Transformers: Age of Extinction

A dumb story is again plays a front for shifting the frontiers of special effects technology. Bay finds the most wonderful corners of our planet and uses them as the backdrop for impressive battle scenes. I still don’t understand how somebody can expect more from this than a visual feast and three hours of brain death. It’s just a shame that the female supporting role (she reminds me of the girl on YouTube with socks in her bra) is the weakest of the entire series. (20/09/2014)

Alright, Mr. Bay, here’s $210 million, and do the same thing you did in the third installment because it raked in a billion dollars. Oh, and by the way, since Shia has become a total jerk and we don't want to waste money on the rest of the crew either, choose a completely new cast of actors, said the guys at Paramount. As unbelievable as it sounds, Bay followed these instructions to the letter. It would get hard for me to remember which movie was which after a while, so Mikey didn't let me down and made a couple of changes...for the worse. The story takes place in Chicago again (miraculously rebuilt in just 4 years!), the old favorite crew has been replaced by a wishy-washy new one without the marines to help them. Jablonsky is still great, but compared to the first installment, the music isn’t as good (plus, for reasons that escape me, the creators replaced the awesome Linkin Park with Imagine Dragons, who are okay, but compared to Linkin Park a disappointment). In addition to the old Autobots and Decepticons, you get new Transformers, most of whose names you have no chance to remember. But what you expect to get out of this movie is simply mindless entertainment, which won’t allow you to use your brain for even a second, with a disgustingly exaggerated runtime. If you accept that, you are in for the biggest ride of this year full of plagiarized but visually stunning effects. PS: Never in my life have I seen a movie so jam-packed with product placement. PSS: Michael Bay should really pass it on and finally make something new. (20/09/2014)

Of course, I didn't expect a high-quality intelligent film, but that was to be expected. The Transformers' transformations are still great, and I was most excited about the robodinosaurs, which were simply amazing. However, it's still the same disgusting Bay's concoction, consisting of a lot of technology, slow-motion shots, and untalented actresses. Some dialogues are truly pathetic... (14/10/2014)

In the "American Blockbuster" column, this is probably the most vivid collection of the worst that can be found in contemporary Hollywood. Watching the new Transformers is like opening up all the US Army ammunition depots and handing them to those who want to kick the filmmaking Mecca. It is almost ethereally paradoxical that this was done by a man I have admired immensely in this discipline, and who until now has paid the ultimate price in the art of turning a film field into a dollar. I don't think Bay has lost his good judgment. The previous fitness pumping clearly screamed how much better he can do behind the camera. He just lost all humility and mindlessly milked a cow for three hours that was long overdue to be embalmed. For the first hour, when they seem to introduce the characters in a style that could be done in ten minutes, I thought that my patience level still had a bit left in the tank. I still accept the fact that it's impotent in terms of its plot, completely off in the acting (OK, Stanley Tucci has a lot of fun copying John Turturro), and absolutely deaf musically. But then there was the event that redefines the term "digital brothel" for the new edition of the Interpretive Dictionary, and my personal fuse was finally blown. After all the destructive feasts I've enjoyed so much at the movies over the years, I've started to wish this era would go mercilessly to... (24/09/2014)

Relative brain loss / the fun is worse than part two and three. Something keeps getting moved from place to place under a flimsy pretext, takes a position, destroys everything within reach and travels further for another flimsy reason. The 165 minutes and the lobotomized story sometimes made it difficult for me to understand why, because it all seems so sparse, a bit like an advertisement for (mostly American) cars accompanied by pyrotechnic effects. At the end, the film plays to the Chinese audience, everyone hugs and the story returns roughly to where it was at the beginning of part one, and only the appearance of the actors and their casting changes a little. If you're able to spend two and three-quarters of an hour to see the capabilities of 3D IMAX detail, you're ok, but while Edwards recalled the magic of the perspective in Godzilla, this sounds like a fucking waste of time and money to me. For fans of the series, the good news is that Transformers can continue to run in an endless loop, because "we all have a boss" and even the highest boss has a higher boss. [40%] (25/06/2014)