Sci-Fi Transformers (2007)

[Kevin]

Title: Transformers

Tagline: Their war. Our world.

Genre: Adventure, Science Fiction, Action

Director: Michael Bay

Cast: Shia LaBeouf, Megan Fox, Josh Duhamel, Tyrese Gibson, Rachael Taylor, Anthony Anderson, Jon Voight, John Turturro, Michael O'Neill, Kevin Dunn, Julie White, Amaury Nolasco, Zack Ward, Patrick Mulderrig, Luis Echagarruga, Michael Trisler, Brian Shehan, Ashkan Kashanchi, Rizwan Manji, William Morgan Sheppard, C.J. Thomason, Bernie Mac, Carlos Moreno Jr., Johnny Sanchez, John Robinson, Travis Van Winkle, Peter Jacobson, Glenn Morshower, Frederic Doss, Charlie Bodin, Joshua Feinman, Chris Ellis, Brian Stepanek, Steven Ford, Michael Shamus Wiles, Andy Milder, Craig Barnett, Brian Prescott, Scott Peat, Colleen Porch, Jamie McBride, Wiley M. Pickett, Brian Reece, Samantha Smith, Ravi Patel, Rick Gomez, Andy Domingues, Mike Fisher, Colin Fickes, Tom Lenk, Jamison Yang, Esther Scott, Madison Mason, Jeremy Jojola, Jessica Kartalija, Andrew Altonji, Andrew Lewis Caldwell, J.P. Manoux, Pete Gardner, Sophie Bobal, Laurel Garner, Chip Hormess, Ray Toth, Michael Adams, Ron Henry, Benjamin Hoffman, Michael McNabb, Jason White, Adam Ratajczak, Maja Kljun, Michelle Pierce, Odette Annable, Bob Stephenson, Mason Rock Bay, Peter Cullen, Mark Ryan, Darius McCrary, Robert Foxworth, Jess Harnell, Hugo Weaving, Jimmie Wood, Reno Wilson, Charlie Adler, Michael Bay, Colton Haynes

Release: 2007-06-27

Runtime: 144

Plot: Young teenager, Sam Witwicky becomes involved in the ancient struggle between two extraterrestrial factions of transforming robots – the heroic Autobots and the evil Decepticons. Sam holds the clue to unimaginable power and the Decepticons will stop at nothing to retrieve it.

 

[Kevin]

From Cinescape comes word that the live action Transformers movie is taking shape. I remember watching the cartoons as a kid in the 80's but I just can't picture them as a live-action movie. Time will tell.

TRANSFORMERS finds a home and a release date
Movie eyed for summer 2006 release


While Transformers producer Don Murphy said on his website that there would be a major announcement concerning his project at the San Diego Comic Convention, it turns out that the trades beat him to the punch. Both Variety and The Hollywood Reporter are running stories that Murphy and Tom DeSanto's live-action Transformers film has found a shared home; both DreamWorks and Paramount Pictures will share in the development of the movie, with a summer 2006 release date eyed. The former movie studio will handle domestic distribution while the latter will take care of international markets.


DreamWorks co-founder Steven Spielberg will come on to serve as an executive producer on the project. HAsbro, the manufacturers of the toy line that serves as inspiration for the film, will remain an active participant in the development of the movie's storyline, production, marketing and related merchandising.

As yet no writer, director or acting talent have signed on.

 

[Robby]

John Rogers (Catwoman) is writing Transformers, a DreamWorks/Paramount live-action SF movie based on the popular Hasbro toys, Variety reported.

[Full article @ Sci-Fi Wire]

 

[Robby]

John Rogers, who wrote the screenplay for the upcoming Transformers movie, told IGN FilmForce that the big-screen adaptation will be a "big-scale movie."

[Full article @ Sci-Fi Wire]

 

[Kevin]

There have been rumors circulating around years about a live action Transformers movie but more often than not it was just fan's wishful thinking. I was surprised then to see this blurb on Sci Fi Wire....

Steven Spielberg told SCI FI Wire that he's intent on producing a Transformers film: "It's happening," he said in an interview, adding, "We'll announce the director in three weeks."

