---
title: "Transformers: Age of Extinction"
year: 2014
kind: "film"
canonical: "https://film.one/film/transformers-age-of-extinction"
fi1m_id: "transformers-age-of-extinction"
imdb_id: "tt2109248"
tmdb_id: 91314
wikidata_id: "Q6151665"
fi1m_score: 38
critics_score: 42
critics_reviews: 24
published: "2026-10-06T18:21:55.728598+00:00"
updated: "2026-10-06T18:21:56.943570+00:00"
region: "IL"
licence: "© Fi1m Ltd. Written by AI under a human editor; checked against sources before publication. Quote with attribution and a link to the canonical URL."
---

# Transformers: Age of Extinction (2014)

Directed by Michael Bay · 2h 45m · Science Fiction, Action, Adventure

## Identity

Transformers: Age of Extinction

- **Canonical:** https://film.one/film/transformers-age-of-extinction
- **Type:** Film
- **Fi1m ID:** transformers-age-of-extinction
- **IMDb ID:** tt2109248
- **TMDB ID:** 91314
- **Wikidata ID:** Q6151665
- **Same entity:** https://www.imdb.com/title/tt2109248/, https://www.themoviedb.org/movie/91314, https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q6151665

**Fi1m score: 38** · Critics 42 from 24 reviews

*In a sentence:* Three credited editors, 165 minutes, and not one shot that tells you where anyone is standing

> Michael Bay’s fourth Transformers film has a new cast, a new country and Stanley Tucci in a lab coat, and none of it stops the machine. At 165 minutes it is the longest and least coherent of the series.

## Synopsis

Five years after the battle of Chicago, the Autobots are being hunted. Cade Yeager (Mark Wahlberg), a broke inventor on a farm in rural Texas, buys a wrecked lorry from a derelict cinema to strip for parts and finds it is Optimus Prime (voiced by Peter Cullen), hiding and badly damaged. Within a day a CIA unit run by Harold Attinger (Kelsey Grammer) and his field man James Savoy (Titus Welliver) arrives at the farm, and Cade, his daughter Tessa (Nicola Peltz) and her rally-driver boyfriend Shane (Jack Reynor) are on the run with the robots. In Chicago, industrialist Joshua Joyce (Stanley Tucci) is building Transformers of his own out of the metal of the dead ones, with Attinger’s blessing and a buyer already waiting.

## Review

Michael Bay’s fourth [*Transformers*](https://film.one/film/transformers) film starts again. Ehren Kruger’s script moves the story to Texas, where Cade Yeager (Mark Wahlberg), a broke inventor, buys a wrecked lorry for parts and finds it is Optimus Prime (Peter Cullen). The Autobots are now fugitives, hunted by a CIA man, Harold Attinger (Kelsey Grammer), and sold for scrap to an industrialist, Joshua Joyce (Stanley Tucci), who is building his own. It is a reasonable idea for a fresh start. The film then runs for 165 minutes, longer than any of the three before it, and the fresh start lasts about forty of them.

The first act is the best stretch, mostly because it is the only one at a scale a person can read. Amir Mokri shoots the Texas farm in low evening light, with the camera down near the dirt and the sky doing most of the work, and when Attinger’s men arrive and Cade’s barn goes up, Bay stages it as a raid rather than a battle. Wahlberg plays Cade as an exasperated dad who happens to be able to build a robot, and he is likeable in it. Jack Reynor’s Shane, the rally driver dating Cade’s daughter Tessa (Nicola Peltz), carries a laminated card explaining why that is legal in Texas, and the film thinks this is funny. It is not, and it tells you how little thought went into either of them.

Stanley Tucci is the reason to sit through the middle. His Joyce is a smooth, nervy salesman who has reverse-engineered the dead robots into a metal he can shape at will, and Tucci plays him as a man discovering, one line at a time, that he is out of his depth. Jeffrey Beecroft’s design for the company headquarters is a clean white laboratory in Chicago where a block of the stuff turns itself into a handgun and then a loudspeaker, and it is the one sequence in which the effects are allowed to be strange rather than loud. We laughed properly at Tucci twice, which is twice more than the rest of the cast managed between them.

Then the machine takes over. Roger Barton, William Goldenberg and Paul Rubell are credited as editors, three of them, and even so we spent long stretches unable to say where anyone was standing, who was firing, or why. A fight in a city street cuts to a robot’s shoulder, to a car flipping, to Peltz screaming, to a slow pan up a product, and back. Steve Jablonsky’s score runs underneath all of it at one volume, so there is no quiet to measure the noise against. Somewhere in the second hour we stopped trying to follow it and began watching the clock, and by the third we were angry about that, because the robots themselves look better than they ever have. You can see Hound (John Goodman) and Drift (Ken Watanabe) as separate bodies rather than a heap of parts, and nobody gives them a scene worth the detail.

