What Movie Should We See Tonight?

My mind matched that weird haze that comes after stepping out of the movie theater into the pre-sunset haze (my apologies to the great S. E Hinton). I had just experienced what was to date the single worst movie I'd ever seen. The worst!


I've walked out of movies before-to hell with my $9.50! I've slept through movies before (shout out to Revenge of the Sith). I've skewered movies while in the theater, annoying a girlfriend and probably five people around me ("Come ON! That was obviously a rip-off of The Bourne Identity!) in doing my best contemporary "Mystery Science Theater 3000" impression. But this movie trumped them all in terribleness.



While I must admit that I see very few movies-a fact my friends rib me about-I believe that my voice still must be heard in the wilderness, trumpeting the horrid two hours and thirty-six minutes that was "Transformers III."




The movie was the consensus pick of my basketball team, a wholesome team activity for the first night of a three-day out-of-town tournament. I was more than happy to dodge Kevin James and his "Zookeeper," and while I didn't expect to get great enjoyment out of "Transformers III," I figured I could sacrifice for the team and it couldn't be THAT bad.

It was that bad. Five minutes into the movie, I knew that this was going to be a long evening. The 3d glasses provided gave me a headache. The Dolby Surround Sound made it doubly worse. The plot was already unnecessarily complicated and trite. Twenty minutes in and I thought about slipping out for an extended and indefinite "break." One of the parent chaperones fell asleep about ten minutes into the movie, and man, how I envied him! The other parent chaperone asked semi-earnestly, about halfway through the movie, "So, the plot is basically a good versus evil setup?"

The plot, such as it is, revolves around the shifting allegiances between automobiles that transform into fighters. The Transformers have come to Earth to take over the planet or else defend the planet.

Or something. Throw in a half-assed love story and you've got a movie that at two hours and thirty-five minutes is two hours and thirty-five minutes too long.

After the movie mercifully ended, I was joined by my ten players, the great majority of them giddy over the hot new love interest, the action scenes, an obscure quip.

Said my starting center, "Man, I told you the movie was dope!"

Half kidding, he added, "Coach, can we watch it again tomorrow night?"

The expectant pairs of eyes burned into my peripheral vision confirmed the fact that the great majority of the guys-maybe all the guys-loved this movie.


Never have I felt so old in a movie theater.