Based on one of the many factoids found in the supplements, I’m apparently among the 25% of American males who haven’t had the Transformers experience as a child or adolescent. I was unaware of the animated television series, I never played with Transformers toys as a child . . . all I knew was that Hasbro had marketed a toy line of robots that could be bent and folded into other things. So the prospect of a film based on a bunch of toys that was purported to be a prolonged commercial for General Motors did not fill me with glee. But wait a minute. Michael Bay directs, Steven Spielberg is an executive producer, ILM is doing the special effects, and the budget is a staggering $148 million dollars. Hmmm, maybe I should take this venture more seriously. Bay and Spielberg spent their production budget well; they delivered a prototypical popcorn movie that earned an impressive $478 million worldwide.
The film opens with some exposition that orients the uninitiated 25%. A peaceful world of cybernetic creatures that achieved sentience was wracked by war as evil and good battled for dominance. During the conflict, the source of life, the Allspark, was lost and it drifted away into interstellar space. Ever since, both the forces of evil in the form of Decpticons and the forces of good in the form of Autobots have been searching for the Allspark to recover it.
By no small coincidence, the Allspark made its way to earth to become this film’s Macguffin. The key to its location is now in the hands of an awkward teenager with raging hormones: Sam Witwicky (Shia LaBeouf). He lusts after the beautiful and sexy Mikaela Banes (the impossibly foxy Megan Fox), and is desperate to sell some of his grandfather’s possessions that survived his years as an explorer and adventurer. Little does he know that among them is the information that will either save the Earth or destroy it.
Never underestimate the power of the Web. Sam is trying to sell those artifacts on eBay to earn his share of the money required to take his father up on an offer to buy his first car, a car he hopes to use to impress the delicious Mikaela. Both Autobots and Decepticons have come to Earth, and through the power of the information superhighway, have tracked down the hapless teen (how they know that one of his grandfather’s artifacts is important is not clear). And when Sam is sought out by the robots, his life will also be transformed in ways he couldn’t hope for or imagine.
Not surprisingly, the military are also on the case. The Decepticons have made their destructive presence felt in none too subtle ways, perhaps as a diversion as they try to hack military servers to steal the information they believe might lead them to the Allspark. The devastation is impressive (and strictly gratuitous). The military also discover Sam’s involvement, so we have the Air Force, the Army, Defense Secretary John Keller (Jon Voight), and Section 7 Agent Simmons (John Turturro) of a shadowy, secret organization reminiscent of Men in Black, all after the teenager.
This is beauty and the geek submerged in an absolutely kickass, special effects laden, action-intensive sci-fi flick punctuated by humor; it’s simply a lot of fun. Bay has put together an intense, quickly paced film that’s so involving that you don’t have a chance to think long enough to appreciate the plot holes or be bothered by how utterly silly it all is. I found myself amused by a screenplay laced with humor that is entirely contextual and not at all gratuitous. Shia LaBeouf is charming and funny, the perfect archetype horny teen. Megan Fox is appealing and delightful as the girl who’s always attracted to the wrong kind of guy. Jon Voight is persuasively take-charge. The reliable John Turturro is credibly creepy. And the supporting cast is uniformly effective. But the real stars of the show are created within the confines of a vast network of computers. I was terribly impressed with the quality of the CGI and the complexity of each robot. The transformations are a wonder to behold.
So
Transformers has earned a top spot on my list of guilty pleasures. It’s eye candy and ear candy. It’s fun. It’s entertaining. And it is pure silliness, but I liked it anyway.
The Video: How Does The Disc Look?
The film’s theatrical aspect ratio of 2.35:1 is presented in an excellent high definition transfer compressed with the AVC video CODEC. This is a great-looking disc. If all HD DVDs had this level of detail, this illusion of depth, this level of finely grained textures, and this terrific video dynamic range sans white or black crush, I’d be hard pressed to maintain my preference for Blu-ray Disc. (I’m not sure, but I think I may have discovered a quality pattern that I will investigate and, if my theory is correct, report in a column.) My only objection is that the colorist made all the flesh tones entirely too yellow; everyone in almost every shot looks like they’re suffering from jaundice. Other than that, my impression is that this is one of the better transfers I’ve seen in the HD DVD format.