 

[Tim]

wow! that's going to be pretty difficult considering the size of the models. i could understand a puppet type film, terrahawks style, the amount of money they will have to sink into total film cgi effects would be incredible


now this cartoon i want to see made into a live action film, although it didn't have the following back when i used to cherish each epiosde i caught. another toy i asked my parents to get me for xmas as a kid and they didn't

http://www.x-entertainment.com/messages/605.html

Centurions!!!

 

[Tom]

BOTTALK.COM

PAWTUCKET, R.I.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--June 11, 2003--Hasbro, Inc. (NYSE:HAS) announced today that it entered into an agreement with the highly successful producers Tom DeSanto (X-Men and X2: X-Men United) and Don Murphy (currently producing 20th Century Fox's The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen) for a full length, live action movie based on Hasbro's enormously popular TRANSFORMERS brand.

"We're thrilled to have entered into an agreement with the very talented and accomplished Don Murphy and Tom DeSanto," said Brian Goldner, President of Hasbro's U.S. toys group. "TRANSFORMERS is a natural for the big screen, and both Tom and Don have the track record and skill to bring to life a TRANSFORMERS movie that will be action-packed and flawlessly executed."

LOS ANGELES, California (AP) -- The shape-shifting "Transformer" robots from the 1980s may soon be using 20-something nostalgia to fuel a Hollywood movie.

The Hasbro toy company has teamed with the production company Angry Films to create a live-action version of the popular cartoon series that ran from 1984 to 1987, about a group of alien robots who disguise themselves on Earth as common vehicles.

"The basic thing is that if you've been going to the comic-book festivals and seeing all that stuff, the '80s kind of came back last year in a huge way," Angry Films producer Don Murphy said.

Based on original lineup
The story of "The Transformers" centers on a war between two mechanized armies -- the heroic Autobots, led by the red tractor-trailer Optimus Prime, and the evil Decepticons, ruled by the gigantic silver gun Megatron. Seeking new sources of energy, both factions crash-land on Earth.

Although the "Transformers" toys have changed over the years -- from animal shapes to the current series of futuristic machines -- Murphy said the movie would be based on the original lineup.

The 1980s Hasbro toys, which the cartoon helped turn into a money-machine for the company, have recently been reissued by the original Japanese manufacturer, Takara Co. A recent comic book based on "The Transformers" and a DVD of the original cartoon series have also become best sellers.

Murphy and his producing partner, Tom DeSanto, whose credits include "X-Men" and "X2: X-Men United" are still in the early stages of the "Transformers" movie. The project has not yet settled at a studio and no potential release date has been set.

Title: The Transformers
Log Line: An intergalactic war between two races of robots (the heroic Autobots and the evil Decepticons) comes to Earth, and the future of humanity inevitably hangs in the balance.
Writer: n/a
Agent: n/a
Buyer: Angry Films
Price: n/a
Genre: Action-Adventure
Logged: 6/11/03
More: To be based on the Hasbro toy line. Tom DeSanto and Angry Film's Don Murphy to produce. DeSanto is working on the treatment, but will hire a screenwriter shortly.

MORE: The good news about the Transformers movie is it'll be based on the comic book more than the cartoon. Or so producer Tom DeSanto tells us. DeSanto, the guy who created the story and defended the mythology on X-Men and exec produced X2, jumped into Transformers for his next franchise.

But as a comic-loving fellow, he admitted it was the Marvel comics line, not the after-school cartoon, that got him interested in the big car-turning-into-robots series.

We don't know much else about this, other than DeSanto will be joined by comic-book producer Don Murphy, who helped bring us League of Extraordinary Gentlemen and From Hell. But is that a good thing?

07/21/03 DeSanto Talks Transformers

Tom DeSanto葉he X2 producer who is also producing a proposed live-action Transformers movie葉old SCI FI Wire that the film will make use of both computer and practical effects for the signature machines and will be based primarily on the original 1980s lineup. "We're working on the storyline for Transformers, and we're hopefully going to set that up," DeSanto said in an interview at Comic-Con International over the weekend. "We're going to start going out to studios."

DeSanto also said that he and producing partner Don Murphy are close to hiring a director. "We've been talking with several now," he said. "But we have a big guy next week." He declined to comment on a report on IGN FilmForce that quoted Murphy saying that the candidates include Michael Bay, Robert Zemeckis and Joseph Kahn.

