Infamous action jockey Michael Bay is something of an enigma in the filmmaking world. Critics tend to hate his work pretty laterally and he gets little respect as an auteur, yet his films are seen by millions of people and make millions upon millions of dollars. His Transformers films alone are discussed endlessly by just about everyone under the age of 30 on the internet, and I know many people who own several Bay films in home video, despite an open loathing for the director. Never has the financial success and cultural presence of a filmmaker been so inversely proportional with their popularity as an artist. Bay’s movies are simultaneously hated and universally seen.
What’s more, Bay has not come across as the most sensitive or humble man in interviews, usually talking only about how much he loves explosions and action, rarely addressing things like character, plot, or theme. He openly uses his films’ financial success to gain validation as a talent. Bay is often the go-to name for anyone looking for an archetypal Hollywood hack.
This means, of course, that it’s high time Trolling defended the man. We won’t rest until we’ve pissed off every single person in the world! Bay, so often accused of being a talentless Hollywood hack without a humble bone in his body, may actually be a stirring talent and one of the most important figures working in modern Hollywood. Indeed, let us posit that Michael Bay RULES! Let’s take a look at a few reasons why…
Bay’s films are sometimes clunky, often chaotic, usually obvious, sometimes sexist, and might be accused of jingoism, but you cannot deny the sheer force of popular power the man seems to wield. He knows how to gather a crowd. And, at the end of the day, he is probably the single best proprietor of explosions working today. He is enthused about action, and can wrangle some of the biggest productions in Hollywood. He is a master.
Until next week, let the hate mail flow.
Witney Seibold is a featured contributor on the CraveOnline Film Channel, and co-host of The B-Movies Podcast. You can read his weekly articles Trolling, Free Film School and The Series Project, and follow him on “Twitter” at @WitneySeibold, where he is slowly losing his mind.
8 Reasons Why Michael Bay RULES!
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He Took Action Filmmaking to a New Level
When Michael Bay first emerged in the mid-1990s, action films – even big event films – were relatively modest affairs. Sure, the was the occasional Terminator 2 along the way, but most action films of the time were more along the lines of, say, Judge Dredd. What Michael Bay did with films like Bad Boys and The Rock was turn action into more of an extravaganza, more of an event, more explosive, and more melodramatic. By 1998's Armageddon, Bay had set the new filmmaking idiom: bigger budgets, long runtimes, and even more stars. As such, effects-based action films have become the new central paradigm of blockbuster thinking. If you have liked any action film made since 1996, you owe a debt to Michael Bay.
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He is Consistent
Whatever you think of his actual movies, you have to admit that Bay has an idiosyncratic visual panache that is markedly his. The orange-saturated sunsets, the helicopters, the swirling spinning camera movements, the sweaty-looking closeups, the weapons fetish. These are all Bay trademarks, and are clearly the result of a man with a singular visual style. And it goes beyond his action sequences. All of Bay's films have a similar tone as well. Anyone who can repeatedly wrangle giant action blockbusters, and make them all feel equally alike clearly has a clarity of vision only usually assigned to great talents.
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He is an Auteur
Bay's films are, at their heart, all about the same thing: patriotism. Bay is an unabashedly enthused American patriot who relishes in American iconography and, more importantly, American ideals. He tends to fetishize the American military and lionize blue-collar workers, but he never turns them into buffoons, often citing – in one way or another – that the American dream is alive and well in this world. Or perhaps he allows America to speak through bold heroes like Bruce Willis and Nicolas Cage. And while he's not exactly known for finesse and subtlety, Bay is still making a comment here: that, without irony or hatred, America is a righteous place.
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He Has a Sense of Humor
Unlike the relentlessly dour James Cameron (whose True Lies remains his only film with even a scrap of levity) Michael Bay is always energetic and upbeat. Bad Boys proved to be a buddy cop movie loaded with snappy banter, The Rock had its share of barbs, The Island showed Ewan McGregor awkwardly and hilariously kissing for the first time, and the Transformers films are full of slapstick, giggles, and a scene where John Malkovich gets his tummy tickled by a robot monster. These are all amusing things. I'd rather see a lighthearted and fun action film than one that is bleak, dark, and ponderous.
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He Has a Sense of Humor About Himself
And lest you accuse Bay of being a blustering blowhard who all-too-blindly hungrily pushes his overblown action schtick on audiences, unaware of the place he occupies in the public and critical eye, you should perhaps think of Pain & Gain. Bay's 2012 film was a comedy about excess akin to Martin Scorsese's The Wolf of Wall Street, and was a clever sendup of the excessive patriotism he perhaps included in his previous films. He also once starred in a television commercial wherein he playfully hammered away at the word “awesome,” acknowledging that, yes, he knows what he does it often over-the-top. You can't deny that he's self-aware. And that's an admirable trait in Hollywood.
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He Knows What's Sexy
Michael Bay started his career shooting Playboy videos, and, wow does he ever know how to photograph a model. Most of the women in his films are attractive models, and his experience in the field of sexy ladies has allowed him to develop an eye for it. And while his female characters may not be all that rich or strong, there is a pure aesthetic strength and professional panache to the way he films them. He then extends that occasionally to sexy men (see Pain & Gain) giving human flesh a perfect sweaty sheen. Yes, there is an integrity to that.
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He Was Funny in Mystery Men
And extending back to that sense of humor about himself, Michael Bay appeared in one of the best superhero films ever made – 1999's Mystery Men – playing a parody of himself. Bay, in a cameo, played the head of an evil supervillain clique called The Frat Boys, whose only line was “Can we bring the brewskis?” Tell me that's not funny.
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Hey, You Keep Seeing His Movies
Whatever anyone says about how awful Bay is (and a litany of such things could easily be constructed), they need to remember one salient fact: He is undeniably popular. Popularity doesn't necessarily make him good, but it does prove one thing: he knows how to make films people want to see. All of Bay's films – even the maligned Pearl Harbor – have been hugely successful. Teenage boys, genre fans, and human beings the world over are inextricably drawn to Bay's hypercharged action spectaculars. You've probably seen a few, if not all of his movies. If you keep going back, then he must be doing something to keep you interested. And that's a talent even some of Hollywood's most stalwart auteurs don't possess.