The last hour moves to Hong Kong, and we will not describe what arrives there beyond saying it is on the poster. Mokri’s helicopter shots of the harbour are handsome, and the film treats the city as a place to break, which is what it did to Chicago. Marie-Sylvie Deveau’s job on Peltz is a pair of cut-off shorts and a camera angle. Li Bingbing’s Su Yueming is given a motorbike, a fight and no character. Kelsey Grammer glowers in a good suit.

Bay made [*Pain & Gain*](https://film.one/film/pain-and-gain) the year before this, a small, mean film that at least knew what it thought of its characters. Here he is back on the assembly line, and the difference shows. The first three *Transformers* films were loud and silly and had, at their best, a cheerful vulgarity; this one is loud and silly and solemn, and the solemnity is what wears you down. Most critics landed near where we have, and the few who enjoyed it mostly said they were enjoying the noise and not much else.

If you have a twelve-year-old who wants to see robots hit each other, there is nothing here that will harm them beyond the running time, and the 12A is fair. Everyone else should take the Tucci scenes and leave. We would not say that about a film we thought was lazy; this one is the opposite, every frame worked over by hundreds of people, which is the sad part.

*Fi1m score 38, published 6 October 2026.*

## Straight answers

**Is Transformers: Age of Extinction worth watching?**

*Transformers: Age of Extinction* is not worth watching for anyone but a twelve-year-old who wants to see robots hit each other, and we scored it 38. Stanley Tucci's scenes as the industrialist building his own robots are the one good reason to sit through the middle. The rest is 165 minutes of noise in which we could rarely tell who was standing where.

**How long is Transformers: Age of Extinction, and what is it rated?**

*Transformers: Age of Extinction* runs 2h 45m. It is a science fiction and action film.

**Where can I watch Transformers: Age of Extinction in Israel?**

*Transformers: Age of Extinction* is available to rent from Apple TV from ₪16.90. Availability is checked daily; the links above go straight to each service.

**How violent or frightening is Transformers: Age of Extinction, and is it suitable for children?**

*Transformers: Age of Extinction* is a 12A, and we think that is fair: the violence is robots breaking cities and each other, loud and constant but not bloody or frightening in a way that would trouble a child of twelve. The real hazard is the running time, which at 165 minutes will wear down a young viewer long before anything on screen does.

**What should I watch after Transformers: Age of Extinction?**

After *Transformers: Age of Extinction*, try [*Pacific Rim*](https://film.one/film/pacific-rim) (2013, Fi1m 70): Giant robots hit giant monsters and you can always tell which is which. Then [*The Iron Giant*](https://film.one/film/the-iron-giant) (1999, Fi1m 88): A boy, a robot and a small town, done with feeling in under ninety minutes; and [*Shin Godzilla*](https://film.one/film/shin-godzilla) (2016, Fi1m 74): Japan’s answer to the city-smashing film, with committee meetings as the action.

