T h e N o t e
by Michael Bay
Hello. This is millioinaire filmmaker Michael Bay. I am grateful to my friend and colleague Dale Wisely, for allowing me to write The Note for this issue of Right Hand Pointing, made possible by the recent acquisition of this website by the Hasbro Corporation. Well, made mandatory, actually.
I want to take this rare opportunity to describe the plot of my new film Transformers: The Age of Distinction which, as you know, is the latest in the series of Transformers movies. This is just one part of a toy/game/movie franchise which has existed since 1984 and has made enough money to give every man, woman, and child on the planet a new, non-transforming helicopter. Made of gold. And stuffed with cash.
Sixty-five million years ago, during the Crustacean Period, beings known as the Creators detonate many "Seeds", wiping out most life on Earth. These were bad "seeds." In the present, a geologist named Darcy discovers a dinosaur corpse covered in a strange metal.
Darcy the Geologist is played by Sophia Myles.
next
Four years have passed since the Battle of Chicago, which you will remember from Transformers III: Crushing the Crap Out of Chicago. Cade Yeager, a struggling inventor with the same last name as famed aviator Chuck Yeager, and his friend Lucas, buy an old truck to strip it for parts in hopes of sending Cade's daughter Tessa to college.
Tessa, played by Nicola Peltz, really wants to go to college.
Cade soon discovers that the truck is an injured Optimus Prime and repairs him. For those of you not familiar with with who/what Optimus Prime is, this is because you failed to see Transformer I: Optimus Prime is a Sentient 18-Wheeler. Meanwhile, Cemetery Wind, an elite CIA unit headed by a paranoid Kelsey Grammer, has been tasked with hunting down the remaining Decepticons. But, let me put that in a way more familiar to readers of Right Hand Pointing.
M i c h a e l B a y
Cemetery Wind
an elite CIA unit
headed by a paranoid
Kelsey Grammer,
tasked with
hunting down
the remaining Decepticons.
The fact that you don't know what Decepticons are is due (a) to you being (a) a bunch of pretentious intellectuals and (2) the fact that you've never seen Transformers I(a): Decepticons: Deceptive Icons Which Are Evil.
Anyway, back to the movie.
Melanie Specht, who plays a Senior Executive Assistant. Some sexist filmmakers would have cast her as a secretary. Not me. Senior Executive Assistant.
On the other hand, here's a picture of me leaving a restaurant with an unidentified woman. I knew her name at the time. Anyway, by all means, keep writing your little poems.
I feel like this summary is going on a little long. But you have to understand this movie runs 2 hours and 40 minutes. There's just no way to tell a story this complex and nuanced in less than that. So, let me just provide these last plot points, knowing that, due to your negligence, you don't have the background to follow all of it. I copied it from Wikipedia. Lockdown gives Kelsey Grammer a Seed, a bomb that can cyberform (turn to transformium) any area of land, giving Cade, Shane, and the Autobots time to board the ship. Cade and Shane save Tessa, and, with the help of Crosshairs and Bumblebee, are able to escape. Shortly after, Hound and Drift save Optimus and leave before Lockdown enters deep space. Optimus and Brains reveal that Galvatron is Megatron reincarnated, and that he has been manipulating KSI to make an army and steal the Seed in order to wipe out humans and create more Decepticons.
Victoria Summer, who plays a beautiful Executive Assistant. They can't all be seniors.
Let me ask you a question. How important are reviews, anyway? One reviewer says this film (I prefer "film" over "movie.") is "inflated, interminable and incoherent ...."
Yes, I know what that means and, really, that's just nitpicking.
Let me end with a picture of the fine actor Stanley Tucci, who is actually in this film.
Stanley Tucci, who plays a beautiful, if somewhat arrogant head of an organization called KLI, which stands for something.
Enjoy the poetry in this issue. As a fellow artist, I'm sure I'd be able to appreciate it. If I read it.
Michael Bay
P.S.: Actress Li Bingbing. Also in this movie.