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Transformers: The Last Knight Discussion Thread

Discuss anything and everything related to the Transformers Live Action Films franchise, which are directed by Michael Bay. Join us to discuss the movies and stuff up to date with news for the 2017 release of Transformers 5. Check out our Live Action Film section here.

Re: Transformers: The Last Knight Discussion Thread

Postby kurthy » Mon Jul 03, 2017 6:24 pm

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Deadput wrote:
kurthy wrote:I'm still going to place a lot of blame on Bay. His only concern is making it look cool.

Like every director ever...

Why do people assume that the movie makers are going to care about the property as much as we do? Fan is short for fanatic for a reason.
kurthy wrote:He's never made a great movie and most of his experience is creating music videos.


First of all that is subjective and an opinion...not exactly a fact.

13 hours was a pretty good movie though and it came out in 2016 so he is able to make decent movies but not that many people are going to give him a chance because of his name.

http://m.imdb.com/name/nm0000881/filmotype/director?ref_=m_nmfm_2

I looked through his critics scores on imdb. His best rating from critics (people who know a lot more about film than I do) comes in at a 60 out of 100. That's his highest rated movie ever. I think that qualifies that he's never made a great movie. His best movie was transformers, and I'll admit that I enjoyed it.

You also said he's able to make decent movies, I'll concede that, too, but a decent movie is his high watermark. 13 hours was a flop that made $2m more than its production cost. But box office flops can be good movies, although the critics ratings are lower than transformers and the user ratings are barely higher than his next movie (transformers, again) and the same on rotten tomatoes. At this point, I'm probably not going to take your recommendation to watch it.

My argument isn't that Bay is completely at fault, just that he's not completely absolved of all blame. When he directs a great movie, I'll relent and say that he did nothing wrong on transformers. He's got a long list of great actors but his movies get nominated for awards for best sound editing and best visual effects, not best director, best cinematography, best editing, best acting, best screenplay, or best picture. His track record shows he's done nothing to merit praise.
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Re: Transformers: The Last Knight Discussion Thread

Postby Deadput » Mon Jul 03, 2017 8:35 pm

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kurthy wrote: 13 hours was a flop that made $2m more than its production cost. But box office flops can be good movies, although the critics ratings are lower than transformers and the user ratings are barely higher than his next movie (transformers, again) and the same on rotten tomatoes. At this point, I'm probably not going to take your recommendation to watch it.

It's still a good movie and just because it didn't do well in the theater doesn't change a thing also people adore the original 1986 movie and look how well that movie did.


Rotten tomatoes is a cancerous website for wannabe reviewers, spammers and bots.
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Deadput wrote:Actually I don't know my mother's name is Valerie so is Va'al actually my mother?

Yes. Now go to your room and don't play with yourself.


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Re: Transformers: The Last Knight Discussion Thread

Postby Kurona » Mon Jul 03, 2017 8:45 pm

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Well, 1986 wasn't exactly a good movie either...

...

So anyway, I love you all, please don't kill me.
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Re: Transformers: The Last Knight Discussion Thread

Postby william-james88 » Mon Jul 03, 2017 8:53 pm

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Deadput wrote:just because it didn't do well in the theater doesn't change a thing

I think thats something people often dont realize. How good a movie is or how big its cultural impact is is not related to how much it made at the movies.

Case in point: Moonlight. That movie won best picture and yet of all the nominees it was the one that performed the worst.
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Re: Transformers: The Last Knight Discussion Thread

Postby Va'al » Mon Jul 03, 2017 9:00 pm

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Deadput wrote:
kurthy wrote: 13 hours was a flop that made $2m more than its production cost. But box office flops can be good movies, although the critics ratings are lower than transformers and the user ratings are barely higher than his next movie (transformers, again) and the same on rotten tomatoes. At this point, I'm probably not going to take your recommendation to watch it.

It's still a good movie and just because it didn't do well in the theater doesn't change a thing also people adore the original 1986 movie and look how well that movie did.


Rotten tomatoes is a cancerous website for wannabe reviewers, spammers and bots.


