8:30pm - 4th July, 2011 (3D)

Oh my God......... I mean... let me compose myself for a second..... This film is, the worst I have seen this year. Granted, I haven't seen many poor films in 2011, (the Green Hornet for example) but this nonetheles gains immediate access to the elite little group.  Michael Bay's third installment of the franchise brings no subtlety, improvements, or almost anything at all to the table. But.... I am here to state my reasons as to why I think this, this should at least be interesting.

I have not seen Revenge of the Fallen, but thankfully, I had no need to, as the film appears to have forgotten all of the plot from it. The story rotates around the events of the Moon Landing in the 60's, where aparrently, the U.S. goverment stumbled upon a ship which had fled the war between the Autobots and Decepticons.  A Prime, named Sentinal is found to have piloted the ship. In the present day, we see the Autobots aiding the Goverment and working to protect Earth.  A fuel cell is doscovered in Chernobyl, which the Russians secretly retrieved from the stricken ship on the Moon, and attemped to use as a source of radioactive energy. However, this leads to the awakening of Shockwave.

There is more to this plot, which revolves about the discovery of "Pillars" that can open a time portal, returning Sentinal Prime to life, who in turn wishes to enslave mankind and use them to return his home back, and a massive battle between the Autobots and Decepticons, but honestly... I have not a clue on how to describe it. It is baffling to the highest degree and gets far too convoluted in itself to be of any emotional revelence.  To the fans, all you need know is this is a Transformers film running on the same formula, so expect the same style here.

But..... wow, even my friend, who is an honest fan of the previous films, walked out speechless after this.  And to try and plug all the issues here is like trying to plug the holes in a sieve. But, for here, I'll try.

First and foremost, the film has absolutely no idea what it is. Drama? Action? Humour, slap-stick? Instead, it's an awkward mix n' match of all, with scenes of tension followed almost immediately by comic refief. It's a horrible clash that happens throughout the entire film. The humour itself is almost embarrassing, it's the kind that you would hear in high school - uninventive, slow, and pointless. How they managed to cram these "jokes" into almost every scene is beyond me, but none of it works. All it resulted in from the audience tonight was a few slight giggles, which faded away rapidly.

Next, there is no consiquence at all to any of the actions that happen. Enourmous battle scenes, death, and destruction happen all the time, and yet you are left utterly cold to all the characters. There is no emotional connection, which left me feel severed from what was happening on the screen. Without that, it became nothing more than a video game FMV - a series of pictures to get things from point A to point B, nothing more.

Then there are the little things, the small inclusions that you cant help notice and stare in disbelief at. Perfect examples of this are, the "humour" Autobots, the very sexist camera angles used on the actresses, unecessary cameos, comfusing battles, dreadful editing, and, SEVEN American flags stuck into the film. I know that this is an item that has been symbolic in the Spiderman series, and that's fine. But seven? Why?? It's not like the audience is going to forget they saw it the furst time, you don't need to shove it in our faces.  This is the level of bewilderment that Transformers 3 brings in bucketloads. Just scene after scene of awkwardness, dead humour, cold action, and inert acting.

The story itself almost plays no part, the majority of the time is allocated to inconsisternt pandering and unecessary cutscenes of the Autobots driving to the next location.  They trail-hop around the World so often, you just give up on questioning their methods of transportation. Any time the story is brought to the foreground, it is covered as fast as possible, in order to get to the next scene. Which you can guarantee on being some stupid bloody joke. Or else we are treated to some... very strange scenes where it blacks out and immedietely returns to the scene as a method to raise tension. Which it doesn't, it's more like Alice on her first lesson in Film-making.

I am however, not entirely critical. The technical team did their work well, the film's special effects were very impressive, and one scene in the final act on a skyscraper raised me from my coma and got me thoroughly interested. It was nicely shot, choriographed, and did have a real sense of danger to it. But even here, it was let down by a very dark screen, and also the major fact that we have all seen this before. There is not a single scene that wows, or amazed, simply because it's been done in the previous films.  I do applaud the CG studios, but I just wish they had something new or original to add here.

I went into this with low expectations, I was ready to give it a chance to at least entertain me, or keep me interested for the time. In the same way as the blockbuster action movies of the 90's would. But it fell utterly flat on it's face, never once living to it's expectations, justifying it's massive action sequences, nor making me care at all for anything that happened.  It's lack of consistency, intelligence, and / or innovation does nothing to help matters. I know many fans would hate me for this, but there's nothing to do but give it a Some ol' Bullshit. I wish I had something good to say of it, but there's not a single redeeming, or memorable moment to mention.  Seriously people, you don't need to pay premium prive to see this in the theatre, wait for the Blu Ray release if you must.

But once again, we have been shown the ruthless and ignorant side of Hollywood, who throws hundreds of millions of dollars at a film, with no goal but to make a profit. It is films like these, that make me look back and remember the likes of Limitless with a smile. If only more films had suck an air of ambition and originality to them. Transformers 3, will not be remembered for such traits. It will merely be a set of figures in the Accounting books, and used as a reference  in Special Effects classes.

---nkWhiteStar---