Sound harsh? Maybe, but it isn’t inaccurate. I knew going in that this was not going to be a “good” movie. It’s hard to do that when it is a film about giant talking turtles who fight crime in New York City. The premise alone pretty much promises it will be as cheesy as possible. However, cheesy doesn’t always have to be bad and bad can sometimes be a lot of fun. A good example would be the recent success of the horrifically bad “Sharknado” films. They know they are terrible ‘B’ movies and are working within that sphere, fully aware of their place in the film industry.
No, the problem exists when a bad movie doesn’t know it’s a bad movie and attempts to play itself off as something ‘epic’. That’s when you get the major film flops in history such as “Battlefield Earth” and “Gigli”.
Michael Bay has made a career out of making horrendously awful films that somehow still seem to clean up at the box office. His staples as an ‘auteur’ seem to be lots of explosions, horrendously over-used slow motion shots (especially if there is a large breasted woman running), helicopter shots from the ground with the American flag flying majestically in the background, sexualized female characters that could easily be replaced by a table lamp if not for the ‘necessary’ slow motion running sequences, and horribly long action sequences that cause you to fall asleep (I DID fall asleep twice during Transformer 4, and STILL didn’t miss anything!)
That said, a lot of people had hope for this film as it wasn’t being directed by Bay, merely produced. Still, it is clear that director Jonathon Liebesman and Michael Bay share the same film maker’s “vision” (if one can call it a vision – or even call them proper film makers), as Liebesman’s direction does not stray too far from the Michael Bay staples of ‘blow ‘em up now, explain plot never’. It isn’t so much the fact that the movie is popcorn blockbuster fluff, but rather that so much of it does not make sense plot-wise or is downright offensive in some ways. It isn’t a surprise given its troubled production history (numerous re-writes to the script are more than obvious within the film), but it does come as a disappointment.
And yes, I was disappointed. Even though I pretty much knew I would be unhappy with this ‘rendering’, I am still first and foremost a fan of the “Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles”. I watched the cartoon when I was a kid faithfully every day after school. I own the original live action films from the 90s. I enjoyed the Nickelodeon cartoon and even the CGI film that they made in 2007. It’s not as if the bar was set incredibly high either – I mean this is a franchise pretty much tailor made to satisfy your 5-9 year old audience.
Still, too much was wrong with this film or just down right bad to ignore.
It is your standard “Turtles” plot. April O ‘Neil is a “plucky” reporter desperate to be taken seriously but only ever getting “fluff” pieces – that is, until she witnesses an attack by the notorious gang that has been terrorizing the city called the Foot Clan. (They are apparently called so because they ‘step all over everybody’ – a reason so cheesy I am sure my 9 year old nephew could come up with something more creative). It is during this attack that she witnesses a vigilante take on the Foot and stop them. Of course, this means her desire to prove the Turtles exist and “get the story” means she becomes fully ensnared in the plot.
Which as far as I understand it (and details are murky here), is for the Shredder and a man named Eric Sacks, to take over New York City using a toxin that will supposedly kill everyone unless they purchase the antidote that only he has, making Sacks rich (well, rich-er since he is already a billionaire) and give Shredder control of the city. Sounds simple, but actually falls flat when you really start to think about it.
The Bad:
- Where to start? I will start with April. One of Michael Bay’s annoying staples is to tell non-human stories through the eyes of human characters. It can be done if the film maker is skilled, but Michael Bay is far from ‘skilled’ when it comes to film making. The Transformers films were weakened by the presence of the human characters complicating the story and this is no different. I am not saying there shouldn’t be any human characters, but rather that we should see the story through the Turtle’s point of view in order to really understand the world they live in. By seeing it through April’s eyes, we are immediately positioned as outsiders and are not given enough time to get to know the Turtles. Bay and Liebesman are unable to balance the plot with the amount of screen time given to the Turtles to the point where we are 40 minutes into the film before they even make an appearance. And given the weak nature of April’s storyline it is definitely a mistake to do it that way.
