Steven Spielberg Told Michael Bay To Stop Making Transformers Movies

Ambulance director Michael Bay has revealed that Hollywood legend Steven Spielberg advised him to stop making the Transformers movies. Ambulance is director Bay’s latest venture in action movies. The film, based upon the Danish film written by Laurits Munch-Petersen and Lars Andreas Pedersen, tells the story of two robbers who steal an ambulance as a getaway vehicle after one of their bank heists goes horribly wrong. Ambulance stars Jake Gyllenhaal, Yahya Abdul-Mateen II and Eiza González, and is set to be released on April 8th.

Bay is one of the biggest names in action filmmaking, and is perhaps known no better than for his Transformers movies based on the popular action figures and cartoon of the same name. Between 2007 and 2017, Bay directed a total of five Transformers movies, with the first three starring Shia LaBeouf, and the final two starring Mark Wahlberg. While most viewers agree that the films dropped in quality after the third film, Dark of the Moon, Bay continued to churn out sequels, which in turn continued to make large amounts of money. While Bay left the director’s chair after the fifth film, the series still produced a spinoff entitled Bumblebee which was helmed by Kubo and the Two Strings director Travis Knight.

While promoting Ambulance, Bay spoke to Unilad about the Transformers films and their gradual decline in quality. Bay has revealed that even he agrees he perhaps should have stopped after three films, as does Oscar-winning director Spielberg. According to Bay, Spielberg advised him to “just stop at three,” which Bay initially agreed to. However, when the studio asked him to return for a fourth installment of Transformers, he agreed against his good judgement, and the film made $1 billion, which inspired him to make a Transformers 5. While Bay has agreed that he “should have stopped,” he admits that the movies were “still fun to do.” See his full quote below:

“I made too many of them. Steven Spielberg said, ‘Just stop at three’. And I said I’d stop. The studio begged me to do a fourth, and then that made a billion too. And then I said I’m gonna stop here. And they begged me again. I should have stopped. They were fun to do.”

Despite agreeing that the Transformers movies saw a gradual drop in quality, he has maintained that he did not lose passion for them. Bay has stated he has never made a movie he doesn’t feel passionate about, and despite the series’ flaws, the passion shines through. Bay is known for his chaotic action scenes which have been lovingly dubbed “Bayhem” by his fans, and the Transformers sequels contain “Bayhem” on nearly the biggest scale cinema has ever seen. No matter what people think about the later films, it is certain that Bay didn’t simply make the films only for a paycheck.

Bay’s assertion that he is passionate about every film he makes definitely bodes well for Ambulance. The trailers for Ambulance already show nearly all of the director’s trademarks crammed into the movie, from wild explosions to helicopters everywhere. If Bay is as passionate about this film as he says he is about all his work, Ambulance is likely a film not to be missed by any Bay fan who is ready to return to the theatre after a long pandemic.

Source: Unilad