I'm going to all cap this, because clearly no one **** gets it:

ROTTEN TOMATOES GATHERS TOGETHER CRITICAL VIEWS FROM ACROSS THE INTERNET

IT ALSO HAS AN AUDIENCE SCORING SYSTEM

JUST BECAUSE ROTTEN TOMATOES SHOWS THAT CRITICS AND AUDIENCE DID NOT LIKE A MOVIE IT DOES NOT MEAN YOU CANNOT ENJOY THAT MOVIE


It's not hard to read information that the sources provide themselves: https://www.rottentomatoes.com/about/
I know it's easier to just follow soundbites, but COME ON
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Re: Transformers: The Last Knight Discussion Thread

Postby Deadput » Mon Jul 03, 2017 9:13 pm

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Va'al wrote:ROTTEN TOMATOES GATHERS TOGETHER CRITICAL VIEWS FROM ACROSS THE INTERNET

Did they change it? Because I certainly don't remember it being like that several years ago.

Well if I'm wrong I'm wrong I'll accept that.
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Yes. Now go to your room and don't play with yourself.


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Re: Transformers: The Last Knight Discussion Thread

Postby Va'al » Mon Jul 03, 2017 9:40 pm

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Deadput wrote:
Va'al wrote:ROTTEN TOMATOES GATHERS TOGETHER CRITICAL VIEWS FROM ACROSS THE INTERNET

Did they change it? Because I certainly don't remember it being like that several years ago.

Well if I'm wrong I'm wrong I'll accept that.


Aggregator. Always been an aggregator.

Rotten Tomatoes was launched on August 12, 1998, as a spare-time project by Senh Duong.[5] His goal in creating Rotten Tomatoes was "to create a site where people can get access to reviews from a variety of critics in the U.S."[6] As a fan of Jackie Chan's, Duong was inspired to create the website after collecting all the reviews of Chan's movies as they were being published in the United States.

Wikipedia for ease, but both claims backed by interviews.


Addendum to my last post:

JUST BECAUSE PEOPLE (AUDIENCE AND CRITICS) DO LIKE A MOVIE, DOESN'T MEAN YOU HAVE TO LIKE IT TOO
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Re: Transformers: The Last Knight Discussion Thread

Postby william-james88 » Mon Jul 03, 2017 9:42 pm

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Deadput wrote:
Va'al wrote:ROTTEN TOMATOES GATHERS TOGETHER CRITICAL VIEWS FROM ACROSS THE INTERNET

Did they change it? Because I certainly don't remember it being like that several years ago.

Well if I'm wrong I'm wrong I'll accept that.


Rotten tomatoes has always been like that. They have no opinion themselves they just look at all reviews and do a tally of those who like it against those who dont. Its not an average of scores its just the percentage of people that say Yes against No. So the score itself doesnt really mean what people think it means. Toy Story isnt the greatest movie of all time but because nobody thinks it sucks (hence it got no "no"s), it has the highest score.
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Re: Transformers: The Last Knight Discussion Thread

Postby Burn » Mon Jul 03, 2017 9:50 pm

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At the end of the day, if you consider a movie a good movie, then it's a good movie.

If you consider a movie good or bad based on some critics and/or some rating on the internet, then you're a sheep that should probably learn to think for yourself.

Don't let others dictate to you what is good or bad, decide for yourself.
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Re: Transformers: The Last Knight Discussion Thread

Postby Sabrblade » Mon Jul 03, 2017 9:53 pm

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cruizerdave wrote:and plenty of idiotic, juvenile frat boy humor.
All that was pretty much scarce-to-nonexistent in the fourth and fifth films.
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Re: Transformers: The Last Knight Discussion Thread

Postby Kurona » Mon Jul 03, 2017 9:57 pm

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Burn wrote:At the end of the day, if you consider a movie a good movie, then it's a good movie.

If you consider a movie good or bad based on some critics and/or some rating on the internet, then you're a sheep that should probably learn to think for yourself.

Don't let others dictate to you what is good or bad, decide for yourself.

No, that simply means you like a movie. It's only being a sheep if you mindlessly agree with another's opinion rather than attempting to understand them and actually take in what they're saying.
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Re: Transformers: The Last Knight Discussion Thread

Postby william-james88 » Mon Jul 03, 2017 10:05 pm

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Sabrblade wrote:
cruizerdave wrote:and plenty of idiotic, juvenile frat boy humor.
All that was pretty much scarce-to-nonexistent in the fourth and fifth films.

