Transformers

Just as Valentine’s Day was invented by Hallmark, Transformers was sponsored in full by General Motors, with small contributions by Ford Motor Company and the US Air Force.

Or so it seemed.

At least I know that I had a hard time figuring out if Michael Bay’s nerd-fantasy-come-true was one big commercial for American made cars, the air force, the army, or anti-Hummerism (some Abercrombie-clad, collar-popping, tool job high school football star drives one, and I think it was supposed to make me hate him more. It worked.). The autobots curiously enough come down to earth and choose to take the form of a Camaro, some crazy Pontiac, a GMC SUV, and a Mac truck. I hear the plot line for the sequel has already been leaked, and the autobots are passively destroyed by a fleet of Toyotas and Hondas. The superior gas mileage and service records eventually win, and no fighting or action actually occurs because the rising gas prices shut down the GMC, the Pontiac has transmission issues, and the Camaro has electrical problems. Optimus Prime in his grief takes the form of a hybrid and lives in hiding and shame in Portland.

Bay also followed suit with most movies in our “hate-on-the-president” era and snuck in a shot at our commander in chief with an unmistakably lazy, incompetent, out-of-the-loop US president with a dim-witted southern drawl.

Also following suit to the “ambiguous patriotism” trend this season, we see an impeccably diverse band of soldiers (weird Hispanic, attractive Caucasian, slick black dude, and a guy with glasses. Somehow you need all those races and a guy with glasses to round everything out) who overcome all odds to save the world and distribute freedom at any cost. I expected to receive a more tangible souvenir to go with the movie, like a few pom-poms or maybe a flag that said “Go America: Blow things up.” Instead, my $11 bought me a video cocktail of testosterone, CGI, and cavalier military men- a cocktail that transforms regular politically ignorant moviegoers to equally politically ignorant “patriots” wondering if we use those same cool weapons to blow up terrorists because if so that is awesome and why haven’t they made a video game yet.

Before I sound like I hated the movie, let me at least assure you that I was thoroughly entertained and that it was visually amazing. The CGI and special effects were stunning and fluid. I am ashamed to say that I got a strange feeling of giddiness when the car-to-robot transformations I remember making with plastic toys as a kid were there right on screen, faster and more realistic than ever. Watching fighter jets and tanks shoot huge robots that* have even more powerful weapons attached to their hands is extremely entertaining. Imagine the fluid and graceful choreography of The Matrix applied to gigantic robots with gun-hands.

Therein lies the problem with the movie, as the graphics and visual effects functioned as a huge spotlight to amplify the weaknesses in acting. It wasn’t terrible, and Shia LaBeouf (Disturbia) was excellently sarcastic and comical. Unfortunately, no other character established his or herself as more than just a “character”. While there was once an age where movies were full of humans and sprinkled with a little bit of computer effects, now they are full of computer effects and sprinkled with a little bit of human. Even the humans are more “effects” than actual people, and fit into the categories of hot, funny, soldier, or disposable (these were stepped on, crushed under debris, or similarly killed).

It was entertaining, and a movie that you can see with a bunch of guys and look at each other after a big explosion or fight scene and say “Are you kidding me? That was AWESOME!” It’s summer, and the time for thinking is gone. Watch the explosions and go in with little expectations. If you can watch this movie and remember the cartoons and toys, I believe you will really enjoy this movie, if only to covet Michael Bay for being able to make money by creating a movie about something every boy has dreamed about.

* Note: When typing the phrase “huge robots that have even more powerful weapons” I originally intended to say ‘who have’ instead of ‘that have’. Spell Check wouldn’t let me, and apparently, Microsoft Word does not recognize a robot as worthy of being described as a ‘who’. I was upset about this at first, and couldn’t believe that my computer didn’t think a robot could be a ‘who’. This is ironic to me, because after watching a movie about robots that (who) ran around and talked I came home unwittingly full of sentiment and affection for said robots, sat at my computer, and tried to grammatically describe a robot as a ‘who’. After realizing that the computer was more grammatically savvy than I, I gave up and stuck with the way the computer wanted me to write the sentence. After all, if my computer recognized a robot as a ‘who’, it is only logical to assume that my computer would recognize itself as a ‘who’, and with its (his?) superior knowledge in math and grammar would be too big of a threat both for national security and for personal use and I would have to destroy it (him).

