Transformers live action film
A 2007 live action film based on the Transformers franchise and toy line. Directed by Michael Bay with Steven Spielberg acting as executive producer, it stars Shia LaBeouf as Sam Witwicky, who discovers the map to the Allspark: the source of life, for which the heroic Autobots and evil Decepticons wage their war. The project originated with producers Don Murphy and Tom DeSanto, who gained support from fans on the Internet to rehire Peter Cullen as the voice of Autobot leader Optimus Prime, 20 years since the original cartoon ended. This adaptation is the Transformers' first American feature film since The Transformers: The Movie in 1986. However, this film is intended to be a reboot of the franchise, with a new complex design aesthetic for the Transformers. It has a release date of June 29, 2007 in Australia, July 2 in New Zealand, July 4 in the US and Canada and July 27 in the UK
Directed
by Michael Bay
Produced by Steven Spielberg
Tom DeSanto
Don Murphy
Lorenzo
di Bonaventura
Written by Screenplay:
Roberto Orci
Alex Kurtzman
Story:
John
Rogers
Roberto Orci
Alex Kurtzman
Starring Shia LaBeouf
Megan Fox
Josh
Duhamel
Tyrese Gibson
Jon Voight
Voices:
Peter Cullen
Hugo Weaving
Keith
David
Music by Steve Jablonsky
Cinematography Mitch Amundsen
Distributed
by DreamWorks
Paramount
UIP
Release date(s) June 28, 2007
Plot
Spoiler
warning: Plot or ending details follow.
In the Arctic Circle during the 1800s,
Captain Archibald Witwicky falls into an abyss and lands on a robotic hand partially
buried in ice. He finds staring back at him the eyes of Decepticon leader Megatron,
who burns a map showing a location of the life giving Allspark into Witwicky's
eyeglasses. These are handed down to his descendant, Sam, in the present day.
Elsewhere, Decepticon Blackout attacks a US Air Force base in Qatar in the present
day, grabbing and absorbing information from a computer whilst he destroys the
base and deploys Scorponok. Scorponok chases Captain Lennox and his Special Ops
team in the desert and in a village. Lennox then makes a phone call to The Pentagon,
who send a jet to fight off the Decepticon. Sam Witwicky buys his first car, which
happens to be the Autobot Bumblebee. Bumblebee helps Sam to gain Mikaela as his
girlfriend. The Autobots come looking for Archibald's glasses, whilst hiding in
Sam's yard, and the nefarious Sector 7 comes to invade Sam's house. The film concludes
with a battle that begins at the Hoover Dam and concludes in Los Angeles as Autobot
leader Optimus Prime and Megatron face each other.
Cast and characters
Humans
Shia LaBeouf as Sam Witwicky
Megan Fox as Mikaela: Sam's love interest.
Josh
Duhamel as William Lennox: Captain of a Special Ops team in Qatar, who manages
to escape the destruction caused by Blackout. He has a wife and child back home.
Tyrese Gibson as Epps: A combat controller who teams up with Lennox to escape
Blackout and Scorponok.
John Turturro as Simmons: Head of Sector 7, a secret
government group that holds Megatron hostage. Simmons is leading a team tracking
down Bumblebee.
Jon Voight as Keller: US Secretary of State.
Kevin Dunn
as Ron Witwicky: Sam's father.
Julie White as Mrs. Witwicky
Rachael Taylor
as Maggie
Bernie Mac as Bobby Bolivia: A car dealer from whom Sam buys Bumblebee,
both unaware of its alien origin.
Autobots
Peter Cullen as voice of
Optimus Prime (Semi-trailer truck): The powerful, wise leader of the Autobots,
Prime comes to protect humanity from the evil Decepticons.
Bumblebee (1974/2008
Chevrolet Camaro): Rendered mute in battle, Bumblebee is a honest and friendly
soldier who befriends humanity, namely Sam, in his efforts to find the Allspark.
Jazz (Pontiac Solstice): The smallest and feistiest of the Autobots, Jazz
is one of Optimus' best warriors, talented at learning new cultures.
Ironhide
(GMC Topkick pick-up truck): A tough, weathered soldier, Ironhide is one of Optimus'
oldest friends, and is always the first in battle.
Ratchet (Search & Rescue
Hummer H2): The medic and scientist, Ratchet has a sense of duty to protect life.
Decepticons
Hugo Weaving as the voice of Megatron (Cybertronian jet):
A missing Decepticon leader held hostage by Sector 7, Megatron desires power over
the Allspark and hates organic lifeforms.
Starscream (F-22 Raptor): Megatron's
second-in-command, Starscream actually desires to overthrow Megatron and take
the Allspark for himself.