I love how the fourth movie even killed the biggest comic relief character in a really rough way. It was a nice way to tell us that this wasnt gonna be the movie for that. Too bad they brought back more dumb humour in the 5th one, like the women thinking Mark Walhberg is having sex with their neice.
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Re: Transformers: The Last Knight Discussion Thread

Postby Burn » Mon Jul 03, 2017 10:10 pm

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Kurona wrote:
Burn wrote:At the end of the day, if you consider a movie a good movie, then it's a good movie.

If you consider a movie good or bad based on some critics and/or some rating on the internet, then you're a sheep that should probably learn to think for yourself.

Don't let others dictate to you what is good or bad, decide for yourself.

No, that simply means you like a movie. It's only being a sheep if you mindlessly agree with another's opinion rather than attempting to understand them and actually take in what they're saying.

Ten years Kurona. Ten years of listening to people piss and moan about these movies. It's the same **** each time, the same pissing and moaning.

If that's not a sheep herd mentality then I don't know what it is.
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Re: Transformers: The Last Knight Discussion Thread

Postby kurthy » Mon Jul 03, 2017 10:58 pm

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Burn wrote:At the end of the day, if you consider a movie a good movie, then it's a good movie.

If you consider a movie good or bad based on some critics and/or some rating on the internet, then you're a sheep that should probably learn to think for yourself.

Don't let others dictate to you what is good or bad, decide for yourself.


I don't have enough time to decide whether or not every single movie that comes out is good at the cost of 2 and half hours. If a lot of people are saying it's awful, I'm probably more than willing to say skip it, especially after the last 3 installments didn't exactly leave me wanting more.

I've seen every bay movie until 3 of his last 4. I've decided that nothing involving him is worth my time ever again. Giving or not giving a movie a chance based on what other people are saying isn't being a sheep, it's using your resources, like reading reviews on this site and basing my purchasing decisions on it (I don't always, because sometimes I'm either really not into a character or really want a character for my collection). 10 people on here say something is awesome and 1 person says it's awful, I'm inclined to get the toy and decide whether or not I like it. Like a lot of people loving TR blurr/brainstorm and me being at best ambivalent.
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Re: Transformers: The Last Knight Discussion Thread

Postby SlyTF1 » Mon Jul 03, 2017 11:35 pm

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Burn wrote:At the end of the day, if you consider a movie a good movie, then it's a good movie.

If you consider a movie good or bad based on some critics and/or some rating on the internet, then you're a sheep that should probably learn to think for yourself.

Don't let others dictate to you what is good or bad, decide for yourself.


See, this is what I've been trying to say for years. I hate how systematic everyone's view of a "good movie" is. And I don't get that "guilty pleasure" crap. If you like it, you like it. Quit trying to justify why you like it by putting it in some kind of sub-category that means nothing.
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Re: Transformers: The Last Knight Discussion Thread

Postby Sabrblade » Mon Jul 03, 2017 11:41 pm

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SlyTF1 wrote:
Burn wrote:At the end of the day, if you consider a movie a good movie, then it's a good movie.

If you consider a movie good or bad based on some critics and/or some rating on the internet, then you're a sheep that should probably learn to think for yourself.

Don't let others dictate to you what is good or bad, decide for yourself.


See, this is what I've been trying to say for years. I hate how systematic everyone's view of a "good movie" is. And I don't get that "guilty pleasure" crap. If you like it, you like it. Quit trying to justify why you like it by putting it in some kind of sub-category that means nothing.
But I think the Super Mario Bros. movie is a stupid, very lousy movie, yet I also like it. How do you rationalize my liking a movie I consider to be a bad one?
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Caelus wrote:My wife pointed out something interesting about the prehistoric Predacons. I said that everyone was complaining because transforming for them mostly consisted of them just standing up-right. She essentially said, 'So? That's what our ancestors did.'
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Re: Transformers: The Last Knight Discussion Thread

Postby SlyTF1 » Tue Jul 04, 2017 2:07 am

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Sabrblade wrote:
SlyTF1 wrote:
Burn wrote:At the end of the day, if you consider a movie a good movie, then it's a good movie.

