Michael Bay
Director
6/24/09 Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen $402,111,870
7/3/07 Transformers $319,246,193
7/22/05 The Island $35,818,913
7/18/03 Bad Boys II $138,608,444
5/25/01 Pearl Harbor $198,542,554
7/1/98 Armageddon $201,578,182
6/7/96 The Rock $134,069,511
4/7/95 Bad Boys $65,807,024


Coming off of the stellar disappointment of "The Island" Michael Bay's career was in turmoil to say the least, the downturn began with the mess known as "Pearl Harbor" and continued into the incoherent "Bad Boys II", by the time "The Island" came along the public had seemingly gotten wise to Michael Bay's antics and grown tired of it. After the huge disaster that was "The Island", Michael Bay's vanity projects reached an end, he now "owed" the studio, and this debt was shortly called in by Steven Spielberg, and this is how Transformers (2007) came to be. Upon the movie's release and surprising success(it was thought of as a gamble at the time, no video game/toy property/cartoon had ever been translated very successfully, critically or financially) Michael Bay once again returned to being Hollywood's Golden Boy, his past discrepancies completely forgiven. Michael's next move film-wise was to completely reverse the goodwill he had regained with the public with the Transformers sequel(ROTFL or somethin'). Now we are approaching the third installment in the franchise, and while the first sequel was undeniably a financial success, critically it was a failure, and by critically I don't mean the snobby upper-crust that turn their nose up at anything less than Shakespeare, I mean the general movie going public. So, the question is, is DOTM already D00med due to the lack of respect shown for the audience in ROFL, and if not, if Michael delivers another 2 hours of Sam and his parents at school and 15 minutes of incoherent robot battles, will this be the final nail in the coffin?

 

I wish I could be a failure with a couple of $100M plus movies!

 

Since Revenge of the Fallen is like what, in the top ten highest grossing movies of all time, I don't think Bay's career is going anywhere.

I have complete faith in DOTM after everything we've seen.

 

ROTF wasn't a fail with the general public, as far as I can tell. Was it a good movie? God no. But, did a lot of people see it and enjoy it? Well, the box office speaks for itself, and many of the people I know irl like it still despite its faults, and are excited to see the third one.

Don't worry, DOTM is not going to fail. If the general public cared about a deep, engaging story about space robot toys, ROTF would've made ~$16 total worldwide.

 

So you post the individual profits for each film Bay has made, but then go on to say that while ROTF was hugely sucessful it was panned by critics. Why post the profit if it has nothing to do with the point you're trying to make.

Anyway, DOTM will be a sucess at the box office. Maybe not as much as ROTF, after all the negative press that film received.

I actually enjoyed The Island, but that wasn't sucessful. Does that mean it's a bad film, not in my opinion.

Bay's already stated several times that he was personally dissapointed with the way ROTF turned out, and is trying to not make the same mistakes with DOTM. At least this time there isn't the writers strike getting in the way, messing up the script like with ROTF.

I believe that DOTM will be at least as good as TF1, if not better.

 

DOTM wouldn't fail in box office, even if it's rated NC-17.

 

Corrected with worldwide figures:

6/24/09 Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen $836,297,228
7/3/07 Transformers $709,709,780
7/22/05 The Island $162,949,164
7/18/03 Bad Boys II $273,339,556
5/25/01 Pearl Harbor $449,220,945
7/1/98 Armageddon $553,709,788
6/7/96 The Rock $335,062,621
4/7/95 Bad Boys $141,407,024

That makes for a staggering $3,461,696,106 - I don't think MB needs to worry about his career anytime soon.

 

The decline of box office after Armageddon until Transformers was a part of my point, and I also liked the Island, mostly because of Scarlett Johanson. As for everyone else, yes I realize the movies made more money worldwide, what movie doesn't? The point is if he burns the audience again with DOTM, will people continue to trust his "direction"? Judging from the replies, happily.

 

Seconded.

 

I thought those figures were a bit low, especially as films like The Island were actually quite popular over here in the UK.

 

You know people still say the same thing about M. Night Shyamalan?
It's called denial.

 

You do realize that is not 100% profit right? Movies are quite expensive to produce and market. I'm sure you've heard of this.

 

^^this

 

Ummm...no, it isn't. It's #24 on the top 100 grossing movies of all time list. Though on the Domestic list it's #11, but I honestly think if we're going to rank how good a movie is based off of how much it made, than the Worldwide list is the one that should be used.

Still, both movies have made quite the sum of money. As long as Paramount thinks there's money to be made, they'll continue making sequels.

 

No. I live with my head in the sand!

 

@ the thread title: BWHAHAHAHAHAHAHA

Also, TF2 was far from a flop. It was a bad film with a lot of flaws but it still brought in the big bucks. There is no way in hell DOTM could kill his career, since there's no way it could ever fail at the box office unless it wasn't released. If ROTF didn't kill it, I don't know what can.

That is to say if DOTM is bad, which we have no idea if it will.

 

Plus Speilberg makes the odd rubbish film (War of the Worlds!) yet people dont think oh crud he made a rubbish film I'm not watching anything else.

Directors are generally judged on Box office numbers, and if he makes money, he'll still be offered films!

 

When was Bays Career ever in doubht i never remember hearing this .

The transformers films have only boosted his career now. Deff dont see it destroying it dont even get how you would asume this.

 

LOL At this thread.

 

Just wait till they really sell the 3d I'm sure the next trailer is going to show a lot of crazy stuff. In my experience I was the one hyping it up to my friends and a good mount of them liked it when I disliked it. I think that the general audience ( not us) feel more the need for him to make up for it. The general audience just wants flash, in which say what you will bout his movies but there is always something crazy and exciting things going on in a bay movie. Let's say he even sells half as many tickets it still going to be just as impressive as the 3d tickets will boost the sales dramatically. I think he will be fine where he is after dotm.