- The sexualisation of April. This was not a shock given Michael Bay’s (and apparently Liebesman’s) view of women. Between the two of them, not ONE has done a film in which a female character is anything more than either a prize to be won, a pair of boobs to stare at, or a victim to be slaughtered. Not one. Not one has made a film in which a female character has any kind of autonomy or agency of her own. Bay is far worse an offender for this for every single one of his films does nothing but sexualize women as objects and nothing more. It is obvious that this is what they intended when they cast Megan Fox, as her previous roles in the Transformers films have shown that Michael Bay enjoys objectifying her. Throughout this film, every scene that April is in treats her this way. She is constantly reminded via every male character she runs into, that she is nothing more than the sum of her body parts. Every scene she is in makes SOME kind of comment to that fact, whether it is Vern’s constant (and rather pathetic attempts) to hit on her, catcalls from random passer-bys, or even the Turtles themselves making rather lewd (and slightly disturbing remarks), we are bombarded with the fact that she is a sexual object over and over again. Michelangelo says something particularly creepy when she first meets them about his “shell tightening” when he sees her body which is beyond disturbing – especially for a film aimed primarily at 8 year old boys. This is the message that is being taught – that women are objects to be “won” or stared at. The film attempts to make it into a joke by having April as a character who is trying to “rise above” this stereotype and become a “serious” reporter, but the message never fully translates for even as she makes the complaint, she is bouncing up and down on a trampoline to film a piece or some other kind of obvious attempt to show off her… ‘assets’. It is beyond disgusting. Previous incarnations of the Turtles have had April flirted with, yes, but never to this degree of blatant sexuality or objectification. She was never simply a sexual gimmick as she is here. The flirting that took place between April and Casey Jones in the 90s version was more playful banter than outright sexualisation and it worked. This was beyond gratuitous. It sends the message to young girls that you can become a reporter – but only if you’re hot.
- Splinter. His entire character was extremely disturbing for a kid’s film. And before I get the purists commenting and saying things like “well originally the Turtles were meant to be dark and gritty, etc.”, I am going to come right out and say I don’t care what they were originally supposed to be. If you want to make a dark, adult oriented film about the Turtles, then do so. But if you are going to create a lighthearted summer action blockbuster (like this one – there were fart jokes and everything) geared toward children, you cannot have the Turtle’s “father” (for lack of a better term), coming across as a sadistic jerk who abuses and tortures his children. Splinter is not the kind, gentle sensei that he has been portrayed as in the past. He is brutal and cruel in this film and that really sends a horrible message. In one scene in particular after the Turtles return from disobeying his orders and going above ground, they are not just afraid of being caught as a kid would be afraid of a parent, they are terrified. When they are discovered, Splinter then proceeds to attack them with his tail in a very very vicious way that is not in any way the way a parent should treat his children. He then tortures them until they give him the information of how they have disobeyed him and to what extent. I don’t know if the film makers were totally oblivious to the message this was sending, but it gave me the heebie jeebies. Splinter identifies himself as a father figure when he explains to April how he raised the Turtles after they were set free from the lab. So how is it in any way OK for him to repeatedly beat them? Is this part of their ‘training’? Sorry, doesn’t wash.
- The plot. Makes. No. Damned. Sense. Seriously. Not only have we have seen this whole ‘urban terrorism to make money’ idea over and over and over ad nauseum, but it doesn’t make ANY sense! They go to extreme lengths here to make sure that ALL the characters are connected to each other, in the hopes of making the plot ‘coherent’, but all it ends up doing is getting confusing, and stupid. April’s Dad worked for Eric Sacks, a billionaire scientist who is in cahoots with Shredder. The Turtles and Splinter were lab subjects injected with the mutagen that ended up turning them into giant talking creatures. When April’s Dad found out what the two of them were up to (which it turns out was creating a poison that they had the antidote for via the mutagen), they were forced to kill him by shooting him and setting fire to the lab. They thought their test subjects were gone forever, as April helped her ‘pets’ to escape from the fire. So what doesn’t make sense??? Well the film starts out establishing the idea that the Foot Clan and the Shredder have been terrorizing the city for years. It seems that there is a reason already at play and indeed when Sacks talks to Shredder, they seem to have something prepared and ready to unleash on the city. Only they don’t because you find out later on when April tells Sacks about the Turtles, that they were the only source of the mutagen (and therefore the poison) that Sacks had. After April helped them escape, they thought it was gone forever leaving them with an antidote, but no means to make the poison. So what were their big plans before they found out the Turtles were still alive? Wreck a bunch of stuff until something fell into their lap??? Not to mention that Sacks declares his reason for helping Shredder is so that he can become ‘stupid rich’. Given the fact that he already lives in a GIGANTIC mansion and has billions of dollars, makes you question how rich is ‘stupid’ rich??? Are we really supposed to believe that this guy would go to all these lengths to help Shredder take over the city just to get more money? He is already a billionaire! And April…where to start here? We are told that she helped the Turtles escape when the lab caught fire…which leads us to believe that she was IN the lab with her father when Sacks shot him and set the lab on fire. This begs a number of questions, such as why didn’t Sacks kill April as well? Why didn’t she try to get her father out instead of saving a bunch of lab turtles and a rat? Why didn’t she hear or see the gunshot? How was she not aware that Sacks had killed her father?? Never mind, that’s not important…move along.
