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[Bay Talks 'Pearl Harbor']
Helmer Michael Bay is talking about his upcoming Pearl Harbor project, which had to go through a number of major hoops to get made.
While talking to Hollywood Reporter columnist Martin Grove, Bay spoke of how his film compared to other recent big budgeters, saying, "It's kind of a funny term to describe a movie because when you look at movies like The Grinch, that's a higher budgeted movie. You look at Titanic (which) was green lit at $100 million or $110 million. It went to $200 million and something. We were green lit at $135 million and we had a $5 million cushion, which made it $140 million. We came in at $140 million. They also put the caveat (in the deal) that I was responsible for all the overages. So I can assure you that I would come in on budget. But we had a lot of prep time to make sure that (it could be done on budget). We had about a year of prep time."
While talking to the Wall Street Journal, Bay spoke of his fear son set regarding the budget and his own obligations, saying, "I'm thinking this movie can go $10 million over budget in a heartbeat. You can have a hiccup, and I'm going to be financing Disney's movie."
Bay notes that he had another, smaller project in mind as his next film. He says it was Disney's then studio chairman Joe Roth that got the ball rolling on the project. Bay explains, "I had a deal with Disney and I said, 'Joe, I don't really have a movie that I like that's over at your studio and I'm going to go do Phone Booth with Will Smith. It's a little teeny tiny movie. We're going to do it for $10 million.' Joe Roth wasn't too happy with that. He said, 'Come by my office and we're going to pitch you 20 things.' And, literally, the twentieth thing was a guy raising his hand, who was a friend of mine, and saying, 'Would you like to do a movie on Pearl Harbor? Something that would involve a love story.'
"My first thought was, 'Who would be crazy enough to attempt to do a movie like this of this scale and scope?' Pearl Harbor hasn't been attempted since Tora! Tora! Tora!, which was, what, 30 years ago. I said, 'The battleships don't exist anymore. There's only one original Flying Zero left in the world. But, you know what, I'll entertain it.' Actually, Jerry Bruckheimer was interested in this idea, as well, (and so was) Randall Wallace, the writer of Braveheart. Basically, they gave us a lot of reading material for Pearl Harbor. We came together about a week later totally fascinated with the idea. But my challenge was to see if I could even recreate this. So I got on a plane and flew to Ford Island, where most of the attack happened at Pearl Harbor. I was surprised to see that the base was basically left intact. The bullet holes are still left in the ground from the Zeroes when they were strafing. They leave all the bullet holes in the walls as a reminder. It's a very hallowed ground to the American military. And the bases are some of the prettiest I've ever seen. It just had a great period feel."
Bay started to believe he could actually do this film. He says, "It then came down to, 'Digitally, what could we create?' Through investigation I found a World War II aircraft carrier that I needed for the movie as well as an Arizona class battleship that was in Texas. It's in Houston and is called the U.S.S. Texas. From there I started to have meetings at ILM (Industrial Light and Magic) to see what we can use real and what we can create digitally. It would only work if it was dead real. From there they showed me Saving Private Ryan. There are about 85 effects shots in the movie and they showed me how they recreated the battle and they did it so realistic. But what I was asking for was a much bigger scope of a movie because this is, basically, an air (and) battleship war where the fleet is sinking right in front of your eyes. They proved to me that they could digitally recreate some of this stuff. The technology has advanced each year so much more than like what you had in Titanic. The water's gotten better. Digitally, you're able to build a portion of the ship and extend the rest out."
Bay also wanted to shoot on the spot where it really happened, which required getting the approval of the U.S. Navy.
"The admirals there were saying, 'You know what, we're gonna have to divert nuclear subs. We have a huge exercise where different fleets from around the world come together. We don't know if we have enough time to help you with your movie.'" reveals the helmer.
Then Bay showed them animatic of a bird's eye view of a bomb dropping down on the harbor, a scene which has made its way into the film's trailer. Bay continues, "Once we showed them the cartoon -- the cartoon had some music to it, some Thin Red Line music -- there were tears in their eyes. The attack happened a hundred feet outside their office. The weight of the movie is what got them caught up (in helping with the project). I said to the admirals, 'You know, it's very easy for you to say no because it's going to take a lot of extra work. But I guarantee you that once this movie's done you will feel proud you did it.' We involved all the men and women on the base. We used them as extras. We used their kids. The Pentagon gave us amazing support with some naval historians and army historians. There was a whole camaraderie thing that came about on the base."
Still, in the midst of all this, the money issue remained hanging over the production.
According to the Wall Street Journal, and as previously reported, Joe Roth split from Disney leaving Peter Schneider to take his place. In the early development of the film, when the budget was being estimated at over $200M, Schneider suggested that Bay be given his leave in favor of a director who could craft the film on a smaller budget. Word has it that Jerry Bruckheimer threatened to walk if Bay was axed, thus ending that.
In addition, in order to save on money, Disney wanted Bay to scuttle the Doolittle raid on Japan at the film's finale. This and the studio's demand that the helmer bring in the picture with a PG-13 rating rather than an R threatened to capsize the project with word that Bay was contemplating walking. Bay eventually won on the Doolittle front, but the film will be PG-13.
Still, though Bay got Doolittle, the studio demanded and got a studio executive on the set whose daily task was to watch the film's budget, which would seem to be stepping on the toes of Bruckheimer's responsibilities.
Still, though he could have saved money by shooting the film somewhere else, Bay sizes it up with Grove, saying, "I was directing one day and sitting in my director's chair and leaning over and just seeing the bullet strafing marks right under my feet, there was (such) a magical feeling of shooting right where it happened."
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