The DVD transfer is also excellent, clearly derived from the high definition transfer. I was pleased that edge halos are virtually nonexistent. But if you look closely, you’ll find a bit of mosquito noise around high contrast onscreen titles. Within the limitations of the 480p format, the images are quite nice.
The Audio: How Does The Disc Sound?
The Dolby Digital Plus 5.1 track is striking in its bombastic envelopment. The surrounds are extremely active with both discrete sounds and pans of jets, helicopters, and flying robots. Deep bass will pummel you during combat sequences and robotic battles; a very fine subwoofer is essential. The sound effects have an impressive dynamic range. The score by Steve Jablonsky is definitely in the Hans Zimmer school of composition; loud, energetic, exciting, it’s an appropriate compliment to the visuals. Despite the sonic fireworks, the dialog remains crystal clear throughout. Expect just a hint of unavoidable harshness that is a product of lossy compression.
The DVD’s 5.1 mix is essentially identical, but with Dolby Digital’s slightly more harshness and a tad less accuracy in the timbre.
Alternative languages are in French and Spanish, presented in Dolby Digital Plus 5.1 on the HD DVD and Dolby Digital 5.1 on the DVD. The optional subtitles are in English, Spanish, and French; the HD DVD also includes English SDH and the DVD also includes English Closed Captions.
Supplements: What Goodies Are There?
The film is so long and the supplements are so generous that a second disc is needed for each format. And with the exception of the easter eggs and two special features on the HD DVD, the supplements are the same for each format.
We begin with a very fine feature-length
commentary by director Michael Bay. He begins at the beginning, describing a telephone call from Steven Spielberg, inviting him to direct a toy movie. He describes his transformation from a skeptic to a true believer and signed on. He describes his relationship with the military, explaining his access to hardware that even surprised me. He’s very open and chatty, and it becomes extremely clear very quickly that this is one intense director. He talks about his cast and we learn about the audition process and Bay’s technique for motivating his players, particularly Megan Fox, a relatively new performer. He talks at length about the CGI and his collaboration with ILM and Digital Domain, a special effects house he purchased with some partners. We learn about his relationship with General Motors and Hasbro. We learn that he put so much faith in the film that he gave up his director’s fee in exchange for a backend deal - that worked out rather well. I enjoyed his anecdotes from the shoot. But the commentary ends with a bit too much of a self-congratulatory tone. Even though there’s some duplication with the material in the video supplements, this is a worthwhile track.
After the closing credits, you'll find
trailers for
IronMan (2:28),
Transformers Teaser (1:53), and a kind of a music video by The Used for "Pretty Handsome Awkward" that turns out to be a promo for a website (1:14).
Also on HD DVD’s disc one, you’ll find
Transformers H.U.D., which is a fine text trivia track that pops little factoids onto the screen throughout the film. There are also
Web enabled features that regular readers know I can mention but not critique since I have no high speed Internet connection in my home theater. But frankly, I’m not sure you could want more than is found on disc two. Let me move on to the second disc.
I applaud Paramount for providing all the supplements in fine-looking 1.78:1 high definition video also compressed with the AVC video CODEC. Bravo.
We begin with the
Our World documentary (49:20 with the considerately provided Play All option); it’s divided into four sections:
The Story Sparks;
Human Allies;
I Fight Giant Robots; and,
Battleground.
In the first section, we learn about Hasbro and the origins of the robotic characters. Executive producer Steven Spielberg appears to describe the origins of the film concept. Michael Bay was reluctant initially, but after attending Transformers School at Hasbro became convinced that the concept had merit. We’re taken through some concept art and learn that Bay transformed the script from a bit too campy to something dead serious. With the collaboration of the specialists at ILM who specialize in animatics, he planned his shoot.
