‘TRANSFORMERS ONE’ (ANIMATION; DUBBED) REVIEW | 20 September, 2024

Paramount Animation, Hasbro Entertainment, Bayhem Films, New Republic Pictures and Di Bonaventura Pictures’ Transformers One (animation; dubbed from the Hollywood film of the same name) traces the origins and early relationship of Optimus Prime and Megatron and how they forever changed the fate of Cybertron, the home planet of the Transformers.

Orion and D-16 are miners who are assigned to smelting duty at Sublevel 50, where they meet B-127. Orion, D-16 and Elita get to know that Sentinel had betrayed the Primes and had secretly removed the transformation cogs from bots. The team now plans to expose Sentinel, but D-16 is keen on killing him. After a point, Orion and D-16 are on separate missions. What happens finally?

Based on Hasbro’s Transformers action figures, Andrew Barrer and Gabriel Ferrari have written an engaging story. The screenplay is written by Eric Pearson, Andrew Barrer and Gabriel Ferrari. The drama keeps the audience fairly involved but it often gets very confusing. The climax is tension-ridden but not as exciting as it ought to have been.

The voice-acting of the artistes ranges from average to excellent.

Josh Cooley’s direction is nice. Brian Tyler’s background music is fantastic. Cinematography (by Christopher Batty) is lovely. Animation, computer graphics and visual effects are extraordinary. Lynn Hobson’s editing is sharp. Dubbing is excellent.

On the whole, Transformers One is a fair entertainer but its business prospects among the Hindi film-going audience are very limited.

Released on 20-9-’24 at Gemini (daily 2 shows) and other cinemas of Bombay thru Viacom18 Studios. Publicity: good. Opening: dull (in spite of the National Cinema Day when ticket prices are low). …….Also released all over. Opening was weak at most of the places despite the National Cinema Day. …….The opening of the original English version, also released simultaneously, is better.