Starring: Megan Fox, Alan Ritchson, Noel Fisher
April O'Neil (Fox) is a young journalist wanting to take on some serious investigative work and not covering lightweight fluff reporting. Investigating a crime syndicate causing chaos in New York City, April becomes fascinated with the actions of who she believes is a vigilante. It's in fact four vigilantes and they're all giant talking turtles with martial arts skills looking to save New York.
There's a not insignificant number of twenty-somethings out there with a real fondness for the things they enjoyed as children and few things are remembered as fondly as those heroes in a half-shell, the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. A late-80's/early-90's animated TV series that over the last several years has been hammered at to be commercially viable again to mixed results. This latest attempt to revive the franchise has got the heart beating again (it's already made its money back) but its a Frankenstein's monster. Living, but not very well and frankly probably better off in the grave.
One thing that TMNT does achieves as a movie is the ability to be both obnoxious and dull. Although Joe Liebesman has the director's credit, this is really seen by the public at large as the work of the film's producer, Michael Bay. Bay's studio, Platinum Dunes, worked on the project and its revamping of 80's nostalgia and the involvement of Megan Fox means that thoughts of Bay's franchise, Transformers are never too far away.
Fans of the original TV show may be the most offended, though for the record, despite being the of the same age as the nostalgic fans and having watched the show as a kid, I have a passing fondness at best. Aside from the aformentioned Bay connection, Fox seems like an odd casting choice for April O'Neil and whilst there are the expected remarks about her being attractive and some backstory, I don't quite get the sense of intrepid interviewer. Early on, Fox seems rather stilted when delivering to camera as an interviewer. Not a bad performance per se, but not a good casting choice.
As for the turtles, there's a mixture of the old humour of the "totally radical" variety from the cartoon (Michaelangelo is still the comic relief in particular) whilst also a need to make them tough and edgy. Raphael is particularly intense, to the point that you almost think he belongs in a different movie. Donatello is sort of the nerd of the bunch, but this doesn't gets expanded on very much and Leonardo is...present. There are promising supporting roles from Will Arnett and Whoopi Goldberg, but Whoopi disappears not long into the film and Arnett is best doing his over-confident goofball schtick, but seems out of his otherwise fairly plain character when he does so.
As action-packed at the film is, and rightly so, it suffers from low lighting and a frantic editing style that makes the action hard to follow and the 3D, whilst clear at times, doesn't really make the film any better unless you like things pointing out of the screen. Backing this all up is a story that...well...just isn't very interesting and is very predictable. Fans may get something from this as the spirit of the original turtles is buried in there somewhere, but what's come with it is crass and not particularly enjoyable.
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