So Dominic Toretto (Vin Diesel) and his crew are back. Luke Hobbs (Dwayne Johnson) and his crew are back. And some new faces, Hobbs’ partner Riley (Gina Carano) and villain Owen Shaw (Luke Evans) dd to the franchise’s ever-growing roster.

I thought the vast number of characters would be too much of a distraction in the last installment, and, to an extent, it was. But I liked Fast 5, and I’m happy to say that 6 is even better.

The premise is all but unnecessary. Hobbs recruits Toretto to take down Shaw, a gangster/terrorist/arms dealer whose goal is not particularly clear, but then it doesn’t need to be, does it? Shaw’s latest plan is to steal a military whatsit that can cause blackouts, and his gang of thugs, the minute you meet them, seem like the evil twins of Toretto’s — and it’s a credit to the movie’s cleverness that they actually address the parallels and get some great character beats in from Roman (Tyrese Gibson) and Tej (Chris Parker), two fellows whose roles in the previous films were to stand around and wait for something to do.

When asked about his role in Jaws 4: The Revenge, Michael Caine once said, “I never saw it—but I saw the house it paid for, and it’s fantastic!” I suspect John Turturro’s been saying something similar for the past four years whenever he’s asked about the Transformers movies. Now we can add John Malkovich and Frances McDormand to that group. And maybe Alan Tudyk.

The plot is as labyrinthine as it is unnecessary. Back in the early 1960s, a ship from war-torn Cybertron (if the Transformers spend all their time fighting, how did they ever evolve?) crashed on the moon. Among the cargo were several “Pillars” that have some sort of significance to the war.

Also, a big, tough Autobot named Sentinal Prime. The White House gets wise to this, and thus we have the impetus for the moon landing (apparently, many historical events were due to Transformers; they don’t get around to revealing that car in which Kennedy was shot was an Autobot, but there may be a fourth film).

Fast-forward to the present day, where the Autobots are now working for the Feds to preserve humanity (how did we ever get along without them?). While on a mission to Chernobyl, Optimus Prime discovers some remnant of the Pillars and decides that it’s high time to revive Sentinal. Also, the Pillars are somehow able to teleport things, which means that it can be used to bring an army of invading Decepticons to earth (according to Frances McDormand, National Intelligence Director).

Maybe I should preface this with the disclaimer that I’ve not seen any of the previous installments of The Fast and the Furious. I’m not a fan of Vin Diesel. I’m not particularly interested in fast cars and, most of the time, I’m more irritated than outright furious.

I also didn’t know anything about the characters’ backstories going into the film nor was I, in full disclosure, looking forward to this screening. That said, I had a lot of fun with this flick—and evidently so did everyone else at the screening, from the critics, who laughed snarkily at the plot contrivances and flagrantly obvious exposition, to the rest of the audience, who clapped at every conceivable moment and in general ate it up like hotcake-crepes wrapped in unicorn butts.

If you have seen the other movies, you may be happy to know that the original trio of Vin Diesel (Dominic Toretto), Paul Walker (Brian O’Connor), and Jordana Brewster (Mia Toretto, Dominic’s sister and Brian’s lover) are back, as are Sung Kang (Han Lue), Tyrese Gibson (Roman Pearce), Matt Schulze (Vince), Ludacris (Tej Parker), a whole bunch of others I’m not sure were in the other several thousand Fast-and-Furiouses, and, what the hell, they got The Rock, too.

The movie begins with the jail-springing of Toretto, a stunt so implausible that not even the film itself takes it seriously, and soon the gang’s in Rio (and, after seeing the animated film Rio recently, I’m guessing that somewhere there’s an elephantine warehouse filled with stock shots of the cityscape as leered from behind Christ’s shoulder), plotting a car-jack heist for their shady friend Vince, who’s after three seized cars being transported across the country by train.

You know you can tell a good trailer when 90% of it is all doom and gloom. That’s just what we’re getting with the first full-length feature trailer for Michael Bay’s Transformers 3: Dark of the Moon.

If you’re just now coming into the franchise or you have already forgotten the robot balls from Revenge of the Fallen, here’s the official synopsis.

Shia LaBeouf returns as Sam Witwicky in Transformers: Dark of the Moon. When a mysterious event from Earth’s past erupts into the present day it threatens to bring a war to Earth so big that the Transformers alone will not be able to save us.

This trailer gives us all of the goods: tons of destruction, introduction of both the human and robot villain, and lots of visible robot battling. Joining the regular cast of humans this time is Rosie Huntington-Whiteley, John Malkovich, Patrick Dempsey, Ken Jeong, and the always evil Frances McDormand.

Take a look at the brand new trailer after the jump, and get ready for Transformer action (and hopefully Dinobots) on July 1st.

We all remember the scoffs Universal got when news hit that they were doing a fourth sequel to the Fast and the Furious franchise, but when the film opened to an astounding $70 million in the first weekend, the only people laughing were at the studio. So why wouldn’t they continue that trend with another film?

