幼部屋

This time last year we saw a lot of excited articles about how "Inception" showed there was an audience for a smarter, more conceptual blockbuster. But hold the front page: Michael Bay is out to prove there's a bigger audience for brainless bombast and nonstop mayhem.

去年的這個時候出現很多文章講《全面啟動》，大家似乎終於證明一個有腦、有概念性的商業電影是有市場的。然而事實不是我們所想的那麼簡單，今年麥可貝證明只要搬出一連串無腦的轟炸和混亂，這是更大的市場。

Even Bay now admits he's set himself a very low bar, but yes, it's true what you may have heard: "Transformers: Dark of the Moon" is an improvement on "Revenge of the Fallen." It's a lousy movie, but at least it's a lousy movie with a serviceable story, killer CGI and an action climax that goes on forever (at least an hour). An awful lot of people like that kind of thing -- my kids included.

儘管麥可貝承認他為自己設的標準很低，但你可能耳聞《變形金鋼3》比起第二集要進步許多。的確，這是個很吵的電影，但至少它有吵出能用的故事、絕佳的特效、好像永遠不會打完的動作高潮(起碼打了一個小時)。很多人就喜歡這種東西，包括我們家小孩在內。

Like "X-Men First Class," the latest Transformers movie goes in for a spot of fantastical sixties revisionism.

Screenwriter Ehren Kruger reimagines the Space Race as a covert response to Autobots on the moon, and Bay audaciously drafts in Presidents Kennedy and Nixon, as well as Neil Armstrong and even Buzz Aldrin in the flesh to sell this appealingly lunatic conspiracy theory.

Forty years later, the Decepticons snare a devious trap that touches on Chernobyl, corrupt accountancy firms, aging teen Sam Witwicky (Shia LaBeouf) and his new "world class hottie," Carly (British model Rosie Huntington-Whiteley).

就像《X戰警：第一戰》，這部《變形金鋼》將開場設在迷人的六零年代。編劇Ehren Kruger一樣借歷史以假亂真，讓美蘇為了月球上的博派太空船而進行太空競賽。為了增加可信度，麥可貝設計甘迺迪、尼克森、阿姆斯壯和艾卓恩本人討論月球任務的戲，相當大膽。四十年後，狂派變形金鋼設了新的局，去了車諾比、毀了會計事務所，還牽連剛出社會的山姆魏維奇(西亞李畢夫飾)以及他「全世界最性感的」女朋友卡麗(英國名模蘿西杭亭頓)。

The script's bold outlines don't play so well on a bald scene-by-scene basis. Kruger's dialogue leaves even such experienced professionals as Frances McDormand and John Malkovich high and dry, and Bay seems to have no interest in reining in the performances of John Turturro or Ken Jeong, whose manic mugging is more surreal than comic.

Comedy, which relies on timing and nuance, remains Bay's most glaring deficiency, though no one seems to have pointed this out to him. That, and a sensibility that's still essentially adolescent in its puerile sexism and homophobia. As for Huntington-Whiteley, she makes Megan Fox look like Meryl Streep.

劇本企圖性強，可惜搬上大螢幕就差很多。Kruger的對白讓兩位專業演員(法蘭西絲麥朵曼、約翰馬克維奇)整個誇張到乾掉，而麥可貝也絲毫沒興趣控制一下已經很誇張的約翰特托羅和鄭肯，讓他們演的比漫畫還要超現實。要搞笑可以，只是要抓準時間和細微上的差異，而麥可貝最失敗的就在這裡，儘管好像沒有人跟他說過這件事，他也好像對自己幼稚的性別歧視和恐同症無動於衷。至於蘿西杭亭頓，她的演技讓梅根福克斯看起來就像梅莉史翠普一樣。

At least Bay has reconsidered his signature chop suey editing style to adapt to 3-D. The cutting may not be coherent (there's a neat bit involving some skydivers, but quite where they land is a mystery), but the pacing is more measured and this is one of the relatively rare blockbusters where the third dimension enhances the experience, giving crunch and punch to the numerous bot battles.

至少，麥可貝招牌的碎剪風格成功的與3D技術接軌。剪接雖然不算通順(飛鼠部隊很帥，降落在哪就是個謎)，節奏上卻拿捏得很精準，很少有商業電影能夠透過3D技術，將一堆機器人打架的狠勁表現出來的。

What's more, Bay has put the gargantuan budget on screen. He's an unabashed maximalist. Before he's through he's poked fun at a third president (Obama) and decapitated a fourth (the Lincoln Memorial), he's trashed downtown Chicago and pulled in not one, not two, but three worlds for extra oomph. The relentless climax practically batters you into submission.

The CGI is more extensive and more textured than in the previous films, and Kruger has come up with a couple of authentically dramatic scenes for the Autobots. But if Bay is hands-off with his human actors, he's even less interested in his eponymous stars.

再者，麥可貝砸下龐大的預算，豪不吝嗇的展現其極大主義。他先取笑了歐巴馬，接著又轟掉林肯，把芝加哥變廢墟又把三個世界(哪三個@@)搞再一起，高潮一波緊接另一波讓人不得不投降。而且這集特效比前兩集來的更多更廣更有條理，Kruger也得以為博派安排幾場很有戲劇張力的橋段。可是如果麥可貝不想管人類演員的演技，他也根本不會想管這些機器人演得怎麼樣。

And that's been the big problem with these "Transformers" flicks all along -- the mounting suspicion that Michael Bay finds such kids' stuff beneath him. He doesn't "get" the Transformers, has no interest in kids, and so he defaults to what he is good at, which is blowing everything up. And the kids love him for it.

這就是《變形金鋼》系列最大的問題，讓人越來越懷疑到底麥可貝在這些兒童玩具裡找到什麼。他不懂變形金鋼的魅力何在、也對小孩沒興趣，所以他就做他最擅長的事，也就是把每個東西都炸一遍，然後這些小孩就愛死他了。

轉貼自CNN特稿: http://edition.cnn.com/2011/SHOWBIZ/Movies/06/29/transformers.dark.movie.review/index.html?hpt=en_c1