### Reviews we read (24)

- **Variety**, Maggie Lee (70/100, inferred): Lee finds the film an exhilarating spectacle, though its human characters and plot are weak. She praises the robots’ expressive physicality and the vivid Hong Kong locations. [Read](https://variety.com/2014/film/asia/film-review-transformers-age-of-extinction-1201238365/)
- **Evening Standard**, Charlotte O'Sullivan (65/100, inferred): O'Sullivan finds the film's chaotic, franchise-sized spectacle entertaining despite its muddled plot and relentless excess. She particularly praises Bay's frenetic visual effects and the fun of the film's disorienting action. [Read](https://www.standard.co.uk/culture/film/transformers-age-of-extinction-review-9599420.html)
- **Los Angeles Times**, Betsy Sharkey (65/100, inferred): Sharkey calls it a better Transformers film, though still not a great one. She praises the increasingly clear, technically impressive action battles, while noting the weak humor and overstuffed story. [Read](https://www.latimes.com/entertainment/movies/la-et-mn-transformers-review-20140627-column.html)
- **Screen Daily**, James Marsh (64/100, inferred): The page identifies this as a review, but the review text is hidden behind a paywall. Its verdict and any specific praise or complaint are unavailable in the provided content. [Read](https://www.screendaily.com/transformers-age-of-extinction/5073412.article)
- **Film Comment**, Kevin B. Lee (63/100, inferred): The available page shell does not reveal the critic’s verdict. Its standfirst focuses on the interlocking parts of the fourth installment. [Read](https://www.filmcomment.com/review-transformers-4-age-of-extinction/)
- **Little White Lies**, David Ehrlich (4/3/3): Ehrlich finds the film messy and regressive but too wildly unpredictable to dismiss. He singles out its transparent portrayal of blockbuster globalism, especially the China-set final hour, as fascinating. [Read](https://lwlies.com/reviews/transformers-age-of-extinction)
- **Radio Times**, Alan Jones (3/5): Jones finds this the longest and most wearisome Transformers sequel yet. He singles out its impressive action sequences, including those set in Monument Valley and Hong Kong. [Read](https://www.radiotimes.com/movie-guide/b-4iicq4/transformers-age-of-extinction/)
- **Time Out**, Joshua Rothkopf (3/5): The review gives the film three out of five, indicating a mixed verdict. The available text highlights Bay’s earlier Pain & Gain for its performances and satirical bite, but the full review is unavailable. [Read](https://www.timeout.com/movies/transformers-age-of-extinction)
- **The AV Club**, Ignatiy Vishnevetsky (C-): Vishnevetsky finds the film joyless and creatively exhausted, with its action mostly running on autopilot. He praises the visually distinctive KSI headquarters and the biomechanical spaceship sequence as rare moments when the movie comes alive. [Read](https://www.avclub.com/transformers-age-of-extinction-runs-on-fumes-1798180790)
- **Total Film**, Kevin Harley (2/5): Harley judges the film stale and overstuffed, arguing that it squanders the chance to reinvent the franchise. He singles out the weak human characters and small ideas, which are overwhelmed by familiar Bay excesses. [Read](https://www.gamesradar.com/transformers-age-extinction-review/)
- **The New Yorker**, Richard Brody (35/100, inferred): Brody finds brief excitement in the film but ultimately sees its meticulous craft overwhelmed by vulgar excess and poor taste. He praises Bay’s fluid integration of effects and live action, while faulting his lack of visual insight. [Read](https://www.newyorker.com/culture/richard-brody/michael-bays-meticulous-excess)
- **The Guardian**, Peter Bradshaw (30/100, inferred): Bradshaw finds the film wearing, ridiculous, and overlong, with only occasional humour. He singles out Stanley Tucci’s unexpectedly droll performance as a glimmer of comic relief. [Read](https://www.theguardian.com/film/2014/jul/10/transformers-age-of-extinction-review-michael-bay)
- **The Hollywood Reporter**, Clarence Tsui (30/100, inferred): The critic finds the film dull and bloated, a disappointing attempt to revive the franchise. Stanley Tucci’s comic performance is singled out as a highlight, while the underwritten human characters draw criticism. [Read](https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/movies/movie-reviews/transformers-age-extinction-film-review-713864/)
- **Slant Magazine**, Eric Henderson (1/4): Henderson finds the film monotonous and sluggish, criticizing its spectacle for failing to deliver excitement. He singles out Bay’s framing of the human protagonists as evidence of the director’s lack of genuine wonder. [Read](https://www.slantmagazine.com/film/transformers-age-of-extinction/)
- **Empire**, Owen Williams (20/100, inferred): Williams finds the film bloated, incoherent, and tiresome despite its enormous scale. He singles out Stanley Tucci as the standout, while criticizing the weak plotting and largely pointless human characters. [Read](https://www.empireonline.com/movies/reviews/transformers-age-extinction-review/)
- **Vulture**, David Edelstein (20/100, inferred): Edelstein calls the film a shambles, criticizing its incoherent script and exhausting length. He praises Bay’s ravishing, layered images and the film’s striking CGI action sequences. [Read](https://www.vulture.com/2014/06/movie-review-transformers-age-of-extinction-is-a-shambles.html)
- **The Playlist** (64/100, inferred): The URL identifies this as a review, but the review text is inaccessible. Its verdict and any specific praise or complaint cannot be determined from the available page. [Read](https://theplaylist.net/review-michael-bays-transformers-age-of-extinction-starring-mark-wahlberg-20140626/)
- **Digital Spy**, Ben Rawson-Jones (50/100, inferred): The critic finds the film occasionally enjoyable as spectacle, but weighed down by weak characterization, messy plotting, and crude gender politics. The large-scale set pieces and technical craft are singled out for praise, especially an effective escape sequence aboard an Autobot ship. [Read](https://www.digitalspy.com/movies/a581402/transformers-age-of-extinction-review-can-wahlberg-save-the-day/)
- **Den of Geek**, Mike Cecchini (2/5): The review finds the film a satisfying spectacle for franchise fans but says it ultimately collapses under its own excess. It praises the robots’ visuals and Dinobots while criticizing the 166-minute runtime and repetitive human story. [Read](https://www.denofgeek.com/movies/transformers-age-of-extinction-review/)
- **Paste**, Mark Rozeman (3.2/10): Rozeman finds the film an overlong, tedious retread whose “dumb fun” defense has worn thin. He singles out Stanley Tucci for bringing welcome energy and humor to the cast. [Read](https://www.pastemagazine.com/movies/transformers-age-of-extinction)
- **Consequence**, Dominick Suzanne-Mayer (10/100, inferred): The critic finds the film overlong, incoherent, and unpleasantly self-serious, arguing it has lost the earlier entries’ appeal. They single out its relentless product placement and franchise-as-brand priorities as especially distracting. [Read](https://consequence.net/2014/06/film-review-transformers-age-of-extinction/)
- **Eye for Film**, David Graham (10/100, inferred): Graham finds the film overwhelmingly tedious and convoluted, calling for the franchise to stop. He grants that some action set-pieces and occasional childish humor work, but complains that the effects, editing, and endless battles leave the experience deadening. [Read](https://www.eyeforfilm.co.uk/review/transformers-age-of-extinction-2014-film-review-by-david-graham)
- **/Film**, David Chen (10/100, inferred): Chen delivers a strongly negative verdict, arguing that the film is anti-cinema and built to maximize commerce. He especially criticizes its blatant product placement and action figures taking precedence over coherent storytelling and character development. [Read](https://www.slashfilm.com/532552/transformers-age-extinction-film-as-commerce/)
- **The Wrap**, Alonso Duralde (10/100, inferred): The critic condemns the film as a punishing, incoherent spectacle that leaves little but commercial excess. They praise the robots’ improved visual clarity, but single out the disorienting editing as a major flaw. [Read](https://www.thewrap.com/transformers-age-of-extinction-review-clang-clang-clang-went-the-robots/)