So here it is, the fifth film in the series, titled simply Fast Five. Worry not, fans won’t get another Tokyo Drift, as Paul Walker, Vin Diesel, and a bunch of the originals are all returning. Here’s the breakdown of the film.

Since Brian (Walker) and Mia Toretto (Jordana Brewster) broke Dom out of custody, they’ve blown across many borders to elude authorities. Now backed into a corner in Rio de Janeiro, they must pull one last job in order to gain their freedom. As they assemble their elite team of top racers, the unlikely allies know their only shot of getting out for good means confronting the corrupt businessman who wants them dead. But he’s not the only one on their tail. Hard-nosed federal agent Luke Hobbs (Johnson) never misses his target. When he is assigned to track down Dom (Diesel) and Brian, he and his strike team launch an all-out assault to capture them. But as his men tear through Brazil, Hobbs learns he can’t separate the good guys from the bad. Now, he must rely on his instincts to corner his prey…before someone else runs them down first.

The flick is set to hit on April 29th, and you can check out the full trailer after the jump.

Michael Bay loves teaser trickery when it comes to his epic Transformers film franchise. We all remember the first teaser that started it all, which gave many of us hope for what turned out to be a pretty lackluster franchise. Bay is hoping to change all of our minds with his newest film in the series, Dark of the Moon.

Here’s the official, yet somehow unreleased synopsis.

The Autobots Bumblebee, Ratchet, Ironhide and Sideswipe led by Optimus Prime, are back in action, taking on the evil Decepticons, who are determined to avenge their defeat in 2009’s ‘Transformers Revenge of the Fallen’. In this new movie, the Autobots and Decepticons become involved in a perilous space race between the U.S. and Russia, and once again human Sam Witwicky (Shia LaBeouf) has to come to the aid of his robot friends. There’s new characters too, including a new villain in the form of Shockwave, a longtime ‘Transformers’ character who rules Cybertron while the Autobots and Decepticons battle it out on Earth.

All of our favorites are back from the first two films, including Shia, Duhamel, and Turturro, with new faces like John Malkovich, Frances McDormand, and Patrick Dempsey joining the fight this time.

Check out the new teaser trailer after the jump and catch Transformers: Dark of the Moon in theaters on July 1st.

With the fan reaction being as negative as it could have been for Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen, it was expected that the studio and Michael Bay would be very careful in choosing a title for the third film. Fans felt alienated with the way Revenge of the Fallen went down, between the racist robots and robot balls, and now that creeping feeling is returning as the title for the third film has been announced.

It isn’t confirmed just yet, but according to a reliable Transformers fan site, marketing has started for the title Transformers: Dark of The Moon.

Some upcoming books listed at the Amazon revealed what might possibly be, the Title of the 3rd Transformers Movie.
The books are to be released (May 17, 2011) very near the release date of Transformer 3 (July 1, 2011). The author of the books is official and has written books for the 2007 Movie and ROTF. The publisher is none other than HarperColins, which produced similar books for both movies.

So it may sound like a high school adaptation of a Pink Floyd film, but this could bring new depth to Bay’s Transformers universe. It has been confirmed that Megan Fox is not returning, while LaBeouf, Duhamel, Tyrese Gibson, and Turturro are all coming back. Joining the cast for the first time is Malkovich, Patrick Dempsey, Ken Jeong, Alan Tudyk, and Frances McDormand.

The film is slated to hit on July 1st of 2011, so expect to see a big trailer by year’s end, hopefully along with a confirmed title.

Hitting stores everywhere today, Screen Gems’ Legion will be taking the Earth by storm in the form of DVD and Blu-Ray. Originally in theaters back in January, the action-thriller brought about the apocalypse with a cool “God purging the world of it’s disease” storyline, some cool zombie/demonic baddies, and an epic showdown between angels Michael (Paul Bettany) and Gabriel (LOST’s Kevin Durand).

Directed by visual effects artist Scott Stewart, the film fills out its cast with some great talent like Dennis Quaid, Private Practice’s Kate Walsh, Tyrese Gibson, Adrianne Palicki, and American Gothic’s Lucas Black. As part of the Blu-Ray release, we’ve got some great clips from the disc’s features to show you.

Dennis Quaid delves into the troubles of his character, Bob, Paul Bettany talks about doing (just about) all of his own stunts, and we see exactly how the production crew got the 60+ year old Jeannette Miller to hang from a ceiling.

Check out the clips after the jump, and pick up Legion on Blu-Ray or DVD today.

Most people that go to see District 9 this weekend will get to see Legion’s far less violent green band trailer. But recently released online was the far more interesting “Red Band” preview of the post-apocalyptic action-thriller — courtesy of the folks at Trailer Addict.

The film’s premise, which is quite interesting, goes something like this: “When God loses faith in Mankind, he sends his legion of angels to bring on the Apocalypse. Humanity’s only hope lies in a group of strangers trapped in a desert diner and the Archangel Michael (played by Paul Bettany).

The film looks to be something like Constantine meets Demon Knight, which is a pretty cool idea. Legion hits theaters on January 22, 2010.

Check out the probably NSFW trailer after the jump.