Movie reviews: The Transformers (2007) – Part 56

Michael Bay has scored big with The Transformers. Overall, this motion picture delivered time and time again where other classic cult cartoons turned live action have failed in the past. The hype for this film had been built up to epic proportions starting with the 1st nerd who caught wind of a rumor about preproduction, and amazingly, the movie lived up to all of it.

There was a serious risk factor when Michael Bay decided to take on this project. It is extremely difficult to grab hold of a cult favorite like Transformers and appease the obsessed fans by staying true to the original while modernizing and universalizing the theme to the point where non-fans of all ages can thoroughly enjoy it. This is a very thin tightrope Bay had to walk across. If the movie slips and falls toward the fans, then it will appeal solely to the action figure collectors and the only money made will be from special edition DVDs that feature a different colored robot on each case. If the movie falls to the other side, true fans in homemade robot costumes will revolt and they will only go see the 1st midnight showing instead of fourteen more times in the following weeks, bringing the ticket sales way down. This will also ruin any plans of a national convention for years to come. The worst case scenario would be a cheaply made hack-job inevitably turning out to be a failure and immediately sending the director down the road of making Lifetime Originals. This scenario was highly unlikely since Michael Bay requires an ungodly budget for every action movie he puts on screen.

In all, The Transformers succeeded at defining the quintessential summer blockbuster. With a steady of balance of fast-paced, eye popping action, a quenching amount of comic relief, and seamless computer-generated graphics, The Transformers is a beautiful piece of movie magic. It is definitely a refreshing alternative to all the pirate, spider, and wizard movies we’ve become accustomed to during the past few summers. If you’re looking for Academy Award winning performances, wait until The English Patient 2 comes out, but if you want to experience an action packed thrill ride for the whole family, take The Transformers for a spin.