticons should have thought of using LONG ago. LaBeouf and Fox do well with what they've got, but they probably need to do something more challenging than just summer genre films; LaBeouf has done the same character about three or four times now, and Fox looks likes she has more acting skills than running from CGI robots and looking hot in semi-gratuitous shots (not that many would mind looking at her).
On the other hand, Optimus Prime's story arc is handled well enough and Cullen is pure class in his voicing of the character. Watching him trade blows and insults with Megatron recalls Saturday mornings in the mid 1980s. The film is long enough that it manages to do a bit more with the longstanding battle for power between Megatron and his sniveling second-in-command Starscream (Charles Adler). The involvement of "The Fallen" is just a ploy to get a bigger everything in the film, including villains, but "The Fallen" is a disappointing non-entity for most of the battles.
The sheen is bright on the surface of "Transformers 2." Like the original, it is big, dumb escapist fun, when it works. Under the hood shows a clunky mess with some serious problems, some of which begin to show. The strength of popcorn flicks is that they entertain the audience. For the most part, this film is entertaining, and its problems don't make the money spent on the ticket feel like money wasted. It is hit-and-miss; there is a lot to like, and quite a bit to loathe.
Just like pretty much any film by Michael Bay.
FINAL GRADE: THREE STARS (OUT OF FIVE STARS)
"Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen"
From DreamWorks and Paramount Pictures
Starring Shia LaBeouf, Megan Fox, Josh Duhamel, Tyrese Gibson, Kevin Dunn, Julie White, Ramon Rodriguez, Isabel Lucas, John Benjamin Hickey and John Tuturro; Also featuring the voices of Peter Cullen, Hugo Weaving, Charles Adler, Grey DeLisle, Tom Kenney, Reno Wilson, Frank Welker and Tony Todd
Directed by Michael Bay
Written by Ehren Kruger, Roberto Orci and Alex Kurtzman, based on Hasboro's "Transformers" toy line and cartoon series
Running Time: 151 Minutes
Rated "PG-13"-Intense sequences of sci-fi action violence, language, some crude and sexual material and brief drug material