Director goes from award winning commercials to in-your-face action movie.

Orange County Register
Author: Barry Koltnow
(c)1996 Knight-Ridder/Tribune News Service

Michael Bay is that rare Hollywood director whose movies have to live up to the promise of his commercials.

The director, whose "The Rock" opens Friday with Sean Connery and Nicolas Cage, got his start in music videos and commercials. His most famous commercial the Aaron Burr ``Got Milk'' spot won him a coveted Clio, the advertising world's equivalent of an Oscar.

"When I got that campaign, I was embarrassed,'' said Bay, 32. ``I had a reputation for being an edgy director so what the heck was I going to do with milk?''

As it turned out, he did the commercial his way, and he went on to make several other milk commercials, including the one in which the young priest kicks the milk machine and the one that spoofs the classic film 'Lifeboat.'

``I love doing commercials and I plan to do more this summer,'' he said. ``They are a great training ground for making films, and I think I'm the director I am today because of what I learned doing those commercials.

``I learned many of my guerrilla techniques on commercials and music videos. When they asked me if I could handle the tough shooting schedule on `Bad Boys,' I told them I had more set experience than most movie directors twice my age.''

The Los Angeles native attended Wesleyan University in Connecticut, hoping to become a professional photographer. By the time he graduated, he had grown bored with the idea of still photography and shifted his career focus to film.

After being rejected by the well-known University of Southern California film school, he attended the less-known but respected Art Center College of Design in Pasadena.

At age 24, he helped found Propaganda Films and started doing commercial work and videos. Among the artists featured in his videos were Donny Osmond, Meat Loaf and Tina Turner.

After he was named the youngest recipient of the Director's Guild of America's commercial director of the year award in 1995, he was picked by producers Don Simpson and Jerry Bruckheimer to direct the Will Smith-Martin Lawrence action flick "Bad Boys.''

"I didn't have a lot of money for art direction and editing and I had to compete with the $120 million Arnold Schwarzenegger movie `True Lies,' which was coming out at the same time, so I used everything I ever learned in videos and commercials on 'Bad Boys.'"

"I made fast cuts and shook the camera; anything to make it look different.''

In his second film, "The Rock,'' Bay found himself short on time, not money.

"Our original release date was July 12 and then suddenly they told me we had to be ready by June 7,'' he said. "You wouldn't believe what we've been doing to get this film ready.''

The movie takes place on Alcatraz Island, but there are some scenes in San Francisco, and Bay said he couldn't resist the opportunity to put his own spin on the classic San Francisco car-chase scene, immortalized in the 1968 Steve McQueen film "Bullitt.''

"Our chase scene wasn't even in the script but I had to do it,'' Bay said. ``Besides, I thought we needed more action scenes in the movie. We had a cool setup (renegade U.S. Marines take over the abandoned prison and threaten to nuke San Francisco) but we're a big summer action movie and we need a lot of action.

"So I approached that car chase like I approach all my work: aggressive and in-your-face. I guarantee you've never seen a chase like this.''