Optimus Primal (Ron Perlman): “Of all the threats you've faced from your past and future, you've never faced anything like this.”
Summer has finally come in! After being disappointed with character-stuffed The Flash, I was happy to see Transformers: The Rise of the Beasts, a light-hearted super-hero adventure based on Hasboro toys that serves up some wit and ingenious robots into cars or the other way around—I cannot figure that out. What you can figure out is exactly what is happening to whom, not always a virtue of the Michael-Bay fuzzy mix ups.
As in most of these adventures, good and bad are trying to get some magical object, here a Transwarp Key, there The Arc of the Covenant, etc. Because these talismen don’t amount to a hill of beans next to the actual survival of the galaxy, we lose the key of our imagination, less spectacularly than, say, Hitch with a McGuffin.
What sets this hip sequel, or prequel if you will, right is its willingness to have fun and make fun of the struggle to survive, for both bots and humans. While few entries in this franchise can equal Travis Knight’s 2018 Bumblebee success, here director Steven Caple Jr casts Pete Davidson as a swashbuckling, smart-mouthed sports car to buddy up with lead Anthony Ramos as Noah in hip-hop influenced 1994. He establishes his difference from the stern Michael Bay and reminds us how perfect for Star Wars Harrison Ford was.
Transformers: Rise of the Beasts is still quality summer junk food with a twinkle in its eyes. The attitude of lightheartedness with dogged determination to survive made all the difference for my enjoyment. Suspecting as I do a similarity to the upcoming Indy installment that also searches for a talisman, I may be in for an enjoyable albeit superficial summer. Then there is going to be a new Mission Impossible with a returning aging star as well.
It is good to be an old guy these movie days.
Transformers: Rise of the Beasts
Director: Steven Caple Jr (Creed II)
Screenplay: Joby Harold (Awake) et al.
Cast: Anthony Ramos (In the Heights), Dominique Fishback (Judas and the Black Messiah)
Run Time: 2h 7m
Rating: PG-13
John DeSando, a Los Angeles Press Club first-place winner for National Entertainment Journalism, hosts NPR’s It’s Movie Time and hosts Cinema Classics as well as podcasts Back Talk and Double Take out of WCBE 90.5 FM. Contact him at JohnDeSando52@gmail.com
