Transformers: The Last Knight - movie review
Transformers: The Last Knight
Plot: Autobots and Decepticons are at war, with humans on the sidelines. Optimus Prime is gone. The key to saving our future lies buried in the secrets of the past, in the hidden history of Transformers on Earth.
Cast: Mark Wahlberg, Josh Duhamel, Stanley Tucci
Director: Michael Bay
Certificate: 12A (moderate action violence, moderate bad language)
Runtime: 2hrs 29 mins
Release Date: Thursday 22nd June 2017
I love the Transformers series. Don't get me wrong - they are awful films. When Michael Bay began his elongated orgy of explosions as he sat back furiously masturbating to the stars and stripes as he yells "'MERICA" back in 2007, his initial film in the series was, in all honesty, very good. There was actual story structure and everything seemed to fit in with Michael Bay's 'unique' style of directing. Unfortunately, because of the success from the first film, Paramount must have given Bay ultimate free reign and that gave us the sequel, Revenge Of The Fallen. That wasn't good. But at the same time, for some unknown reason, I did have a lot of fun watching it. Guilty fun but fun nonetheless. As for Dark Of The Moon and Age Of Extinction, I'll actually stand by those films and say that I don't understand the insane hate towards them. Sure, they aren't good but I don't see this 'Worst Film of the Year' mentality. So now, we get to Bay's fifth, and reportedly, final Transformers film and it is easily the most Michael Bay one yet.
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| Sit yo bitch ass down, Bumblebee |
Transformers: The Last Knight is one heck of film and I mean that in both a positive and a negative sense. It is horrendous but funnily enough, it is damn entertaining to watch the chaos unfold. Parts of it are so bad it's good but others are just so ridiculous and unlike anything you could ever think to see in a Transformers film that you simply have to applaud Michael Bay for having the balls to do it. And I think that's why this movie is equally terrible and brilliant at the same time. Michael Bay. He does what he wants and doesn't care if you like it or not. If he wants Transformers to fight alongside King Arthur and his knights, he'll get Transformers to fight alongside King Arthur and his knights. If he wants Bumblebee to partake in a spy mission to fight Nazis during World War Two, guess what? Michael Bay will get Bumblebee to fight some Nazis. These might not be the best choices to make for a film but at least he's not afraid of straying into uncharted territory. There is also no denying that regardless of the story or performances, Michael Bay excels in creating a spectacle. One fact that I think no one can deny are tremendous are the visual effects. From the intricate mechanisms deployed when a Transformer transforms to the large scale destruction sequences that always takes place in the final act, there isn't a digital effect out of place. The Last Knight is undeniably, a visual splendour, especially in IMAX. A big selling point of The Last Knight is the fact that Michael Bay filmed around 95% of the film with IMAX 3D cameras which means that for 95% of the film, it looks beautiful. The 3D is gorgeously used and I'm always a fan of when a film fits the screen entirely. The downside to this is the other 5% and when that comes about. There's never a consistency to when the IMAX 3D aspect ratio is deployed. It could be in the middle of a fight scene or a conversation between two characters and the aspect ratio will keep switching between IMAX and regular. It is noticeable and a tad annoying at times but if that's your main complaint about The Last Knight then you watched a completely different film.
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| Oh no. Giant agricultural hexagons. |
Truth be told, The Last Knight is definitely not the worst film ever made in creation. There is legitimate praiseworthy things to be said about this film. The mythology behind Transformers is a cool idea and for the most part, is well realised. Mark Wahlberg's Cade Yeager is still, to me, a thoroughly likeable protagonist, far more than Shia LaBeouf's Sam Witwicky. Bay introduces a couple new female stars into the series in the shape of Laura Haddock and Isabela Moner who serve a purpose to the film and can hold their own with smarts and brawn instead of being the typical Michael Bay female actress who's hired for the sake of solely being stunning and little else. Haddock was enjoyable in her role, although she shares zero chemistry with Wahlberg, and Moner was turning out to be a really interesting sidekick to Wahlberg but at the exact moment when you begin to care about her character, Michael Bay says "That's enough character development for you" and swipes her away for almost the rest of the film. If a sequel comes into realisation, which it more than likely will do, I hope that a new director will expand upon her character more. Oh, and the action scenes are mindlessly entertaining as well. Explosions galore, one Transformer hitting another and highly outrageous, gigantic destruction sequences are what we expect in a Transformers film and The Last Knight doesn't disappoint especially as we get to the final act which is an incredibly bonkers war-like escapade on the fields near Stonehenge.
