Review of 'Transformers: Age of Extinction'

4th film in the 'Transformers' series

transformers_age_of_extinction.jpg Another summer, another Transformers. This installment sees the humans having suffered from the events of the previous movie that destroyed much of Chicago now seeking to rid themselves of any of the Transformers, Autobots or Decepticons with a special unit of the CIA destroying any they come across. Things are not as they seem with CIA Agent Harold Attinger (Kelsey Grammer) as he has made a deal with an intergalactic robotic bounty hunter “Lockdown” (Mark Ryan) who is determined to hunt down Optimus Prime who has gone into hiding.

A Chicago-based company, KSI, is taking the destroyed Transformers and melting them down to create a new, improved, version of self-assumbling robots. Little do they know that they have been played by the melted-down Decepticons into rebuilding Megatron…

Cade Yeager (Mark Wahlberg) is a down-on-his luck inventor in Paris Texas living with his daughter, Tessa (Nicola Peltz) who with his partner Lucas Flannery (T.J. Miller) stumble across a dilapidated truck when cleaning up a local cinema. Taking the truck back to his workshop he quickly realizes this is not a normal truck - Optimus Prime is found! They flee when the CIA attack, meeting up with the other surviving Autobots. Lockdown, with his massive space fleet, invade as they attempt to grab Optimus.

Battles ensue as we are taken from Chicago through to Beijing then Hong Kong as wide-spread carnage ensues - Decepticon, Autobot and Lockdown's group clashing here there and everywhere. Nice to see, in this istallment, the humans actually making any sort of difference in the battle it has to be said…

A very long movie which, surprisingly, found this viewer often quite bored. It takes a long time for anything to start happening and the middle section just plods along. The last part just never seems to end with action upon action upon action. It does get a bit numbing with the destruction never seeming to end. “Sigh, another building destroyed…” Having visited Hong Kong I have to admit the guilty pleasure of seeing what they decide to destroy, so did a bit of sightseeing while watching.

Of course, great effects and really good music. The acting is of secondary concern, but ok.

Reasonable summer blockbuster but not the best in the series though it certainly ratchets up the action and effects to an incredible degree.

Rating: “Average, but who wants to be average?”

Review Date: 2014-07-27


Directed by: Michael Bay

Studio: Paramount Pictures

Year: 2014

Length: 165 minutes

Genre: Science Fiction

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt2109248/


Other reviewed films in the 'Transformers' series:

Other reviewed films by Michael Bay: