"bang, bang, crash, no, no, no, go, go, go, boom, bam, pew, pew, bang, crash".....there, you just saw Transformers without waisting 2.5 hours of your life.

Shit blows up.
Shit transforms.
Shit gets messy.
And everyone is sweating.

I've often knocked this film in the past. My propensity to dismiss Michael Bay as "dumb Hollywood" was ignorance of the highest order.

I finally sat down and properly watched one of his films. Do you know what I admire? The narrative doesn't stand still. It is constantly moving, the writing is sharp, humorous and entertaining.

I'll have to watch The Rock or Armageddon at some point. The combination of a rough week and illness has probably swayed my hard-line stance on Bay.

Also, damn the haters. I can never get enough Shia LaBeouf.

Part 1 of the Transformers All Nighter! (Brought to you by terrible life choices)

Don't ask.

Ok, sure. They're giant robots that transform into vehicles and whatnot, but can you fuck them? No? PAAAASS.

I like Michael Bay - ok!

It took until 2007 but we finally got a live-action Transformers film. Director Michael Bay is uncharacteristically restrained, waiting a full 30 minutes before you properly see a Transformer up close and personal, and despite small pockets of action here and there, the film builds to an end climax in true blockbuster fashion. Sure there are problems; the female leads looking more like from Sports Illustrated covers than high school, the plot directions and the way characters move a scene along to get from A to B, and the toilet humour, in more ways than one, but ultimately, as far as a Michael Bay-directed Transformers film goes, this is probably as good as we were ever going to get.

A flat out assault on your senses. Visual and aural. Loud and dumb. Very loud. Very dumb. Gee wiz.

Saw this the second night I lived in Seattle in a very cool theater.

"Transformers" kicks off the series with a good start. This film has very good action and filming that make you say wow (the only one of the series that makes you say it). The acting is okay. Labeouf is not as bad as he is in the other ones but hes not the best. The rest of the cast is alright. Add in excellent music, cool visuals and a somewhat interesting plot and you have a pretty fun movie. Me in 2007 - "Lets hope the sequel is better!"

This movie was pretty cool. But then he made like 5 more.

Michael Bay may have found the ultimate outlet for his "pouty lips and explosions" aesthetic in TRANSFORMERS, which allowed him to pit alien robots against each other for maximum bloodless carnage, and indeed he spent three entire films playing with the concept. While it may be based on a line of Hasbro toys, TRANSFORMERS is actually a solid action adventure film. Don't come looking for anything intellectual, but Bay knows how to craft an action sequence, and while the final battle doesn't quite pay off, you may find yourself actually becoming invested in the story of Bay's displaced CGI alien creations.