TRANSFORMERS: REVENGE OF THE FALLEN

Written by Ehren Kruger, Roberto Orci and Alex Kurtzman
Directed by Michael Bay
Starring: Shia LaBeouf, Megan Fox, Josh Duhamel and John Turturro


Optimus Prime: Fate rarely calls upon us at a moment of our choosing.

I am having a difficult time figuring out how to express my feelings about TRANSFORMERS: REVENGE OF THE FALLEN. Upon seeing the first TRANSFORMERS, it was simple; I hated it. It angered me, in fact. I had been a big fan of the toys themselves as a kid and so had high hopes for a big screen adaptation. In my mind, it was an easy update but somehow director, Michael Bay, managed to find a way to take my childhood nostalgia and transform those memories into the kind of mind numbing garbage that he insists on forcing upon the film going public time and time again. This time out though, I knew what to expect, so the threshold of disappointment was exponentially smaller. And so I’m not nearly as angry as I was in 2007 but I got exactly what I was expecting, which is essentially just more of the same. By that logic, I should dislike it just as much. Instead, I’m more apathetic than anything else. At least it didn’t get any worse.


Fans of the first TRANFORMERS may actually be disappointed this time around. To go back and watch the first installment now, after the novelty factor has worn off on the superb special effects behind the Transformers themselves, would likely be disappointing for most fans. Without the wow-factor of the heavy metal to weigh it down, the film’s inconsistencies and banalities float to the surface. The same can be said about this sequel. We’ve all seen these majestic creatures before so what is there to be excited about this time out? The story? The acting? This is a Michael Bay picture; if it isn’t about the explosions and the girls, then it isn’t about anything at all. A special effects driven sequel has one goal only – to be bigger and, when it comes to Bay’s films, more bombastic than its predecessor. When the climax of your film amounts to countless explosions and shots of Megan Fox running in slow motion though, the approach is far too transparent to be appreciated. At least it was easier to tell who was fighting whom this time.


People often criticize me for expecting a decent story in blockbuster entertainment. We all know its possible … SPIDER-MAN? THE DARK KNIGHT? IRON MAN? Yet still, the general population is much more apt to forgive story holes in bigger movies because it isn’t the most important element of these pictures. Knowing that it is possible only infuriates me when I see films that don’t even seem interested in trying to flesh out a plausible story. The premise for REVENGE OF THE FALLEN is triggered when Sam Witwicky (Shia LaBeouf) finds a small chunk of the cube the Decepticons (bad guys) wanted to take control of in the first film in the pocket of his sweater he was wearing back on that fateful day. Upon touching it, it gets real hot, falls through the floor and lands in the Witwicky kitchen, subsequently transforming all the appliances into menacing little robots. So for two inexplicable years, the cube fragment lied dormant in a cotton sweater – cotton apparently being the cube’s kryptonite equivalent. When the start of your premise has holes, I just feel it’s pretty lazy to not come up with a stronger one. As for the rest of the plot, the Transformers rumble around the globe pretty much and humanity isn’t sure how comfortable they are with that.


Bay gives us exactly what he always does in TRANSFORMERS: REVENGE OF THE FALLEN because that is truly all he is capable of. Bay, who just loves critics because all they do is tear him apart, knows nothing of nuance and his approach to filmmaking is fairly childish, in a paint-by-numbers-like fashion. He thinks that people want big bombs, big boobs and big egos and arguably, judging from the money his flicks pull in most of the time, the people do want these things. Bringing nothing new to the table though only exposes how thin his direction truly is. Bay made this movie to appeal directly to the teenage male mind because he clearly still operates himself under the same principles that govern that mindset. The trouble is, some of us who remember playing with Transformers as boys fondly have actually grown up now and need just a little brain with our beauty.

MARGOT AT THE WEDDING

Written and Directed by Noah Baumbach


Malcolm: I haven’t had that thing yet where you realize that you’re not the most important thing in the world – anxious for that to happen.

