New Flicks

THE TRANSFORMERS

Imran H. Khan

While growing up, one of my favourite cartoons was The Transformers. Now, almost 1.5 decade later, Transformers makes a come back and this time to the big screen. Directed by Michael Bay, this Sci-Fi genre tells pretty much the old tale. Like an old wine in a new bottle, a war was being waged between the noble Autobots and the Decepticons in a planet called Cybertron for control over a mystical talisman called Allspark that would grant unlimited power to whoever possessed it. The Autobots managed to smuggle the Allspark off the planet with the Decepticons hot on their trail. The Allspark was eventually traced back to the planet Earth. A century later, Sam Witwicky, nicknamed Spike by his friends, buys his first car. To his shock, he discovers it to be Bumblebee, an Autobot in disguise who is to protect Spike, as he bears the secret location of the Allspark. But Bumblebee is not the only Transformer to have arrived on Earth - in the desert of Qatar, the Decepticons Blackout and Scorponok attack a U.S. military base, causing the Pentagon to send their special Sector Seven agents to capture all "specimens of this alien race," and Spike and his girlfriend Mikaela find themselves in the middle of a grand battle between the Autobots and the Decepticons. Meanwhile, within the depths of the Pentagon, a new evil awakens... Transformers stars Emmy-winning actor Shia LaBeouf who, in just a short period of time, rose from the energetic, adolescent second banana on the popular kids' TV series, 'Even Stevens' (The Disney Channel, 2000-03) to the bankable young lead in several major motion pictures. His quick wit and offbeat charm undoubtedly contributed to his ascendancy. He is also expected to star in the much anticipated new Indiana Jones movie, opposite Harrison Ford as the globetrotting archaeologist's son.

Another blockbuster that is sending shockwaves through the movie industry is Live Free or Die Hard. The brilliant Bruce Willis stars in this forth sequel to the Die Hard Trilogy. As an eminent attack is expected in the US, the infrastructure begins to shut down the entire nation. The mysterious figure behind the scheme has every angle figured out… every angle except for John McClane (Bruce Willis). The movie finds our bad-mouthed hero at the beginning of his holiday, but the New York City Detective isn't celebrating. His argumentative saga with his college-age daughter Lucy continues and he soon receives an assignment to bring in a young hacker for questioning. He gets help from the most unexpected of places as he unravels an extraordinary plot surrounding his city. Though the mysterious mastermind is always ahead of Willis, all hope rests on the 'old school' hero, police detective John McClane, to take down the conspiracy and save the city.

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