- Release date: August 8th 2014 (U.S.)
- Director: Jonathan Liebesman
- Writers: Josh Appelbaum, Andre Nemec, Evan Daugherty
- Editors: Joel Negron, Glen Scantlebury
- Score Composer: Brian Tyler
- Cinematographer: Lula Carvalho
- Budget: $125 million
- Domestic gross: Currently Unknown
- Material: Digital
- Aspect ratio: 2.35 : 1
- Running time: 101 minutes
- Current Tomato Meter: 18%
I used to work a job as an auto insurance underwriter. I reviewed, for the most part, identical
auto policies (usually around 40 in an eight hour work day) for boo-boo’s,
illegalities and whether or not the customer was compatible with the company
program. I’m telling you this so
you know I am experienced with boredom. I know it well. Tonight,
however, I spent so much time with boredom that it took on a separate and
sentient personality within my mind.
He became something of a pet. He is mine. I named him.
My boredom’s name is Deeders Tarmopolis Shneolonia.
That's the kind of time I had.
The
turtles are back, and that pesky Shredder (now a flaccidly mysterious Japanese
dude wearing samurai inspired robo-armor) wants to attack New York City with a
deadly-owie-producing gas so he can “have control of the city” (but we are
never told why), and so his partner in crime, Erich Sachs (the usually great
William Fichtner), can become super rich by producing the antidote… the mutagen
which created the heroes on the half-shell and their rat sensei. April O’neil (Megan Fox), a struggling
small-time reporter this time around, knows there are vigilantes saving the
city from Shredder’s Foot Clan, but everyone she tells (including her boss,
Whoopi Goldberg, who disappears 40 minutes in) thinks she is beyond crazy.
That
crazy thing – that could have provided some much-needed funny. Instead, every moment Fox spends
speaking dialogue on screen makes you wonder if these lines were programmed,
rather than learned and studied. I’m
not saying she was given a screenplay worth studying, though. The material found in this, the fifth
big screen adaptation of the popular comic book, is among the simplest I’ve
encountered this summer. Having
said that, there would still be enough humor to capitalize on (with a script clearly
designed for easy laughs) if it weren’t for the nearly incompetent direction by
Jonathan Liebesman. The majority
of the jokes bounced off me like the bullets fired at our heroes near the end
of the film (yeah… they are bulletproof now. Not bladeproof, apparently… what with all the ducking and
deflecting Shredder’s attacks).
Numerous moments of silence, or awkward beats, seemingly deliberately
timed to suspend a punch line were followed by… usually nothing. Including the rarely exciting fight
scenes, it’s all setup for hardly any payoff.
The
turtles themselves, only occasionally able to dodge the filmmaker’s weaknesses
as frequently as their opponents’ gunfire, manage to charm just barely enough
to make me not want them to receive physical or emotional harm. That’s about all I can say for their
efforts. Once they realize they
are impervious (adding that cherry atop the fully-loaded sundae of being 7 feet
tall/500 pounds of pure muscle each), there isn’t much point in hanging around
to see how they will save the day.
I spent most of my time listening to the children surrounding me say
funny things to their adults about “take me doodie” and “THAT WAS A FUNNY
PART!” Based on my experience, I
do at least know it can entertain tiny children, but apparently not enough to
coax bowel movement restraint.
Whether doodie, or funny, I was checked out after 30 minutes. Sure, it has other problems, some of
them very weird (like where are these mountains just outside of New York which are
covered in snow in the spring?), but I am already tired of talking about it… oh yeah, there
are sexual harassment jokes…
Is
it the worst movie ever? No. That
qualification does not, however, make it worth your time or money.
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