What does it say about your wedding when your estranged sister’s attendance is a bigger event than the wedding itself? I mean, it’s right there in the title of Noah Baumbach’s dysfunctional family disaster movie. It isn’t called “The Wedding” or “Malcolm and Pauline Get Married”. No, it’s called MARGOT AT THE WEDDING. If your sister at your wedding causes that big a stir, perhaps the invitation would have been better lost in the mail. Still, despite her better judgment and in the interest of progress and healing, Pauline (Jennifer Jason Leigh) does invite the sister she still refers to as her closest friend after years of not speaking, to her intimate affair. It is clear her idea was not her best from the moment Margot (Nicole Kidman) steps off the boat and on to the New England shore. Pauline sends her fiancé, Malcolm (Jack Black), to pick Margot and her eldest son, Claude (Zane Pais), up from the ferry. She claims to be making last minute arrangements back at the house but I suspect it was she and not the house who was not quite ready to receive. Then, when the two are finally face to face, standing in front of the house they grew up in, they smile and make pleasantries but fidget hesitatingly before actually embracing. That awkward moment grows into a whirlwind of deep-seeded pain before long and suddenly rain on the blessed day is hardly the biggest worry for the bride-to-be.


Baumbach scored last time out with his Oscar-nominated THE SQUID AND THE WHALE. He was lauded for his sensitive and honest tale of divorce and how it affects the entire family unit. With MARGOT AT THE WEDDING, he solidifies his reputation for creating believable family ties based on dependence, dysfunction and subtle admiration. Watching the sisters as they sit around the house catching up is voyeuristic as we are often privy to conversations that feel as though they were not meant to be heard. As the sisters flip through old records in their even older house, Baumbach writes decades of experiences into his characters and we, like Malcolm, are latecomers to this dinner party. Director of photography, Harris Savides, draws us even closer to this inner circle by shooting mostly handheld footage in natural lighting and with older lenses. The resulting tone is dark and grainy but nostalgic and rich with history at the same time. At times, we are the quiet cousin who says nothing but stands in the corner with a camera and follows the drama from room to room. It isn’t long before we learn how to interpret the vernacular of this particular family and we find ourselves laughing along inappropriately at the expense of whomever Margot is lovingly ridiculing at the moment. As we laugh though, we care as well.


Kidman and Leigh (Baumbach’s wife) are both marvelous as they walk the very tightly wound lines of their borderline personalities. Baumbach guides their performances into textured characters that seem natural as sisters and strongly rooted as multifaceted people who struggle to be themselves when in the presence of the other. They even possess archetypal qualities without coming across as contrived. Margot is the master of deflection. She is constantly doling out psychological diagnoses to those around her to avoid any fingers pointing back her way. It never dawns on her that as a writer, she actually has no formal foundation to base her opinions on. She cannot understand why Pauline would settle for Malcolm; she picks at Claude to keep him closer; she even attacks her husband (John Turturro) for his good nature because it just makes her feel like a bad person. She is a fatalist to Pauline’s hopeful but defeated optimist. Pauline is damaged but wants to heal and has done so much more than she gives herself credit for. She teeters back and forth between making sneaky, subtle jabs at her sister, habits from her youth, and building new connections so that she can have the sister she always wanted instead of the one she has always had. Only, in the house that Baumbach built, the answer to whether people can ever truly change is not the least bit clear.


Family, even the best examples, can be tricky to negotiate. Spending any extended period of time with the people who both influenced you and hurt you the most in your life can be exhausting. That said, MARGOT AT THE WEDDING can be no less trying. There are those who revel in watching others with deeper dysfunction then their own. It helps them to feel that their lives are not nearly as bad as they thought. There are also others who feel they have enough to juggle already with potentially damaging weddings of their own to survive coming up fast. Why then immerse yourself in a tornado of neuroses and painful memories that are not even your own? Truthfully, you don’t have to. Along those lines, Pauline never needed to invite her sister to her wedding either. Only if she hadn’t, she would have missed out on everything the experience taught her about herself and the potential for progress. This is the genuine beauty of Baumbach’s work. He shares so intensely and personally that he inevitably forces the viewer to deal with their own inner-Margot.