The next chapter puts the spotlight on casting and the principal actors. We enjoy lots of impressive behind the scenes footage. It’s exceptionally clear that Bay is a frantic and tireless director who runs a tight ship. He carries a megaphone and isn’t afraid to use it. This is one intense man. I guess I would be too if I were gambling a $150 million movie budget. He explains that he concentrated on making both the characters and the situations as real as possible. Bay also shares his thoughts about his performers. We learn and see that Megan Fox frequently had trouble keeping a straight face. She may be gorgeous but she’s not that experienced; with Bay pushing her buttons, she was very effective. The chapter goes through all the principal cast members.
In the next chapter, Bay explains that he has an exceptionally good relationship with the military, has been able to access surprising locations, and was able to film the latest weapons systems. We see the actors going through training, learning how to take a building and handle their weapons. Bay has great respect for the military and uses military people to play military people. It’s also in this section that we learn how he emphasizes practical effects over CGI whenever possible.
At this point I must mention that during this chapter and another in a different section, I experienced a lot of disc stuttering. In fact, when it happened again, very likely in the same disc location but in the second layer, my Toshiba HD-XA2 froze. I had to switch the disc to my HD-A1 and it played fine. This is the second HD DVD release in a row for which a second disc caused problems (see my review of
Alexander Revisited: The Final Cut for another such example).
Battleground takes us to various locations: White Sands Missile Range, Hoover Dam, downtown Los Angeles, and Holloman Air Force Base among them. We see the huge set constructed for the Hoover interior. It was built where Howard Hughes fabricated the Spruce Goose. Impressive.
Moving on to the next section, we begin with a
documentary called
Their War (1:05:07). And it, too, is organized into four chapters:
Rise of the Robots;
Autobots Roll Out;
Decepticons Strike; and,
Inside The Allspark.
In the first, Spielberg kicks off the chapter with a few comments about his memories of playing with his children’s' Transformers toys. It’s here that we learn of the toys’ Japanese origins and how Hasbro bought the rights and created a story suitable for an animated TV show that was intended to sell their toys. It was a very clever business decision; the line has sold over $3 billion at retail since its introduction in the '80s. I had no idea. But the downside of such popularity are obsessive fan-geeks who are so invested in the series and characters that Bay’s reimagining provoked threats. Before principal photography was completed, much information was leaked to the Web, including designs and script. Bay had new technologies created for the alien home world and introduced new concepts. Some fans objected, which had a small influence on the film; other fans were simply threatening. It wasn’t until the film was released and proved to be so respectful of the characters that the threats stopped. We also learn of the evolution of the film. Hasbro affected the decision to stick with generation-one characters and corrected Optimus Prime’s appearance, giving it more of a Samurai-like look. The number or robots was limited by the budget, something that becomes even clearer in a later chapter.
Peter Cullen voiced the TV character of Optimus Prime and he was brought back for the film. We also see Hugo Weaving providing the voice of Megatron. It’s here that the development of the robots is described. First, the production made foam robots as sculptures. From those, larger static structures were built at a cost of anywhere from $250 thousand to three quarter of a million dollars each. It cost $75,000 just to paint Bumblebee. There is a discussion about the cars and which vehicles were to be used in the film. It’s also here that we learn of the negotiations with automobile companies that yielded the winner: General Motors. So advanced were the cars during principal photography that the yellow Camero was a $500,000 hand-built preproduction prototype. All of the cars were highly jazzed up for the film and the featurette demonstrates how. GM also provided flood damaged cars to burn, crash, flip, crush, and mangle. Two hundred cars were destroyed in the making of this film. The featurette shows us how; for example, an amazing compressed air launcher catapulted a car into an L.A. building. Revealed are camera go-cart techniques. And it’s in this chapter that the huge highway chase is dissected, including some impressive physical effects, like a bus being ripped in half. Bay just pushes and pushes and pushes; it’s amazingly that there were no injuries.
In the
Decpticon chapter, we learn of the decision to have the evil robots transform to and from military vehicles. Among them is our country’s most advanced deployed fighter, the F-22 Raptor (StarScream takes that form); I'm still amazed that he was able to film them. The featurette moves through the various vehicles used for the robots. It also touches upon the filming of Ospreys, Warthogs, a C-130 gunship, and the F-117 Stealth fighter, which couldn't be filmed from certain angles for security reasons. It’s here that the important point is made that the film paid for all costs involving the military; none of the costs came out of taxpayers’ pockets.