If you consider a movie good or bad based on some critics and/or some rating on the internet, then you're a sheep that should probably learn to think for yourself.

Don't let others dictate to you what is good or bad, decide for yourself.


See, this is what I've been trying to say for years. I hate how systematic everyone's view of a "good movie" is. And I don't get that "guilty pleasure" crap. If you like it, you like it. Quit trying to justify why you like it by putting it in some kind of sub-category that means nothing.
But I think the Super Mario Bros. movie is a stupid, very lousy movie, yet I also like it. How do you rationalize my liking a movie I consider to be a bad one?


That's an irrational mindset. I can't rationalize an irrationality.

I guess it would have to depend on what you like and dislike about it. Specifically.
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Re: Transformers: The Last Knight Discussion Thread

Postby Va'al » Tue Jul 04, 2017 3:37 am

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SlyTF1 wrote:
Sabrblade wrote:
SlyTF1 wrote:
Burn wrote:At the end of the day, if you consider a movie a good movie, then it's a good movie.

If you consider a movie good or bad based on some critics and/or some rating on the internet, then you're a sheep that should probably learn to think for yourself.

Don't let others dictate to you what is good or bad, decide for yourself.


See, this is what I've been trying to say for years. I hate how systematic everyone's view of a "good movie" is. And I don't get that "guilty pleasure" crap. If you like it, you like it. Quit trying to justify why you like it by putting it in some kind of sub-category that means nothing.
But I think the Super Mario Bros. movie is a stupid, very lousy movie, yet I also like it. How do you rationalize my liking a movie I consider to be a bad one?


That's an irrational mindset. I can't rationalize an irrationality.

I guess it would have to depend on what you like and dislike about it. Specifically.


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Re: Transformers: The Last Knight Discussion Thread

Postby Sabrblade » Tue Jul 04, 2017 9:55 am

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SlyTF1 wrote:
Sabrblade wrote:
SlyTF1 wrote:
Burn wrote:At the end of the day, if you consider a movie a good movie, then it's a good movie.

If you consider a movie good or bad based on some critics and/or some rating on the internet, then you're a sheep that should probably learn to think for yourself.

Don't let others dictate to you what is good or bad, decide for yourself.


See, this is what I've been trying to say for years. I hate how systematic everyone's view of a "good movie" is. And I don't get that "guilty pleasure" crap. If you like it, you like it. Quit trying to justify why you like it by putting it in some kind of sub-category that means nothing.
But I think the Super Mario Bros. movie is a stupid, very lousy movie, yet I also like it. How do you rationalize my liking a movie I consider to be a bad one?


That's an irrational mindset. I can't rationalize an irrationality.

I guess it would have to depend on what you like and dislike about it. Specifically.
That's how guilty pleasures work, though. They defy our senses of good taste and quality by somehow appealing to us when they normally ought to not have any right to do so.
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Caelus wrote:My wife pointed out something interesting about the prehistoric Predacons. I said that everyone was complaining because transforming for them mostly consisted of them just standing up-right. She essentially said, 'So? That's what our ancestors did.'
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Re: Transformers: The Last Knight Discussion Thread

Postby kurthy » Tue Jul 04, 2017 10:10 am

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SlyTF1 wrote:That's an irrational mindset. I can't rationalize an irrationality.


Sure you can, you just have to be imaginitive. e^ipi = -1
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Re: Transformers: The Last Knight Discussion Thread

Postby Va'al » Tue Jul 04, 2017 5:46 pm

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kurthy wrote:
SlyTF1 wrote:That's an irrational mindset. I can't rationalize an irrationality.


Sure you can, you just have to be imaginitive. e^ipi = -1


Or like Jupiter Ascending.
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Transformers: The Last Knight Editors Interview with Art of the Cut

Postby Va'al » Tue Jul 04, 2017 6:17 pm

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People give a lot of (dis)credit to the director of the live-action Transformers movies, Michael Bay, or to the producers like Lorenzo di Bonaventura, or the writers such as Ehren Kruger or Akiva Goldman's writers room - but what about the editors of the movie itself? Art of the Cut had a chance to talk to some of the six editors working on Transformers: The Last Knight, and discussed the intricacies of working in a team on the same footage, dealing with Bay's own selections and personal style, and their previous experiences feeding into this movie. The full, lengthy piece (which is actually three) can be read here - we've only highlighted some passages below!

