Film File - Transformers: Dark Of The Moon

'Transformers' began with the Hasboro toy line of battling alien robots - the Autobots and Decepticons - a frequent first step on the road to Hollywood. Over its 25-year history, this kid-friendly franchise has spawned comics, animated TV series, video games, countless toys and, of course, a score of films that have taken billions at the box office. Perfectly timed for the summer season, 'Transformers: Dark Of The Moon' brings the third episode to cineplexes and their eagerly awaited audiences. Kicking off in in 1961, a spacecraft called the Ark lands on the dark side of the moon, the last ship to escape a Cybertron devastated by wars. Piloted by Sentinel Prime (voice of Leonard Nimoy), it carried the 'Pillars', technology that could save the Cybertronians' civilisation. On Earth, the crash is detected by NASA, and President John F Kennedy authorises the mission to put a man on the moon, resulting in the 1969 Apollo 11 landing on its surface to collect samples from the doomed craft. Fast forward to the present day, and the Autobots have forged a military alliance with the United States of America, only for Optimus Prime (voice of Peter Cullen) to discover the stolen fuel cells from the Ark and proof that the humans deceived the Autobots. Optimus launches his own mission to retrieve the remaining Pillars from the Ark, a move that Charlotte Mearing (Frances McDormand), the Secretary of Defence, warns could be used to bring an invading army to Earth. Meanwhile, Sam Witwicky (Shia LeBeouf) tries unsuccessfully to find a job after college and takes his frustrations out on his girlfriend, Carly Miller (Rosie Huntington-Whiteley), and her close relationship with her playboy boss, Dylan Gould (Patrick Dempsey). Sam eventually finds work in the mailroom of a conglomerate run by Bruce Brazos (John Malcovich), where a colleague tells him of a government conspiracy about 'the dark side of the moon' - just before he's mysteriously murdered. With the help of the retired Seymour Simmons (John Turturro), Sam discovers that the Decepticons, led by Megatron (Hugo Weaving), are systematically targeting people connected to the American and Russian space missions and are luring the Autobots into a complex trap with Sentinel Prime and the remaining Master Pillar as the bait. First off, the good news. After many complaints that the first two 'Transformers' movies, while visually stunning, were ultimately paltry excuses for entertainment based almost entirely on the excesses of CGI, director Michael Bay - never a man to use one gallon of petrol when six will do better - and writer Ehren Kruger have sat up and taken notice. The fight scenes in this third instalment are viscerally exciting and invested with an emotional punch as well as the mechanical kind. Unlike the previously staged battle scenes where warped metal and deafening crashes rendered it impossible to determine the good guys from the bad, the new movie action scenes are coherent and exciting, carrying at least three edge-of-the-seat moments that are worth the admission price alone. The storyline, however, is far too complex for its own good, and comes over-packed with double crosses, betrayals and cover-ups - so much that you stop trying to keep track of who's who after 30 minutes. And while the cast of the latest instalment is impressive, many of the big names, especially Malcovich, are wasted on roles too minor to matter. Overall, this 'Transformers' has the best action sequences of the trio, and some special effects that are seriously cutting edge. Fans will applaud this latest outing - and doubtless will deliver a few more billion to the pockets of the film's parent studio in the process.