If you live in one of the cities where Transformers opens tonight, ahead of its official Tuesday launch, you might want to stop in. Several of our co-workers went to an employee screening Saturday (we chose the new Die Hard instead; we liked it) and it generated a favorable response. So favorable, in fact, that we've spent the last 30 minutes or so scouring the Net for reviews. The consensus? People like a Michael Bay movie, they really, really like it. Or at least they don't hate it. Some even think Transformers is going to take moviedom - viewers and industry, alike - by typhoon, even if it's not, you know, that good.
Here's a snippet of the NY Post's review:
"A box-office analyst whom I respect predicts Transformers will be the year's top-grossing flick. If the enthusiastic response I saw at a screening the other night is any indication, predominately male audiences will flock to see some of Hollywood's most lavish special effects ever, climaxing in a battle that destroys much of downtown Los Angeles."
Here's what Ebert himself writes, in a three-starred review:
"I think Michael Bay sometimes sucks ("Pearl Harbor," "Armageddon," "Bad Boys II") but I find it possible to love him for a movie like "Transformers." It's goofy fun with a lot of stuff that blows up real good, and it has the grace not only to realize how preposterous it is, but to make that into an asset."
And, never one to give into to critical unanimity, the Old Gray Lady rains on Bay's celluloid parade:
"It’s kind of nifty when the robots transform the first time; they furiously shake back and forth like wet dogs desperately to dry off. But by the 99th time there’s no fun left at all, even during the rock-’em, sock-’em knockdown that delivers the movie, in Spielbergesque pastiche, first to a violent and then to a warm-and-fuzzy close."