Art of the Cut takes a step into the epic – not just with the film we’re discussing – but because to cover the editing of Michael Bay’s Transformers: The Last Knight, we spoke to four editors in three separate interviews. The exciting thing for readers of Art of the Cut is that when you get six top editors on a single picture, they all learn from each other in ways that are impossible without working on the same footage and with the same director. Those important lessons are at the core of this Art of the Cut.

The six editors listed as “editors” are Roger Barton (Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Men Tell No Tales), Adam Gerstel (Star Trek Into Darkness, Previs editor), Debra Neil-Fisher (The Hangover), John Refoua (Olympus Has Fallen) , Mark Sanger (Gravity), and Calvin Wimmer (13 Hours). We had the opportunity to speak to all of them except Barton and Wimmer.

[...]

REFOUA: None of us, except Roger, had worked on a movie with so many other editors before, so it took a while for us to figure out how we were going to do this and what does Michael (director, Michael Bay) want? Eventually, you settle into a rhythm and you really have to put your ego on hold because a scene that you work on — Michael, likes to move scenes around from editor to editor. He just wants editors to try different things and eventually he’ll say, “I like that one from this guy…This part from that guy.” So that took a little getting used to.

GERSTEL: What was great is after you put a scene together, you get to see somebody else cut the same scene and it really brings to light a different way that you hadn’t thought about. And so the next time you go to cut a scene in the film that may be similar you’re already now thinking of two different way of doing it. It really expanded your view because you’ve seen so many versions of the scenes while also having an intimate knowledge of what footage was there to put them together. You knew what challenges you had when cutting them and you see how somebody else dealt with those same challenges. It’s quite a learning experience.

NEIL-FISHER: It was fun actually. It was great to see How each of us approached the material differently. Learning from each other was really awesome. Especially for me. I don’t work as often on action pictures so it was really fun to see everybody’s versions on those scenes. I was fascinated by how many versions you can do of an action scene. How exciting and interesting each one was. And then moving on from here I take that with me and use it on the next thing I’m working on.

GERSTEL: Exactly. And this was a complicated story. There’s a lot in there. It has a lot of depth, a lot of layers. And so there was constant conversation about how best to structure it. Michael loved to intercut and he also is not tied to the script so everything is up for grabs and we were always trying new ideas. We would sit, all of us in the room and just talk about what was the best way to put a scene together or put a sequence together. So it wasn’t just always one person taking a stab and then another person taking a stab. There were many times when we were all just discussing it together. Almost like a writers room for editors.

[...]

SANGER: I like to do it organically depending upon the style of the director. All directors shoot differently so I actively avoid setting myself a particular way of working. That’s part of the fun of going into a new project with a new director: the way they shoot determines how I will assemble. But there is one key area that I won’t change and that’s how I get my assistants to prep the material only up to a certain level. Then beyond that, I will prep it myself because that’s how I learn the dailies.

The late and very great Jim Clark always used to mark up his own scripts, rather than use the script supervisor’s version. He would watch the dailies and mark up his own script as he learned them each day. Many of the old school British editors did things that same way. I was only their apprentice at the time but I’m proud to have learned from their wisdom and so what I do is my own version of that.

Some directors will shoot very quick takes while others leave the camera running for fifteen minutes at a time. I will adapt how I break down my dailies depending on how the shoot went.

With Michael Bay, you might get 10 hours of dailies for a single scene, and when that comes in you think, “How on earth am I going to get him an assembly by the end of the day?” I decided that 95 percent of my day would be spent assessing and breaking down the dailies. Then, as I was doing it I was developing a mental structure of how I was going to put that scene together. I work fast and make notes as you go. And then at the very last minute, I cut the scene and got it uploaded to him for wrap. You physically can’t go through 10 hours of material and then spent five hours editing. But you can go through 10 hours of material methodically and understand all the dailies and then put together a version at the end of the day that is solid.

