On the occasion of the release of “Ambulance”, a look back at the filmography of the pope of demolition: Michael Bay. Focus on the five best feature films by a true artist of action and excess.
5 – Ambulance (2022)
The last film of Michael Bay which has just landed in dark rooms, Ambulance ranks immediately among the best feature films of its director. Between two totally bewildering shots for which he has fun like a child with his drones, the filmmaker puts on solid entertainment, never deviating from his intrigue capable of holding on a Post-It.
After bad boys and Pearl Harbor, Michael Bay looks again at an explosive confrontation between two “brothers”. Following a heist gone wrong, Danny and William Sharp (Jake Gyllenhaal and Yahya Abdul-Mateen II) flee the bank and rob it in an ambulance, taking an injured police officer hostage. and a nurse, Cam (Eiza González). Then begins a long chase in the gigantic arteries of Los Angeles.
Betting on a story told in real-time, Ambulance proves to be significantly more effective than 6 Underground. Michael Bay focuses on the oppositions between its three main characters and above all on the action. Besides the tense escape from the bank, the director continuously exploits the city environment, starting with its infinite roads, to offer a spectacle of rare generosity to the spectator. Finding the seriousness of 13 Hours without renouncing the joyful artifices that make up his identity, the filmmaker abandons the patriotic tone of this previous film, preferring to focus on more troubled protagonists who rush towards death with their feet on the floor.
4 – No Pain No Gain (2013)
No Pain No Gain is probably Michael Bay’s funniest feature film. The film tells the true story of three bodybuilders ready to do anything to achieve their American dream: Daniel Lugo (Mark Wahlberg), Adrian Doorbal (Anthony Mackie), and Paul Doyle (Dwayne Johnson). Determined to access a better life, that is to say, to enrich themselves, the muscular kidnaps the businessman Victor Kershaw (Tony Shalhoub) to try to recover all his goods as well as his fortune. But Kershaw is tough and refuses to back down. To make him crack, his captors start torturing him in many ways.
Michael Bay plumbs the depths of stupidity with No Pain No Gain. Sublimated by three unleashed actors, including a Mark Wahlberg who has rarely been so furious, the feature film reveals an accumulation of increasingly stupid decisions, which in turn leaves the spectator speechless and hilarious. A fascinating study of stupidity into which the filmmaker breathes a permanent and almost exhausting energy, which fits perfectly with the winning philosophy of its protagonists, the film also gives a glimpse of the brilliant career that Dwayne Johnson could have had if he had was not lost in the chain of family entertainment.
3 – Armageddon (1998)
An asteroid is about to hit Earth. To avoid the impact, NASA believes it is necessary to place a nuclear charge in the heart of this planet destroyer. The agency, therefore, enlists Harry Stamper (Bruce Willis), the best oil driller in the world, to send him into space so that he can dig a hole deep enough with his men. Not bothering with any scientific relevance, Armageddon allows its lead actor to continue saving the world with panache.
Michael Bay’s passion for mass destruction is felt through the first impressive scenes, where a meteor shower notably comes down on New York. There follows a patriotic spectacle rocked by the heroic score of Trevor Rabin, during which drillers are trained in record time to become astronauts and where their mission obviously does not go as planned. The film benefits from an imposing cast (Liv Tyler, Ben Affleck, Steve Buscemi, Billy Bob Thornton, Owen Wilson…) and ends in dripping of feelings able to draw tears with each viewing. Before the love triangle, Pearl HarborMichael Bay is already keen to let it be known that he has a heart.
2 – Bad Boys II (2003)
Feelings, yes, but not too much either. After delving into World War II and trying his hand at melodrama with Pearl Harbor, which remains remembered for its war scenes despite its many flaws, Michael Bay no longer sets any limits. To this day, Bad Boys II remains the craziest, most vulgar (even if Transformers 2: Revenge is a serious competitor) and most outrageous feature film from its director.
Between two scabrous jokes about Mike Lowrey’s (Will Smith) mistake of having shot his partner Marcus Burnett (Martin Lawrence) in the buttocks, the filmmaker films a phenomenal chase signs his best low-angle shots on his two heroes concerned reveals strange pat-downs in a morgue and offers an explosive trip to Cuba. A hysterical work, completely crazy, which goes in all directions but never forgets to treat the bromance of its two characters in full crisis.
1 – Rock (1996)
For his second film, Michael Bay brings together a prodigious cast and develops a superb unexpected duo, formed by Sean Connery and Nicolas Cage. The first embodies John Patrick Mason, a former spy in the service of Her Majesty (well, well…), imprisoned for many years after discovering several major state secrets. A tailor-made role for the former interpreter of James Bond. The second lends his features to Stanley Goodspeed, a specialist in chemical weapons.
Together, they will have to infiltrate Alcatraz penitentiary, from which Mason is one of the few inmates who managed to escape. Their goal: to stop General Francis Hummel (Ed Harris) and his men, who are holding hostages in the prison and threatening to destroy San Francisco by detonating missiles loaded with poison gas on the city.
A film of a formidable efficiency, where the phlegm of Sean Connery fits perfectly with the sweet madness of Nicolas Cage, and where Ed Harris reveals particularly touching flaws. An impeccable trio surrounded by many familiar faces (Michael Biehn, William Forsythe, David Morse) carries Rock, where all the cinema of Michael Bay is already present: his filmmaking tics, his taste for chases in crowded environments, his ability to develop friendships in the middle of the action and his penchant for heightened emotions, which he is one of the few to master at this point in his register.