During
Inside the Allspark, Bay mentions that he bought Digital Domain, a significant special effects house. Nonetheless, ILM did 75% of the CGI and Digital Domain only did 25%. We’re whisked to ILM with an aerial shot of the Presidio, its new home. Among the ILM programmers are remarkable Transformers collectors and fans. We learn more about the robot computer models; Optimus Prime had an astounding 10,108 parts, an all-time record for ILM CGI complexity. So complex are the robots that for three robots visible onscreen, it took thirty-eight hours to render
each frame. ILM converted Bay to animatics; he’s now a big fan of them rather than storyboards. We learn how ILM was at the shoot to provide guidance. And it is here that another of my questions was answered. Martial arts fighters were taped for the ILM CG animators to help them program more organic movements; I was surprised that the robots weren't created using motion capture. There are discussions of imparting emotions through robotic facial expressions, creating impressive transformations, match moving, and subtle lighting effects, like reflections of the environment.
These two documentaries are extremely through and complete. Very well done.
Also in this section is
Transformers Tech Inspector. It’s an interactive display of the various robots in high detail. You can rotate, select the part of the robot to view, and observe specific details. The only downside is that I couldn't see how to pause the rotation.
The next section is called
More Than Meets The Eye, also divided into different sections.
From Script to Sand: The Skorponok Desert Attack (8:55) is an analysis and dissection of that sequence. Inspired by a comic book, complete 3D simulation as animatics were created as a first step. We join the crew as they scout Holloman AFB in Alamogordo, NM. The location had to be cleared of unexploded ordnance. We’re given a view of construction and a description of the village. We learn about how the pyrotechnics were accomplished. (This is the section that sputtered and froze, forcing me to switch the disc to the HD-A1.)
Next is
Concepts (2:11), a series of artists renderings panned and zoomed and backed by music from the score.
The
trailers section includes Teaser 1 (1:52), Theatrical 2 (2:13), and Theatrical 4 (2:44)
The supplements have their own set of subtitles: English, English SDH on the HD DVD, English Closed Captions on the DVD, French, Spanish, and Portuguese. The 144-minute film is organized into twenty-three chapters in both formats.
Easter Eggs
There are eggs on both formats, and I’ll describe what I had rime to find. There may be more. I’ll begin with the HD DVD.
On the second HD DVD, press left when
Our World is highlighted and a robot head will appear; press enter for the DVD credits spread across several pages. Press right when
Inside The Allspark is highlighted and a little robot will appear, press enter and you'll be treated to a behind-the-scenes sequence of the director's cameo (2:37).
On the second disc of the DVD, there is an egg on virtually every menu page. Scroll down and beyond the menu entries and a special symbol will become visible. Select it and based on the source page, you’ll find DVD credits, a vintage Hasbro TV commercial, Bay’s cameo, a Casting Mojo short featurette, and the filming of a scene in which a small robot rips the dress off an attractive woman in downtown Los Angeles (the deleted scene is then shown).
Final Thoughts
Watch the closing credits for a while; Bay has inserted a few scenes, one of which hints at a setup for
Transformers 2. I never expected to admit his, but I’m actually looking forward to the sequel. This is a fun film with remarkably impressive visuals and a great audio track on HD DVD. The DVD is obviously less impressive, but has great merit for a 480p release. Just ignore the Simpsons syndrome on both. The supplements on each two-disc set are informative, entertaining, and generous. No matter which format player you own,
Transformers is recommended.
Here’s a note about the apparent duplicate Buy Guide. Our I.T. people are hard at work on a large project and have not yet had the time to modify the underlying site database formatting code to accommodate the new 0-to-10 rating scales. So until they do, for HD on disc, I’ll insert this note and a Buy Guide at the end of the review text and leave the conventional 0-to-5 Buy Guide blank.