Blackout (MH-53 Pave Low): The largest Decepticon,
Blackout is fiercely loyal to Megatron and can fire electromagnetic pulses, making
Decepticon attacks easier.
Keith David as the voice of Barricade (Saleen-modified
Ford Mustang police car) : The Decepticon hunter who masquerades in society as
a symbol of the law.[9]
Frenzy (2-speaker CD player): The smallest of the
Decepticons, Frenzy attaches to Barricade. His main purpose is spying on humans,
but he is still a ferocious fighter, shooting blades disguised as CDs from his
chest.
Scorponok (mechanical scorpion): He has a symbiotic relationship with
Blackout, hiding within him until he is commanded to go and kill.
Brawl (Modified
M1 Abrams): A moody warrior, armed to the teeth.
Bonecrusher (Buffalo H Mine-Protected
vehicle): Another piece of Decepticon muscle, Bonecrusher has a hatred for all
others and is only subservient to Megatron, whom he fears.
Production
Development
Producer
Don Murphy had been looking to do a G.I. Joe film but following the outbreak of
the Iraq War, he negotiated rights with Hasbro for a Transformers film. Tom DeSanto
also came onto the project having been a big childhood fan of the characters,
and they wrote a treatment to explore why the Transformers exist, as well as real
possibilities of the concept, similar to a disaster film. DeSanto studied many
of the cartoons and comics to create a story, even meeting with comic book writer
Simon Furman, while Murphy invited fans to discuss the film on his website. Steven
Spielberg and DreamWorks bought the property in 2004, as Adam Goodman, President
of Production, felt it was a good opportunity for Dreamworks to have a tentpole
franchise. Spielberg himself had come to know the franchise via the toys and cartoons
that his children loved. John Rogers was hired as screenwriter on November 4,
2004 to adapt DeSanto's story, and turned in his draft in January 2005. 4 Transformers
were on each side in John Rogers' version of the script, and the draft also included
the Ark.
Roberto Orci and Alex Kurtzman, big fans of the cartoon, were hired the following month to start over. Their first draft focused exclusively on Sam and Mikaela, and expanded in their second for more of the military and giving the Transformers dialogue despite initial studio concerns. Spielberg added his input, saying he wanted the film to be about a boy and his car, focusing on the relationship between Sam and Bumblebee. Inspired by E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial, Kurtzman made Bumblebee a mute, to stress Sam's relationship with Bumblebee as going beyond words, and Orci cut the Ark, feeling "Why would aliens who moonlight as vehicles need other vehicles to travel inside?" Although they always included Optimus Prime, Megatron, Bumblebee and Starscream, Orci and Kurtzman also experimented with additional characters such as Ravage and Arcee, the latter of whom was cut due to poor fan reaction. They added more Decepticons to increase the threat against the Autobots, stressing their teamwork, and they also removed Soundwave, as Don Murphy felt his role sidelined the character. First the Decepticon spy was renamed Soundbyte, then Frenzy, a minion of Soundwave in G1. Other characters given temporary names were Brawl, who was known as Devastator and "Demolisher", and Blackout, known as Vortex and Incinerator. These were their on-set names, and the official names were only confirmed during filming. These names were further made canonical with dialogue written during post production due to a partly animated nature of the film.
Michael Bay was negotiated with to direct, but turned it down as a "stupid toy movie". Realising he had been wrong as a teenager at Lucasfilm regarding Raiders of the Lost Ark' box office potential, he was put through "Transformers school", and in April 2005 he confirmed he was directing the film. The US release date of July 4, 2007 was announced at Comic Con International in July 2005.
Casting
During development, Murphy
used his site to earn support from fans, and decided upon a consensus for the
voices from the 1980s cartoon. Michael Bay auditioned them first, fearing their
aged voices would be noticeable. Peter Cullen, the voice of Optimus Prime in the
animated series, was announced at the July 2006 San Diego Comic Con. Cullen also
read for Ironhide, another character he originally voiced, during the first of
two auditions, though he is not voicing him. In March 2007, Hugo Weaving was revealed
to be playing Megatron. TV series voice actor Frank Welker auditioned, but his
voice didn't fit Megatron's new look.
Filming
Director Michael
Bay filming at Holloman Air Force Base.Principal photography began on May 22,
2006. Two Bell Boeing CV-22 Osprey tiltrotor aircraft (of only three in the US
Air Force inventory) were filmed in flight at Holloman Air Force Base, New Mexico,
on May 26 for the film. Other military aircraft were being filmed at Holloman
and at nearby White Sands Missile Range. On June 9, filming was onsite at the
Hoover Dam, for scenes involving Sector 7 at Area 52. Shooting around August focused
on Pentagon interiors, and filming of destruction in Los Angeles was also taking
place. Filming took place in Rialto, California on finished-but unopened portion
of Interstate 210 between Alder Ave. and Linden Ave. Filming at Edwards AFB began
on September 6, 2006 and ended two days later. Production then wrapped on September
24, although second unit shooting continued in the Arctic and Detroit, where it
finally finished on October 5.
