Yesterday, the word going around was that Michael Bay had apologized for Armageddon, and that sparked a small-scale fan outcry that their hero would dare apologize for one of his greatest triumphs, because let’s be honest, people have a lot of time on their hands. Here’s the original quote, from the Miami Herald, which was widely cited:
“I will apologize for Armageddon, because we had to do the whole movie in 16 weeks. It was a massive undertaking. That was not fair to the movie. I would redo the entire third act if I could. But the studio literally took the movie away from us. It was terrible. My visual effects supervisor had a nervous breakdown, so I had to be in charge of that. I called James Cameron and asked ‘What do you do when you’re doing all the effects yourself?’ But the movie did fine.”
But context is important, because what he was actually talking about was specific to editing – which someone else did – and not the movie as a whole. As you’d know if you’d read the previous paragraph:
“It’s really funny,” he says. “People have always given me a hard time on my editing. But if you could do a graph on my movies, you would see how my editing has slowed down over the years. Bad Boys was my first movie, and we cut that quite fast. Back then it was very new for action. Now you see a lot of that imitated. Call it what you will. Yes, critics have given me s–t about it. But when you watch the Bourne Identity movies, they are cut way faster.
You really think Michael Bay would apologize for an entire movie? As a wise Michael Bay fan named Michael Bay once said, “I don’t change my style for anybody. Pussies do that.” But because of all the busybodies in the lamestream media, Michael Bay was forced to clarify his comments, which he did on his forum:
One press writer has gone too far in reporting false information. He has printed the bare minimum of my statement which in effect have twisted my words and meaning. I’m not in the slightest going to apologize for the third movie in my movie career, a film called Armageddon. On the red carpet for Pain & Gain some reporters asked me what are you apologizing for, and I said what on earth are you talking about?
What I clearly said to the reporter, is I wish I had more time to edit the film, specifcally the the third act. He asked me in effect what would you change if you could in your movies if you could go back. I said, I wish we had a few more weeks in the edit room on Armageddon. And still today Armageddon, is still one of the most shown movies on cable TV. And yes, I’m proud of the movie. Enough said.
Michael
Truly, I can’t get enough of Michael Bay’s tough-guy prose. “Hey, queers. I’m awesome. Sincerely, Michael Bay. (*explosion sound*)”
I like to imagine that he writes these while flexing at himself in the mirror like American Psycho. Anyway, I’m glad Michael Bay didn’t apologize for Armageddon. Armageddon is exactly the type of movie Michael Bay should be making – grandiose, cheesy, and unabashedly earnest in its attempt at “epic cinema.” If anything, he should apologize for all his attempts at comedy, throughout Transformers and in his latest incarnation as the gaudy Tarantino. A person who takes himself as seriously as Michael Bay just isn’t going to be that funny. At least, not intentionally.