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| The acid was beginning to kick in. |
FACT: The scenes of Sir Edmund Burton visiting 10 Downing Street were filmed at the actual office of the British Prime Minister in October 2016.
Obviously, anyone that watches a Transformers movie cares very little about the humans and the ones that do can probably count the humans they like on one hand. What they hope will succeed are the Transformers themselves, both Autobots and Decepticons alike. As usual, the Transformers do seem to take a back seat for a while as humans take centre stage with their conflict. With any Michael Bay film, we get the obligatory military inclusion and secret briefings and whilst I understand that Bay is incredibly patriotic (Christ, count how many times you spot the American flag in the background) but we really don't give two shits about any of them. For the first time, this does feel wholly like a human film with the Transformers starring as supporting characters. The film itself focuses on the events following Age Of Extinction as Transformers are now being hunted by an elite military task force, Cade has joined with a small band of renegade Autobots and Optimus Prime has seemingly become brainwashed as he drifts into space. This is, I think, a cardinal sin that The Last Knight has committed. Undeniably, the most recognisable Transformer is Optimus Prime and despite that every line of dialogue of his is hammy and just reminding everyone of his name, for his fifth outing, he's hardly in it!! For two thirds of The Last Knight, we are Optimus Prime-less. When he does appear, it's business as usual and the fight he has with Bumblebee is fairly exciting but leading up until then, there is an extreme lack of Optimus and the movie doesn't feel the same without him.
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| He must have bowels of steel not to crap himself then. |
As for everyone's favourite yellow Camaro, Bumblebee is a highlight as always but even he plays second fiddle to Cade, military executives and arguably, the single greatest performance Sir Anthony Hopkins has ever given in his prestigious career. Move over Hannibal Lecter because Sir Edmund Burton (the most English sounding name) has arrived. Right at the very beginning of the film we meet Stanley Tucci who appears for one brief scene as a completely different character than who he played in Age Of Extinction. In that scene, you immediately think that no-one else can top Tucci's sheer ridiculousness. Clearly Hopkins must have heard us and ramps his performance up to stratospheric levels of insanity. Only in a Transformers film can you have SIR ANTHONY HOPKINS refer to Mark Wahlberg as "Dude", call his Lamborghini "A bitchin' ride", comment on Mark Wahlberg's character's sex life and, in a scene that nearly had me rolling in the aisles laughing, flipping someone the bird in a speeding car. I should stress, I was laughing at the film and not necessarily with it. This guy is an Oscar-winning actor and one of the most talented to grace us with his skills and he's wound up appearing in Transformers. And, if things can't get any more preposterous and utterly hysterical (again, because of the stupidness of it all) Hopkins is paired with a clockwork made Transformer named Cogman who is voiced by none other than Jim Carter, Mr Carson from Downton Abbey. Carter's voice is already a good fit for Cogman as the footman for Hopkins but in the flick of a switch, turns completely sociopathic and violent. As I said in the beginning, only Michael Bay could make a film like this.
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| Optimus Prime showing off his new contact lenses. |
To briefly provide some insight, as I left my screening of The Last Knight, I honestly had no clue what I just watched. Myself and a group of friends left dumbfounded struggling to piece together whether that classed as a guilty pleasure or just plain bad. I've come to the conclusion that everything about this film is ridiculous. My biggest aim for anyone looking to see this film is to go in expecting absolute tripe and leave your brain at the door. If you follow those rules, you may enjoy parts of this film. At the same time, aside from the visuals, The Last Knight is an absolute abomination of a film that is a cataclysmic, incoherent mess. Is it long? Yes. Is it nonsensical? Yes. Is it so bad it's kind of good? In a roundabout way, yes. This leaves me stuck for a rating so I'm going to do something new just for this film. I'm going to give it two ratings because trying to sum up my experience with this film in one numerical verdict is impossible. So, one rating will be based upon the actual quality of the film whilst the other is related to my enjoyment with the film. Again, and I cannot stress how important this is, this is NOT A GOOD FILM. However, go in with the right mindset and you will definitely have an interesting experience to say the least.
Quality Of Film: 3/10
My Enjoyment: 7/10
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