The Happening

I don’t know how he did it, but I have to see every movie M. Night Shyamalan makes.

I can’t help it. You can’t either, especially when the only other options are superheroes, supercomedians, or superskanks.

Lately though, I feel hopelessly enslaved to his bizarre whims and fantasies, like a parent forced to watch their child’s terrible kindergarten plays and hang their horrible drawings on their refrigerator. I loved the originality of The Sixth Sense, loved being scared of nothing in The Village, and watching the plot come together in Signs. I hated Unbreakable because it was dumb, and Lady in the Water left me wondering what drug I had just taken and how much money I’d spent.

M. Night’s sixth film The Happening settles into the hodgepodge of weird films nicely, without making a real name for itself or it’s director. Deceptively tense and suspenseful during it’s opening scene, the film fails to deliver any sort of dynamic and instead plods on, steady like a freight train, til the end. A crowded central park is suddenly and eerily filled with disoriented people who eventually begin to kill themselves. Naturally, the nation suspects terrorism, but when the events spread throughout the northeast the explanation seems much more difficult to understand. Groups of survivors begin to flock to each other seeking safety, and the typical disasters ensue as they flee the mob of blankly-staring, self-mutilating citizens of the northeast. Beware, paying full price for this movie will cause the same side effects. I think on the way to my car I saw a guy trying to slash his wrists with his ticket stub.

There are genuinely suspenseful scenes, and Shyamalan’s knack for creating a creepy atmosphere out of literally nothing is in full force. I was genuinely on the edge of my seat a few times but never knew what I was scared of or for or about… Sometimes it was just because the wind was blowing or a tree swing was swinging way more that it should by itself. Don’t get me wrong, I think it takes imagination and skill to create this ambiance, and I am aware and appreciative of the fact that sometimes the scariest scenes never really show anything at all. I don’t need to watch some one’s legs get sawed off to be scared. But this film fails to weave the terror into any intelligible climax and instead rambles on towards nothingness, without closure and without purpose, like a bizarre dream and not a nightmare. Without ruining the ending all I can say is that I left the movie the same way I went in: afraid of trees, afraid I wasn’t “green enough”, and afraid the earth was getting pissed at us polluting it and was probably going to do something crazy.

The acting does little to redeem the film’s lack of energy, although the one-dimensional, over-the-top characters are likely Shyamalan’s tribute to the casts of older horror movies – women in dresses and pearl necklaces and men with fedoras and three piece suits fleeing zombies clutching their pipes. Mark Wahlberg and Zooey Deschanel are obvious archetypes, very timeless and all-American looking, and just plain good old people from Philly. Wahlberg is the irritating long lost cousin of Beaver Cleaver and all but smacks himself and says “Gee golly!” as people die left and right. Zooey Deschanel, is simple and irritatingly emotionless, and only a handful of times shows enough emotion to ensure us she herself hasn’t succumbed to the blank and suicidal stare of the bodies littering the landscape. A few times her own personality shows through, but her sarcasm and half-hearted Juno-esque delivery are lost in contrast to John Leguizamo’s actual personality, a breath of fresh air amidst plastic cookie cutter characters.

The film’s redeeming qualities are hard to appreciate without a predisposition towards classic horror films (specifically those of Hitchcock) and a willingness to let yourself get into the plot. The tight camera angles put the viewer right in the mob and subtly instill a sense of panic, the shots are simple and the minimal panning and camera movement make the film very classic-like. Even the little plot decoys thrown in (Wahlberg’s mood ring, the crazy old woman) are reminiscent of Hitchcock’s playful way of leaving the story very much inconclusive, and deceiving you into thinking a resolution is near.* I kept waiting for the little details to come together like they did in Signs or The Sixth Sense, and instead at the end of the film was left shaking my head and saying “Touche, Mr. Night, Touche,” as I walked to my car feeling stupid.

I only wish I would’ve been scared more along the way to at least justify this ride to nowhere.

*See Hitchcock’s film The Birds. They keep carrying around those dang lovebirds in a cage and in the end it had nothing to do with the story.

Random Tidbits:
- Green is supposedly the most stable color in a mood ring.
- If you missed Shyamalan’s cameo in the movie and expected to see him, he was the voice of Joey on the phone.
- The Einstein quote written on the chalkboard in the begining of the movie is not attributed to Einstein, or has recently been proved as a false quotation.