Bay did not want animated aspects of the film to overwhelm live action elements, spending most of the $150 million budget on over 14 practical action sequences.
Effects
During the animatic
process in 2005, producer Lorenzo di Bonaventura felt a computer generated version
of Optimus Prime's comic book incarnation looked silly. Bay's direction created
a aesthetic heavily stressed advanced kinematics and realistic engineering. Bay
said that he drew away from the classic boxy look as he felt it would look fake,
and give a better impression of mass with more parts. During transformation, thousands
of parts of the body move, a result of the lack of any mass shifting Bonaventura
said working out the transformations was mathematical equation of designing where
parts went, to avoid cases such as Optimus Prime's disappearing trailer from the
cartoon. The designs also reflect the alien origin of the characters. Bay also
created a new eye design to make the characters more emotionally engaging, resembling
a camera shutter
Optimus Prime was a character whom the writers admitted
had a classic design that could not be altered too much. However, a flat nose
truck meant Prime would only be 20-25 feet tall, so Bay went for the larger Peterbilt
truck, making Prime 8.5m (28 feet) tall. Bay also added flame artwork to accentuate
Prime's ribs, and had his faceplate made retractable. In contrast, Megatron was
given a less humanoid face, which was to make him more menacing.
During filming, KNB Effects provided animatronics to portray the Transformers. A blue version of Optimus' head with motion capture points was used. and Bumblebee was constructed as a physical prop, around 5.1m (17 feet) tall. Models of Megatron's legs and Blackout's feet were also built. During principal filming, Mark Ryan was hired to be on set, to act as a stand in for the Transformers, giving actors someone to react to and act against during filming, both physically where appropriate and providing dialogue, and also ad-libbed characters during post-production.
Music
Composer
Steve Jablonsky previously collaborated with Bay on The Island, scoring music
for the teaser trailer long before actual work on the film. Per DeSanto's request,
an orchestral version of the TV series' theme was composed.
Marketing
The
first teaser trailer was released on the Internet on June 29, 2006, depicting
a Transformer attacking the Beagle 2 mission, which is not in the film. A second
trailer was released on December 20, breaking Spider-Man 3's record for the number
of internet hits.
Expanding the film's universe, IDW Publishing published
a prequel comic book. Lasting for four issues, it was written by Simon Furman
and IDW editor in chief Chris Ryall, who was allowed to read the film's script
and had the comic meet the filmmakers approval, and with art by Don Figueroa.
The title follows Bumblebee from Cybertron to modern Earth and Sector 7's origin.
It was part of Free Comic Book Day on May 5, 2007. Following this, a weekly adaptation
of the film will follow in June. David Cian was set to write the prequel novel
Transformers: Ghosts of Yesterday but Alan Dean Foster took over, and he is also
writing a novelization.
Hasbro made deals with 200 companies across 70 nations to promote the film. Their toy line for the film was created over two months over late 2005/early 2006, collaborating heavily with the filmmakers. A pair of preview toys, Protoform Optimus Prime and Starscream, were released in the USA on May 1, 2007, before the rest of the figures are released on June 2. More toys are set for release in the autumn. Characters that do not appear in the film are also featured in the film's style. The toys feature Automorph Technology in which moving parts of the toy allow other parts to shift automatically.
Activision is working on Transformers: The Game which is set for release on PlayStation Portable, PS2, PS3, Xbox 360 and Wii formats, and two games entitled Autobots and Decepticons on Nintendo DS. The game allows people to play as Bumblebee, Optimus Prime, Jazz, Ironhide, Megatron, Starscream, Blackout, Scorponok and Barricade in a free-roaming environment, in a different gameplay depending on the faction they choose. There are also characters not in the film, while the PSP edition allows 20 playable characters. The DS version can offer co operative play and the PSP edition offers 4 player play.
Release
An early cut of the film was given a R rating
by the MPAA when screened to them in March 2007, due to the intensity of the action
sequences. Spielberg argued instead for a PG-13. Transformers will premiere at
Rhode Island on June 28, 2007, a freely avaliable event offering fans to buy tickets
for $75 to benefit four charities: Rhode Island Community Food Bank, Autism Project
of Rhode Island, Adoption Rhode Island, and Hasbro Children’s Hospital.
Sequels
Shia
LaBeouf, Megan Fox and Peter Cullen are signed on for sequels. Soundwave will
be a new major character.
Producer Lorenzo di Bonaventura has said he plans for a sequel, though it will depend on the film's box office success.
Film
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