I think the problem isn't writing - the script is pretty thorough and smart.
Just yesterday I watched the Blu-ray and it includes an hour-long documentary about the making of the film. The screenwriters come across as very smart, articulate guys who definitely know what they wanted to say.
The problem is direction. Everyone in the doc says the crime is horrible, but everyone also says it is so stupid, there is no other way to make the film other than as a black comedy.
They are probably correct, the problem is the overall style - Bay shoots the film as if it was just another random action comedy of his. As if it was Bad Boys, Transformers, or whatever else. He didn't adjust his style one single bit and therefore, he treats the entire thing as an OTT action circus with cool camera shots, shiny cars, color filters, etc. The performances aren't civil and grounded, but OTT caricatures.
Bay simply knows only one way to shoot and that's how he shoots everything, regardless of the topic. If he had done Schindler's list, Amon Goeth would be shooting Jews from the balcony with the camera rotating around him and a beautiful sunset in the background.
And that's why the movie felt inappropriate - there was no sense of treating these criminals and crimes as something despicable and serious. It was all just crazy, OTT fun. Which is almost insulting if you think about it.
Something like Fargo would be more appropriate IMO. That was also about a heinous crime which turned absurdly and darkly comical, but it didn't turn the entire story into a flashy circus.
Laura:You left a dead prostitute buried alone in the desert?
Kyle:She's not alone.
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Intothenightalone
8 years ago
But the dialogue is clearly a comedy (unless they changed the original script). Returning the chainsaw and a joke about you would have been better off buying an extended warranty?
"that's a con"
and they get it for free anyway? that's a good joke, but maybe out of place when trying to dismember a woman and her hair is in the chainsaw?
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TheGreatGeekGod
8 years ago
Well the returning the chainsaw did happen in real life, and I belief the blood was still on it when they returned it. The dialogue probably wasn't exact but some of the most hilariously insane moments in the really did happen, or were at least planned in some way, they didn't actually dressed as ninjas, but that was one of their plans in real life. It's an insane story.
Plus it did show how twisted the american dream and excess can get, it showed how Lugo's self egotistical view on how he deserves to on being successful no matter how he achieved it, it showed that Kershaw (who earned his money legitimately) was better because Lugo was so blinded by his view of the american dream that he was willing to completely destroy someone who achieve it through hard work. Lugo thought he deserve the american dream than anyone else and would manipulate and con his way to achieve it. And Lugo doesn't even understand the american dream, and it really shows the idiocy of the people who think excess is the american dream and it's sad how many people there are with that view.
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cyguration (3844)
3 years ago
This comment didn't age too well now that Bay has 13 Hours: The Secret Soldiers of Benghazi on his resume.
If you didn't know Michael Bay directed it you would never have known he directed it. It looks like a Paul Greengrass film.
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