Metal misery

Transformers: Revenge of the
Fallen is exhausting and absurd

WRETCHED ROBOT: Bumblebee

by MARK SLUTSKY

I saw a Transformer’s testes tonight, a pair of wrecking balls suspended by chains, dangling in the air above the head of John Turturro, who inaccurately described what he was seeing as a scrotum. But there was no sack, just a pair of big, black wrecking balls, hanging from the taint of a giant, evil robot made up of several construction vehicles.

And having written those terrible sentences, I guess I have a responsibility to explain them. Turturro’s nut-sack gaffe occurred about five hours, or what felt like five hours, into Michael Bay’s Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen, sequel to his 2007 hit. That movie was ridiculous. Ridiculous and stupid and overstuffed with everything it seemed Bay could think of: ostrich petting zoos, Bernie Mac, giant robots who used eBay. It was also, in a really dumb way, kind of entertaining—it was just too much.

But this movie… this movie kind of broke me. It’s two-and-a-half-hours long, and I swear that at least one hour of it consists of planes taking off and landing and guys walking along aircraft carrier decks and people doing—I don’t really know what they were doing. It’s as excessive as the first movie, if not more, but the joke is on me this time.

I could try and elucidate the plot, but since Bay or the screenwriters didn’t really bother themselves, I’ll just list some of the things you’ll see if you buy a ticket to this very long movie. The testes, of course. An opening that pays homage to 2001. Two dogs humping, repeatedly. A hash brownie comedy sequence. A small Transformer humping Megan Fox’s leg. Megan Fox in short shorts (one point in its favour, I guess). Optimus Prime shooting a defeated, supine Decepticon in the head (so weird and wrong). Yellow Transformer Bumblebee dancing to the Pointer Sisters.

Do I need to go on? I wish I could say the action scenes made it worth it, but unless you’re really interested in the state of computer graphics compositing and modelling they’re not worth it, not even as rambunctious as the first film, save perhaps for one sequence early on. This movie is exhausting, absurd, so very long and so very not worth it.

TRANSFORMERS: REVENGE OF THE
FALLEN IS NOW IN THEATRES