## Details

- **Director:** Michael Bay
- **Director:** Michael Bay
- **Writer:** Ehren Kruger
- **Cinematography:** Amir Mokri
- **Editor:** William Goldenberg, Paul Rubell, Roger Barton
- **Music:** Steve Jablonsky
- **Production design:** Jeffrey Beecroft
- **Costume design:** Marie-Sylvie Deveau
- **Producer:** Tom DeSanto, Don Murphy, Lorenzo di Bonaventura
- **Cast:** Mark Wahlberg as Cade Yeager; Peter Cullen as Optimus Prime (voice); Stanley Tucci as Joshua Joyce; Kelsey Grammer as Harold Attinger; Nicola Peltz as Tessa Yeager; Jack Reynor as Shane Dyson; Frank Welker as Galvatron (voice); Sophia Myles as Darcy Tirrel
- **Runtime:** 2h 45m
- **First release (Belgium):** 25 June 2014
- **Genres:** Science Fiction, Action, Adventure
- **Budget:** $210 million
- **Box office:** $1.11 billion
- **Trailer:** https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S30VkLn5a2o

## Where to watch in Israel

- Apple TV: rent ₪16.90, hd
- Apple TV: buy ₪34.90, sd

*Checked 2026-10-05.*

Also available in: AE, AR, AT, AU, BE, BG, BR, CA, CH, CL, CO, CZ, DE, DK, EC, EE, ES, FI, FR, GB, GR, HK, HR, HU, ID, IE, IL, IN, IT, JP, KR, LT, MX, MY, NL, NO, NZ, PA, PE, PH, PL, PT, RO, RS, SE, SG, SI, TH, TR, UA, US, VN, ZA. Add `?region=XX` to this URL for another country.

## Awards

- Kids' Choice Award for Favorite Movie 2015: Kids' Choice Award for Favorite Movie (nominated)

## If you liked this

- *Transformers* (2007): The first one, when the joke was still a boy and his car
- *Pacific Rim* (2013), Fi1m 70: Giant robots hit giant monsters and you can always tell which is which — [Fi1m page](https://film.one/film/pacific-rim.md)
- *The Iron Giant* (1999), Fi1m 88: A boy, a robot and a small town, done with feeling in under ninety minutes — [Fi1m page](https://film.one/film/the-iron-giant.md)
- *Shin Godzilla* (2016), Fi1m 74: Japan’s answer to the city-smashing film, with committee meetings as the action — [Fi1m page](https://film.one/film/shin-godzilla.md)
- *Mad Max: Fury Road* (2015), Fi1m 88: Two hours of vehicles destroying each other, every cut legible from the back row — [Fi1m page](https://film.one/film/mad-max-fury-road.md)

---
© Fi1m Ltd. Written by AI under a human editor; checked against sources before publication. Quote with attribution and a link to the canonical URL. Canonical: https://film.one/film/transformers-age-of-extinction