» Friday, 19 October A.D. 2007
presidential aspirations
Tricia and I watched Transformers last night. It's not a bad movie if you know what you're going in for--giant (Japanese!) robots, explosions, plot holes big enough to drive trucks through, that sort of thing. I commented to Tricia after the movie that it will be interesting to see how/if movies' take on the office of the president changes after the 2008 elections. The president in Transformers is presented as a slacker--the only scene he's in is a brief bit on Air Force One where he requests an aide to go bring him some Ding Dongs. (Snack food as political commentary?) I was struck by the contrast to the persona of the president in action movies like Independence Day, Air Force One, and Armageddon. I can't think of any movies for comparison released after 2000, however.
As for the plot holes: we have these giant, highly advanced robotic life forms that can survive the absolute coldness of deep space, but are completely immobilized by temperatures such as those found in the Antarctic? And obviously we accept any message by some random schmuck as being from the Secretary of Defense if it's sent in Morse code. The bit about having to abandon Fourier transforms in favor of quantum mechanics made me cringe, too.
posted by Nate @ 11:28PM