I apologize if this sounds like faint praise, but let me provide some perspective. The second of Mr. Bay’s “Transformers” movies, “Revenge of the Fallen,” released in 2009, struck me as not only the worst movie of that year — measured in raw box office dollars, it was certainly among the most popular — but also as irrefutable evidence that our once proud civilization was in a state of precipitous decline. Perhaps my own enjoyment of “Dark of the Moon” is further evidence. I can’t decide if this movie is so spectacularly, breathtakingly dumb as to induce stupidity in anyone who watches, or so brutally brilliant that it disarms all reason. What’s the difference?
