ROTTEN TOMATOES: "Transformers" Cast Shaping Into Something Cool

"Transformers" Cast Shaping Into Something Cool

by Scott Weinberg | April 21, 2006

Summary

IGN FilmForce snagged some solid scoopage by learning the names of several actors attached to Michael Bay's "Transformers" adaptation. We learned last week that Shia LaBeouf was signed up, but now comes a parade of names, including Jon Voight, Bernie Mac, John Turturro, and Michael Clarke Duncan. Back to Article

(1-32 of 32 posts) | Reply

ogenbite writes:
on Apr 21 2006 04:51 AM

[b]waitaminute...[/b]
hold on, i haven't been paying attention to the news on this for awhile. Michael "Pearl Harbor" Bay is directing the Transformers movie? i can already sense a part of my childhood being horribly horribly ruined by Hollywood once again. have we not learned anything from Inspector Gadget? my god. with the way he loves product placement, i'm predicting all the Autobots will have their symbol replaced with the Microsoft logo, and some line will be written into the script about how their entire artificial intelligence is run by Windows. and with all this attention to a high-profile cast, i'm also betting the script will focus the story on the humans instead of the robots. what's all this about a huge army? seriously, why? why should i care about humans when there are already giant, human-like robots on the screen. especially humans who can be summed up as "spirited fellow who loves to sing."

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Aoiboy writes:
on Apr 21 2006 05:53 AM

Exactly my thoughts... well said.

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dracus writes:
on Apr 21 2006 06:15 AM

I wonder if Michael Bay has leaned that it takes more than special effects and a high profile cast to make a good movie. My bet is that he hasn't.

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zbbrox writes:
on Apr 21 2006 07:10 AM

[b]Daaaaaaaaaaammmmmmnnnnnn[/b]
Look at all those stupid, pointless human characters. I really don't want this movie to suck, but this is so distressing...

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lonechicken writes:
on Apr 21 2006 07:53 AM

[b]Figueroa?[/b]
But I thought Bruce "Jimmy the Tulip" Willis already killed Michael "Figueroa" Clarke Duncan.:) How random is that to play a guy named "Figueroa" in two different franchises?

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Vitamin M writes:
on Apr 21 2006 08:09 AM

[b]um[/b]
are there going to be any transformers in the transformers movie?

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whiteyboyprince writes:
on Apr 21 2006 08:59 AM

In reply to this comment (#834139)
My thoughts exactly!!!!! Oh Hollywood please do not slice my poor childhood's heart to shreds!!! Please do not do this movie. I have nothing but fond memories of the Transformers. Give me a break with this madness!!

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ommega writes:
on Apr 21 2006 09:02 AM

Woa woa, Bernie Mac!????

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Spike1967 writes:
on Apr 21 2006 10:02 AM

It looks like 90% of the cast, joining this train wreck all needed work in the worst way

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nogard64 writes:
on Apr 21 2006 10:27 AM

[b]THIS IS GONNA ROCK! (and I dont mean the movie the[/b]
Ye of lil faith! Just go watch the Island and see what Bay can do!

TILL ALL ARE ONE!!!

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Now it's dark writes:
on Apr 21 2006 10:30 AM

Starting to sound like tha American Godzilla movie. The one where the CGI monster took a back seat to the big Hollywood cast.

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CrazyGhost78 writes:
on Apr 21 2006 12:22 PM

How does Michael Bay keep getting employed? WHY DO PEOPLE KEEP WORKING WITH HIM? WHERE IS THE DIGNITY IN THIS WORLD?

Oh, Underneath the mounds of cash, that's right.

And to reply to ommega, as Michael Bay has always has his uncreative stereotypes, you know Bernie Mac is going to be the quick talkin', black-tastic comic relief that saves the day by driving something large through something towards the end of the film.

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zachdybs writes:
on Apr 21 2006 12:25 PM

In reply to this comment (#834134)
[b]this sucks[/b]
i totally agree
Transformers could have been awesome
Michael Bay + Bernie Mac = POOP

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whiteyboyprince writes:
on Apr 21 2006 02:07 PM

In reply to this comment (#834145)
black-tastic???? WTF?? does that mean???

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Stankton writes:
on Apr 21 2006 03:13 PM

John Voight?! AWESOME!

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rockstarfrank writes:
on Apr 21 2006 04:51 PM

Transuckers...this movie is going to blow. This is a joke right? How many humans are in this...or are thses the voices? Good thing there are several good seasons of the cartoon to fall back on.

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southfrisco writes:
on Apr 21 2006 05:41 PM

[b]What cast?[/b]
Michael Clarke Duncan signing. Best song oscar here we come!!

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Elessar Oronro writes:
on Apr 21 2006 06:16 PM

Wow....you are all headed down the wrong road with your comments. I can't wait for this movie to knock your socks off. I think Transformers and I think cars, planes, explosions, and special effects. Who better to make it all look pretty than Michael Bay? Okay...MAYBE Cameron or Spielberg, but at least Spielberg is on board as a producer. Have faith. The first trailer will blow us all away.

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Elixir writes:
on Apr 21 2006 09:51 PM

wow this is gonna bomb.

thank you michael bay for giving me scarlett johanson with long blond hair.

thats all you have done good for this industry.

