Transformers: The Movie (1987)3xvhsdvddub
transformersMore Than Meets The Eye! The year is 2005, and the Decepticons have retaken Cybertron from Optimus Prime and his Autobot warriors. Both sides are seething with anger, and that has blinded them to a hideous menace headed their way. That menace is Unicron, a monster so powerful he devours planets. Unicron has chosen to take control of the Autobot Matrix for his own evil purposes, and to accomplish this he has created a force of super robots. By gathering the remains of fallen Decepticons, including Megatron, and infusing them with life, he forms the Unicrons. With Decepticons on one side, Unicron on the other, and Optimus Prime lost in battle, Earth and Autobot survival depends on The Chosen One who must rise up to open the matrix and use its full power. Who that is remains a mystery.
Details
The all-star cast of voiceover actors include Monty Python's Eric Idle, Judd Nelson, Robert Stack, Orson Welles, Scatman Crothers, Casey Kasem and Star Trek's Leonard Nimoy.
Commentary
Transformers are back with a vengeance with a big budget and really good voice talent. The animated movie (circa 1987) takes place in the transition period between seasons two and three of the TV series circa 1986. Often, a movie production signals the end of a series, but, in this case the movie was used as a vehicle to introduce several major cast changes.
My favorite parts are the planet munching scenes in the beginning, Megatron's dialogue with Unicron and the Galvitron's confrontation with Star Scream. The story is fast-paced and clearly there was more money spent on the effects than one would expect in the TV series, but, all in all, it's very good. I used to have the VHS version and I repurchased this title on DVD.
I did have some issues with the 20th aniversary DVD version of the movie...
The DVD edition has been digitally remastered and "color corrected". Also, this release marks the first time that a widescreen version of the movie has been available. I think that the most striking difference between the earlier VHS version and the current DVD version is the color. The new version is *much* brighter than the old version. In some scenes the color correction doesn't seem quite right.
The original version shows someone ringing a gong, the remastered version show the DEG logo animated to the sound of a gong. Also, there appear to be some edits to the original material. The opening sequence in the remastered version omits the crawl describing the battle between the Decepticon and the Autobots. It also appears that the widescreen version has been artificially cropped.
The changes that were made to the Transformers Movie seem, IMHO, to be a bit too much of a good thing. I'm not against restoration. I just don't believe that the production studio did a faithful restoration on the print. Rather, they modified the print in what appears to have been a somewhat abritrary process -- not unlike colorizing a black and white movie. Just look at poor Hot Rod -- he's pink! And, the fullscreen version, included in the set, has even more of the frame cropped.
That being said, I'm still pleased to have ANY version on DVD rather than NO version on DVD.