The movie will go "back to sort of the roots" of the franchise, DeSanto said. "But if there's something great that ends up from a later storyline, it's the same principle as X-Men: Don't try to follow continuity, but get to the heart and the soul of what made it work."

As for the effects, DeSanto said, "I think relying 100 percent on CGI would be a mistake. But, you know, you need CGI. ... You will believe that an 18-wheeler will transform."

see website for all the rest of the news

 

[Tom]

From Angry Films
http://www.cybertroncinema.net/ccn/index.php?p=20

Transformers' rolling out in live-action pic
By Chris Gardner

"The Transformers" -- the ever-morphing Hasbro toy line introduced in the mid-1980s that has gone on to spawn comic books, multiple television series and an animated feature -- are being prepped to change shape again, this time into stars of the big screen.

Angry Films topper Don Murphy (whose next film is "The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen") and writer-producer Tom DeSanto ("X-Men" and "X2: X-Men United") have teamed to produce a feature-length, live-action movie based on the popular brand.

 

[Tom]

[ D o n M u r p h y ]

 

[Kevin]

Considering some of the designs that Desanto did for his Galactica reworking I think his involvement with the movie will be interesting.

 

[Robby]

Roberto Orci and Alex Kurtzman have been brought on to rewrite the script for the upcoming film Transformers, according to the IGN FilmForce Web site.

[Full article @ Sci-Fi Wire]

 

[Kevin]

Director Michael Bay has done some huge movies like Armageddon, Days of Thunder, and The Rock. Like's like he's considering taking a stab at a live-action version of the Transformers!

Source: http://www.cnn.com/2005/SHOWBIZ/Movies/04/06/film.transformers.reut/index.html

LOS ANGELES, California (Hollywood Reporter) -- Michael Bay is in talks to direct the DreamWorks/Paramount live-action adaptation of "The Transformers," Hasbro's popular 1980s toy line of giant robots that morph into cars, trucks, planes, ships and other technological creations.
The move would reteam the director with DreamWorks, which is handling domestic distribution on the movie. Bay is helming DreamWorks' upcoming summer release "The Island," a co-production with Warner Bros. Pictures. (Warner Bros. is a division of Time Warner, as is CNN.)

Bay also would reunite with writers Alex Kurtzman and Roberto Orci, who, under their two-year, first-look deal with DreamWorks, rewrote "Island" and wrote "Transformers."

The Transformers are divided into two groups of robots, one led by Optimus Prime, which believes in tolerance and the sanctity of life, the other by Megatron, which espouses survival of the fittest and the extermination of biological life.

A November 17, 2006, release date has been set. Bay's credits include the two "Bad Boys" movies, "Pearl Harbor," "Armageddon" and "The Rock."

 

[superintelligentone]

I saw The Transformers on Tuesday, but couldn't get on to post about it until now. It was awesome!

When Optimus Prime appeared in front of Shia as a Semi, then transformed and introduced himself, I got choked up. I guess I have strong feelings from seeing the cartoon back in the 1980s. :lol:

Cool special effects and great action. Good light-hearted moments too. Shia LeBoef and the other 'teenagers' looked too old for high schoolers, but that was a 'minor' complaint. :lol:

I recognized Detroit locations during the climactic street battle. There were two shots of street signs where you can read 'Brush' (Street) of downtown Detroit.

Detroit's Channel 7 and Channel 4 news mentioned that Transformers were shooting in Detroit when it happened. Perhaps I should have went and tried out for an extra part.
SIO: "Augh! Giant robots! Run for your lives!"

Over at the IMDB for the Transformers movie, there are a lot of trolls present trying to spoil the enjoyment people have for the film.

There's some hater claiming that the film is a flop since it cost so much to make, it can't possibly make proportionally as much profit (as a low budget film).

By that logic, The Blair Witch Project was great movie since it made many times its cost and Gone With the Wind was a flop since it cost so much to make compared to its original ticket sales.

 

[marco]

Its good but its not like the cartoons back then when i used to watch them. Yea call me a real critic but its a good movie none the less just thought they could have made the characters head more recognizable in a way.