That’s just what I did, the other editors have their own processes. But we all adapted to Michael’s process and combined it with our own and all were based on necessity due to the volume of material that we receive each day.

[...]

REFOUA: Michael shoots everything live. All the explosions are live. All the smoke is live and the human stunts are live. What we have is a bunch of plates with explosions, smoke, and stunts in them. Our main challenge, in action scenes, was trying to figure out: what’s supposed to happen here? We would talk amongst the editors and say, “I think this is supposed to happen here. And I think this shot’s for that. And a lot of times, Michael would say, “That shot isn’t for that spot!” or he’d say, “That’s cool! I can use this. Yeah, this is a good place for this shot.”

NEIL-FISHER: I definitely went through each scene looking from a specific point of view. If I was starting the scene fresh, I would look through the film and pulled selects of what I thought were the pieces that would work for me. I went through the dailies and found pieces that were going to aid my version of that scene.

HULLFISH: John mentioned that Michael will create his own selects reels. Was it weird using somebody else’s selects?

GERSTEL: No not at all. They were just suggestions from him. You didn’t have to take it as final. It was just, “Here’s what Michael pulled as his options.” Often, they were the same thing we would have pulled or a slightly different version. And sometimes we even shared each other’s selects.

[...]

REFOUA: Gradually the movie, as you put it together, it divides itself into sections. So Michael would say, “I want so and so to make a pass on this section. And I want so and so to try and shorten it and I want so and so to work on this thing that they do or I want somebody to check the jokes and make sure that we have the best jokes.” On Transformers, the editors became a team. We didn’t function as much as individuals but really the teamwork takes over. I had never been in that kind of situation to that extent, so that was cool and sometimes Michael would want three different versions of the same scene.

SANGER: He’ll look at scenes individually for a long time and then he might look at scenes assembled with a couple other scenes around them. But then we’ll start looking at things in reels. Instead of looking at those scenes within the reels for three or four weeks or four or five months in advance there’ll come a point where he’s happy with individual scenes then you’ll watch them in reels and when he’s happy with the reels, then you watch them in the movie. And so you kind of go in these much larger steps than many directors who would work on a scene by scene basis and then a reel by reel basis MUCH earlier on in the process. Michael works on a scene by scene basis for much longer and then makes these big leaps where we’re often watching the whole movie maybe on a Monday, Wednesday, and Friday. The changes that are going on within those five days are huge because with five editors you can get quite a lot happening in that amount of time. But it’s piece-meal for much longer at the beginning.

HULLFISH: That’s got the potential to just be a political nightmare but I’m glad that it worked out for you guys.

REFOUA: Really you have to put the politics away because you’re making a Michael Bay movie. You’re not making a John Refoua movie.

HULLFISH: That’s the quote of the day right there.


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Re: Transformers: The Last Knight Discussion Thread

Postby fenrir72 » Tue Jul 04, 2017 8:10 pm

Motto: "Power to the strong and the right!"
Weapon: Plasma Cannon
Even the batsheetcrazy Chinese who love TF to death couldn't save this piece o' turd that is masquerading as a story! Even the rushed job full o' error G1 Sunbow shows had more story consistency than this high caloric but low brain disaster!

Crossing fingers this won't rub off the entire toy franchise or else it will be the early 90s again when TF went into oblivion!
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Re: Transformers: The Last Knight Discussion Thread

Postby SlyTF1 » Tue Jul 04, 2017 9:46 pm

Motto: "If my first sacrifice wasn't enough, maybe you would prefer to pay with your funky blood."
Weapon: Sword
Finally saw TLK a second time, and I actually liked it more. Not as much as AOE, but there are still glaring issues. My biggest problem is still Optimus's "arc." I hate it. That's where the movie falls apart for me. I also still dislike how the second act was mostly exposition, even though I was never really bored.
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Re: Transformers: The Last Knight Discussion Thread

Postby william-james88 » Tue Jul 04, 2017 9:58 pm

Motto: "'till All Are One"
SlyTF1 wrote:Finally saw TLK a second time, and I actually liked it more. Not as much as AOE, but there are still glaring issues. My biggest problem is still Optimus's "arc." I hate it. That's where the movie falls apart for me.


Agree 100%
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