Michael Mann vs. Michael Bay vs. Michael Bolton
In a comment yesterday, Adam said that the Miami Vice movie might as well be called Bad Boys III, and if I didn't know better, his strong case would have convinced me. I was planning on evangelizing the genius of MV director Michael Mann later on in Miami Vice Month, but for now I just have to make one or two comments about Mann versus Bad Boys director Micheal Bay (pictured).
Michael Mann was the first director to put DeNiro and Pacino on the screen together at the same time -- not even Coppola did that. Early in his movie career, he directed the prequel to Silence of the Lambs. And most recently, he brought golden boy Tom Cruise to the dark side for the first time, and transformed Jamie Foxx from a Booty Caller to a perennial Oscar contender.
Michael Bay, on the other hand, directed both Bad Boys movies which were enjoyable effects-laden spectacles, but have absolutely no character presence whatsoever, and therefore no shelf life. In between those he directed The Rock, which is an undeniable combination of spectacle and character involvement. It was a sign he could be one of the greats, but then he went back to pure-spectacle-with-some-dialogue-inserted-to-fill-gaps with Armageddon and Pearl Harbor. With these, he bet on Ben Affleck twice in a row.
If that's not a sign Bay is the ultimate A-list purveyor of B-quality content, here are two more: Entourage, the new mouthpiece for what Hollywood is thinking, just ripped Bay to shreds last week when Ari told Vince Bay was going to replace James Cameron as director for the Aquaman sequel -- and Vince hung his head, ready to walk off the project. Worse yet, Michael Bay, with his sunken-in cheeks and 80s hair, looks like Michael Bolton.
This last fact alone is enough for me to pretend Michael Bay doesn't even exist -- especially when compared to Mann.
Michael Mann was the first director to put DeNiro and Pacino on the screen together at the same time -- not even Coppola did that. Early in his movie career, he directed the prequel to Silence of the Lambs. And most recently, he brought golden boy Tom Cruise to the dark side for the first time, and transformed Jamie Foxx from a Booty Caller to a perennial Oscar contender.
Michael Bay, on the other hand, directed both Bad Boys movies which were enjoyable effects-laden spectacles, but have absolutely no character presence whatsoever, and therefore no shelf life. In between those he directed The Rock, which is an undeniable combination of spectacle and character involvement. It was a sign he could be one of the greats, but then he went back to pure-spectacle-with-some-dialogue-inserted-to-fill-gaps with Armageddon and Pearl Harbor. With these, he bet on Ben Affleck twice in a row.
If that's not a sign Bay is the ultimate A-list purveyor of B-quality content, here are two more: Entourage, the new mouthpiece for what Hollywood is thinking, just ripped Bay to shreds last week when Ari told Vince Bay was going to replace James Cameron as director for the Aquaman sequel -- and Vince hung his head, ready to walk off the project. Worse yet, Michael Bay, with his sunken-in cheeks and 80s hair, looks like Michael Bolton.
This last fact alone is enough for me to pretend Michael Bay doesn't even exist -- especially when compared to Mann.
1 Comments:
True enough. In fact, directorial skill is the only real reason that the new Vice isn't simply Bad Boys III.
This also seems like a good time to point out a few other things about Bay:
1. He rips off pretty much everything you see in his movies. If he sees a photograph that he thinks is cool, he puts it in a movie. If he sees a great chase scene, boom, consider it jacked. In fact, he even stole the EXACT idea for his website from Mark Romanek (http://www.markromanek.com/), complete with the changing photos on the front page. If you check out Bay's site now (http://www.michaelbay.com/), you will still see some striking similarities. For his action scenes, he tells an assistant the general idea (car chase ending in explosion) and has them put all the best car chases and explosions on a DVD so he can lift all the best stuff out and throw it in his latest piece-of-shit movie.
2. He is the biggest asshole on planet earth. I hear Mann is a pretty big a-hole as well, but nobody holds a candle to Bay.
3. He almost got busted for ripping crap off when somebody filed a lawsuit claiming that The Island stole over 100 scenes from an old 70's sci-fi movie. The story kind of went away so either there was a settlement or Bay passed the buck on to the re-writers.
4. Due to the horrible failure of the aforementioned The Island, Bay almost lost Transformers, which is probably his last chance to leave a mark on the film industry. If he blows this, I think he's done. That said, it will probably look terrific (because he does have a pretty good eye for a shot, some incredible equipment, amazing DP's, and - of course - reels and reels of blueprints from which to work!) and make $250 million, which of course means that we will be subjected to many more Bay catastrophes in the future.
(I also want to add that while Mann has a pretty bad rep as well for being a jerk, I do love his movies. But how long are studios going to let him run long, overspend - usually by almost double the projected budget - and then fail to deliver at the box office?)
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