- The action sequences/3D. No secret that I dislike 3D (anybody with eye problems will agree with me that it gives you a massive headache), but added to my issue with it is that it is mostly a money grab that isn’t visually necessary. A few films have been able to truly use 3D in creative ways, but this is not one of them. In fact, the 3D mixed with the extreme rapidity of the action sequences causes a real visual problem for the viewers in being able to make out what is happening on screen – let alone which turtle is which. The fact that their eye masks are colour coded began with the cartoon as a way of distinguishing one turtle from the next. We know that Raphael wears the red mask, Leonardo the blue, etc. However the dark ‘gritty’ aesthetic of the city, mixed with the rapid fire action sequences and the 3D makes it almost impossible to see what is happening or who is doing what. The action sequences in the 90s live action film were a bit clunky, no doubt about it, but at least we knew which turtle was which!
- Speaking of visuals, this present incarnation of the turtles looks AWFUL. There is NOTHING good here. From the presence of the weird noses that make them look like frogs with shells, to the extremely ‘roided out physiques and terrifying facial features there is nothing positive. People will (and have) argued that this is a return to the more ‘adult’ nature of the comics and how the turtles were originally supposed to look and if they had indeed made a film for adults that would be fine. But again, I point out the abundance of fart jokes and the cartoon violence that says this is definitely a movie for children. So why make the turtles look like something out of our worst nightmares? It doesn’t work.
- What also doesn’t work is the dialogue. They are supposed to be teenagers, so the dialogue remains consistently juvenile. That’s fine, except that they are voiced by grown men who sound like they have smoked for three decades (with the exception of Donatello who sounds sufficiently teenaged.) The slang they use in the film sounds like something you would see in an extremely stereotypical film about urban gang members. Add to that the hugely muscled physiques and deep, deep voices and there is a huge disconnect with the dialogue (which indicates they are still kids) and the look and sound of the turtles which tells a different story.
- We never fully get to know them. Because we are brought into the film via April’s point of view, we don’t get any real time to bond with the characters or know anything about them beyond the basic information we know going in. It’s almost as if Bay and Liebesman assumed that because people had a working knowledge of their characters to begin with that specific character development wasn’t necessary. Only problem is, it doesn’t help to define the characters’ motivations when we don’t get to spend any time seeing them in their natural dynamic. The original 90s live action films had a lot of screen time devoted to showing us just how the brothers worked – what their problems were with one another, how they fought and also how they stuck together. We SAW the rift develop between Raphael and Leonardo, and knew the reasons for it. In this film? Raphael just comes across as a jerk with no apparent rhyme or reason to his behavior. We aren’t given any explanation as to why he’s acting as if he has a stick up his butt, so at the end when he delivers his huge speech to Leonardo, it comes across as extremely hollow not to mention completely out of nowhere. The film’s pace is far too rapid and never gives us any downtime to really get to know their characters, or even start to like them.
- Extreme product placement and what I called the ‘Turtles checklist’. If this were a drinking game, you could take a shot every time a product was blatantly promoted (they ordered from Pizza Hut) or every time they FORCED something into the plot simply because it is part of the turtles lore or the original cartoon. Want to hear ‘cowabunga’? They shoe-horn it in during the fight sequence. Reminder that they like pizza? Guess what April fed them in the lab (as well as the aforementioned Pizza Hut order). Want to see the Turtles van? It shows up at the end (for trying to remain inconspicuous they certainly chose a pretty noticeable van). In-fighting between Raph and Leo? Yep – it’s there cause it was there in the cartoon. No other reason, etc. Each time of these things happened, it did not feel like a nod to the fans, but rather something they had ticked off the list in order to claim it was a ‘Turtles movie’. Thing is, remove the Turtles and put in ANY other action hero, and you would still have the same plot give or take a few details. Just because they order from Pizza Hut, does not a Turtles movie make.
The Good:
- Umm, the beatboxing scene in the elevator was kind of funny? Honestly I am struggling to come up with anything here.
The sad thing is I could continue going through the many flaws this film has, and it would take up a lot of paper but frankly I don’t have the energy. Suffice to say it was a terrible film, which will make tons of money at the box office by drawing in loyal Turtles fans determined to like it despite its obvious crappiness and kids who like a good fart joke. They will make tons of money off the toys and gimmicks that go with it (already I am seeing cups and masks for sale at the theatre) and Bay and co. will continue to go on thinking they aren’t talentless hacks incapable of making an entertaining home movie.
Such is life, sadly.
Hopefully the next one I review doesn’t suck this hard. My brain hurts.
Blogs on the Silver Screen: Reviews and Discussion 