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lpbreeze writes:
on Apr 21 2006 10:01 PM

Michael Bay better be careful because if the movie doesent work he will have to live with the fact that the Cartoon movie was better. Hopefully he won't have any control over the story and there will be people to reign in his awful habits. They didn't for The Island and that movie went from good to average halfway through.

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BetrNBlackNWhite writes:
on Apr 21 2006 10:47 PM

When I think of Transformers...I don't think of Bernie Mac.

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Senh Duong writes:
on Apr 22 2006 01:51 AM

In reply to this comment (#834151)
Agree with you completely. I really can't think of another director that would be better suited for a Transformers movie. James Cameron would have been perfect like a decade ago, but then the technology wasn't there yet. He would still be great, but now he's middle-aged and probably wants to do something more respectable. Bay's probably the right age for this type of movie, and he probably grew up watching the cartoon too. That Spielberg's a producer is also a huge bonus.

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Reel 2/Dialogue 2 writes:
on Apr 22 2006 03:55 AM

In reply to this comment (#834152)
[b]The Transfor-mehs. More than meets your wallet.[/b]
You'd better thank Terry Zwigof first. Scarlett's hair was long in [i]Ghost World[/i].

If the paycheck is big enough, I can already imagine George Clooney's voice coming from Optimus. Georgie, I know you wanna fund your next two idiosyncratic biopics, but not like this...

... not like this... :(

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lavatory love machine writes:
on Apr 22 2006 07:01 AM

michael bay represents everything that't wrong with this world

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jeremyf1977 writes:
on Apr 22 2006 11:31 AM

[b]100 % piece of Horse#$%*[/b]
Peter Cullen and Frank Welker are very much alive. Why are they not the voices of Prime and Megatron.

I'm going to invest 245 in the 1980 Box Sets than waste 10.00 on Michale Pearl Harbor, Armageddon, The Island Bady Boys Bay.

Give me the 1980's toy commerical and the COmic Book than this piece of shit.

I'm so livid I can't even type correctly.

I'm done with movies.

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kendragon writes:
on Apr 23 2006 05:14 AM

[b]Whats the betting....[/b]
That the Autobots and Decepticons become a military experiment with secret machines whose artificial intelligence gets screwed up somehow and they become ''aware''.... I'm afraid of what horrors they are going to afflict on us with this movie....

Pro's: awesome special effects
Con's: possible shite story and total rewrite of transformers existence.

its hard to have faith when a very important creation from your childhood is put in the hands of someone who probably didnt even know what a transformer was until he heard that speilberg was interested in producing a movie about them.

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zbbrox writes:
on Apr 23 2006 11:22 AM

Okay, if you think "Transformers is all about planes and cars and explosions", then, yes, Michael Bay does sound like the guy for it. However, Transformers is also about a group of characters, including very strong, archetypal figures like Optimus Prime, Megatron, and Starscream. Why-oh-why are we not hearing a damn thing about *those* characters in all this mess? Twice now we've gotten casting and character descriptions that focus on human characters, painted in very broad strokes, who the siple fact is *no one will give a damn about*. Michael Bay is not known for making you care about the characters in his films, so cluttering up the film with all these pointless humans is a major problem.

To paraphrase Malcolm form Jurassic Park: You do plan on eventually having Transformers in your Transformers movie, don't you?

If they turn this into a giant robot version of Stealth, there will be blood.

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lovelykeira writes:
on Apr 23 2006 11:24 AM

I never really cared about the Transformers but Turturro kicks ass, and Duncan is pretty cool.

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Now it's dark writes:
on Apr 23 2006 11:33 AM

But will they still make that sound when they transform?

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PrecentorEpsilonXVI writes:
on Apr 23 2006 01:04 PM

Has anyone read the first 4 issues of the Transformer's reintroduction comic? The synopsis is that the Ark exploded on takeoff as they were leaving to return the captured decepticons to cybertron. Jump ahead a few years, and you discover that arms dealers have salvaged a number transformers and decepticons (including Megatron). They attempt to reprogram them so that they can be used as unthinking machines of destruction and sell them to the highest bidder. Unfortunately, Megatron was just playing dumb and kills the arms dealer and prospective buyers, and begins his rampage, using the few brainwashed captured autobots and salvaged decepticons for his nefarious purposes. Meanwhile, the US military is trying to revive their own autobot - Optimus Prime.

I imagine the movie will have a very dumbed down version of this plot - most likely that the military salvaged Megatron, not arms dealers, and that Optimus and "kiddo" have to fight Megatron, the brainwashed autobots, and the "evil" military commander.

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kendragon writes:
on Apr 23 2006 01:19 PM

[b]Its a pity someone who would actually care abo[/b]
Its a pity someone who would actually care about the source material isnt in at the helm of this... films like X-men, spiderman and Hellboy have shown that you can make kick-ass films from comics whilst not stepping all over the original creations history. Sure some of the transformers concepts would need to be updated for a more modern audience but the core principles should remain intact.

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Callpacas writes:
on Apr 25 2006 09:34 AM

ohh....did u heard there's going to be an unlikely young teen hero in the film? and one of the character casting descriptions sounds something like " a super hot female computer techincian working for the government" or something along that line.?

God, hope Europeon cinema can save us, however unlikely.

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