Ok It doesn't feature any bay trademarks (low angle shots, heroic slow motion walks) But it does have over-the-top action, fast cuts, annoying supporting characters (like gilbert gottfried) actors shouting their dialogue and unfunny improvised banter which comes off as more desperate than funny.
I'm sure if Bay was making films in the 80's..this is what it would look like.
If this movie plays like a Bay movie, I would imagine this was one of the movies that inspired him, no?
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Every person that served can be called a veteran, but not every veteran can be called a Marine.
That's because Bay was preceded by Tony Scott, as the Simpson-Bruckheimer summer popcorn movie director. I like Bay, but Tony Scott was a gentleman's refined version of him, doing much of the same flashy stuff, but with more substance, style, and much earlier than he started. I'm sure he influenced Bay's work.
If anything, though, it was more the Simpson-Bruckheimer pre-requisites to be that way.
Top Gun, which Tony Scott directed, could be considered a progenitor to what you would expect from a Michael Bay movie. It has fast and frenetic editing, a huge scope, two-dimensional characters, a rock-inspired soundtrack, the emphasis on spectacle over any kind of substance, and the presentation of war and combat without any kind of emotional or social connections.
https://www.reddit.com/r/flicks/comments/4bwzjl/what_were_the_first_michael_bayesque_films/
https://www.reddit.com/r/flicks/comments/4bwzjl/what_were_the_first_michael_bayesque_films/
https://www.reddit.com/r/movies/comments/68nuj1/why_con_air_was_not_a_michael_bay_film/
https://www.reddit.com/r/movies/comments/4reivr/ode_to_simon_west_the_same_man_that_directed_con/
https://independent-magazine.org/2018/08/17/rewind-scott-rosenberg-con-air/
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I would have loved to agree with you 100 percent - until you claimed JJ Abrams is a "2 bit imitator" of Michael Bay.
I suggest you have a long hard look at Abrams' "Super 8", before you claim he has anything to do with the deplorable filmmaker that is Bay. "Super 8" is pure Spielberg-pastiche in a way someone like Bay would never have the brain power to create.
No, I was never a fan of JJ Abrams' TV show "Lost", but just because he was involved in the screenplay for "Armageddon" I would never in my wildest dreams compare his directing to Michael Bay. Abrams wrote the screenplay for Mike Nichols' "Regarding Henry" too, but I wouldn't compare him to Nichols either.
Abrams is a ten times better filmmaker than Bay.
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He needs to cut down on all the lens flares, and I think he has partly admitted he went overboard with this on some of his films. That said, I appreciate how lens flares can make CGI-heavy scenes seem more realistic (more sense that it was actually shot then and there - despite the lens flare itself being fake). I'm so sick and tired of all the CGI-use in today's movies but I welcome anything that can help ground it in reality.
I feel there is far more substance in Abrams' movies when it comes to HUMAN CHARACTERS (which in my opinion should be the backbone of any good story), for example his humorous moments rarely feel as cheesy as they tend to do in a Michael Bay-film.
Abrams was writing and producing feature films before Bay directed or produced feature films. Bay doesn't even have the talent to write screenplays, he hasn't written any of his films. Abrams has CREATED FIVE TV shows (Alias, Lost, Fringe etc) as well as producing more tv shows, including the upcoming "Westworld". He has written somewhere around 10 feature films.
His film "Super 8" (written, directed, co-produced by Abrams) alone has more HUMAN HEART than all of Bay's movies combined. I'm not a huge Abrams-fan but compared to Michael Bay he's a multi-talented genius. =P
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Tony Scott was the Michael Bay of the 1980s pretty much.
When theres no more room in Hollywood, remakes shall walk the Earth.share
I just came back here to say that Tony Scott was pretty much Michael Bay before Michael Bay. Scott in BHCII, uses a warmer color palette and a heightened style in contrast to what Martin Brest did in the first film. While it may be less gritty and realistic than the first film, it's also arguably more traditionally “cinematic.”
https://www.reddit.com/r/movies/comments/ohy9gk/beverly_hills_cop_ii_1987/
Good post, very little to add but one thought: with Scott, I can think 3 or 4 films I enjoy enough to rewatch; with Bay, there are a few films with some scenes that are enjoyable and at first watch are a bit entertaining, but seldom do I rewatch or revisit. Just my thought, but even with the action sequences Scott appears to still care about the story, as opposed to Bay, who comes off as a guy that just likes to blow up shyt. Scott’s style seems to be a bit more refined than Bay, if that’s possible…
BHC II feels different than the first, but still rewatchable and fun….still haven’t watched III, and I worked at a movie theater at the time of its release….appeared corny and seemed to lose whatever grit the first two possessed, from what little I’ve watched of III