Movies!

Spent the 4th of July watching two movies at the cineplex. Live Free or Die Hard and Transformers.

Bruce Willis once again reprises his role as an NYPD cop caught in the gears of someone else's evil machinations. This time the fate of the whole nation hangs in the balance as John McClane and his new reluctant hacker parter Matt take on the bad guys who are hacking the nation's infrastructure. We also get introduced to Lucy Gennaro ne McClane, John's aggravatingly headstrong daughter who in the movie goes from being just a hostage to a serious chip off the McClain block. Hacker Matt also grows during this movie, his little world is getting trashed throughout the movie and he valiantly rallies to adapt. Even the FBI cyber-geek trying to figure things out shows he has the brass to do the right thing when needed.

One scene is probably the best part of the movie when John and Matt discuss being the hero. McClane bitterly recounts how you get a pat on the back and then nothing. So Matt asks him why he does it and John says 'because someone has to do it and I am the only one there.' At the end of the movie, not only is John McClane a hero again, Matt and Lucy are too.

Transformers I had serious reservations that it was going to suck some rotten eggs. Bumblebee as a Camaro? Megatron can't transform into giant gun? What's going on? Shia Lebouf did a fine job as Sam, sometime loser geek who's family claim to fame seems to be all in the past. Megan Fox plays the girl in high school Sam has fallen in love with, she turns into a princess who can take care of herself. Bernie Mac makes a comic cameo appearance as Bobbie Bolivia, used car salesman where Sam and his Dad find Bumblebee disguised as a rusty yellow 85 Camaro. Bumblebee can only communicate through his radio and he seems to know the correct song to play to reflect the mood of the scene; like Sam and Mikaela on Lookout Point so we hear 'Sexual Healing' on the radio. (; The Autobots trying to hide from Sam's parents while Sam looks for an item in the house that will lead the Autobots to the All Spark is priceless.

Jon Voight plays a very capable Secretary of Defense who knows how to use a shotgun while trying to figure out what wiped out a US base in Qatar. Was a nice touch showing the US military as good guys when a rag-tag team of American servicemen escape the Decepticon attack in Qatar and they manage to save one of the local boys. One scene that had alot of people rolling in the aisles was when the American Captain is trying to call the Pentagon to report their survival over a civilian cell-phone even as a small Decipticon scorpion attacks them, he has to deal with a guy in India asking for a charge card and would the Captain like a new phone plan.

It seems the DoD went all out to support the making of this movie. So get to see A-10s in action and F-22s. Some airmen even got on film. Found this quote from an Army vet of Iraq via the Air Force News Agency to describe how he felt seeing this movie.

"Military people will get a lot out of this movie because of how realistic they depicted the way it is in the field, the way we all work together, and the equipment we use," said Army Sgt. Charles Eggleston, a Walter Reed patient. "The whole thing was action packed and I loved seeing the A-10 'bringing the rain' the way they always came to help us out while I was in Iraq. Some of my fellow Soldiers and I were talking about it's funny that with all the movies out there, it took a movie about alien robots invading the planet to get the military stuff right."

Yeah I liked the movie. Big quibble is all the Autobots like Bumblebee, Ratchet, and Jazz are GM products, but it seems the movie company had a tie-in deal with GM for it. So Bumblebee spends most of the movie as the 2008 prototype Camaro while Jazz is a Solstice and Ratchet is a rescue H2. But after awhile I did not care as the movie carried me away with its plot, characters, and humour.

Update: the name is McClane and not McClain. So changed it. Proofreading is a virtue. :)