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Michael Bay has said that Transformers 3 wouldn't feature as many robots as the previous two movies, and, so far, Bay has assembled a growing human cast for the upcoming sequel. Besides the usual suspects of Shia LaBeouf, Megan Fox, Tyrese Gibson, and Josh Duhamel, Bay has recently added the surprising names of John Malkovich, Frances McDormand, and The Hangover's Ken Jeong. Now Variety reports that Patrick Dempsey has joined the cast.
see what Dempsey has said about his character >> Posted 05.05.10 by Ryan -
"3-D Conversion." To many studio executives, that phrase conjures images of dollar signs in the form of higher ticket prices. But to director Michael Bay the phrase implies gimmicky, "fake 3-D" unsuitable for the "complicated stuff" he puts on film.
Back in February, when Bay was just starting to scout locations for Transformers 3, he dismissed rumors that he might be shooting the movie in 3-D, saying that his style of shooting is "too aggressive for 3-D cameras" and that he preferred "anamorphic lenses" over digital cameras. Despite his disinterest in shooting in 3-D, Bay admitted a month later that he was testing 3-D conversion on "some Transformers scenes."
Apparently, things are not going too well with the conversion process. Bay, as quoted by Deadline, recently had a few choice words to say about the conversion process, seemingly aimed at the Paramount and DreamWorks executives who are presumably pressuring him for a Transformers 3-D.
I'm used to having the A-team working on my films, and I'm going to hand it over to the D-team, have it shipped to India and hope for the best? This conversion process is always going to be inferior to shooting in real 3-D. Studios might be willing to sacrifice the look and use the gimmick to make $3 more a ticket, but I'm not. Avatar took four years. You can't just sh*t out a D movie. I'm saying, the jury is still out.
It's unclear whether Bay truly believes that 3-D conversion might eventually work on Transformers 3 or if he's simply trying to appease the studios, but he said that he hasn't completely abandoned conversion as an option.
I am trying to be sold [on conversion], and some companies are still working on the shots I gave them. Right now, it looks like fake 3-D, with layers that are very apparent. You go to the screening room, you are hoping to be thrilled, and you're thinking, huh, this kind of sucks. People can say whatever they want about my movies, but they are technically precise, and if this isn't going to be excellent, I don't want to do it. And it is my choice.
While Bay either can't or won't flat-out tell the studios what he thinks about 3-D, Avatar director and champion of 3-D technology James Cameron has no problem speaking his mind about it. Cameron used the Spider-Man reboot as a prime example of the wrong way of going about making a movie in 3-D.
This is another example of Hollywood getting it wrong. Sony says, "We're doing Spider-Man in 3D." The director doesn't say, "Hey, I want to make the movie in 3D." The studio says, "You want to direct this movie? You're doing it in 3D, motherf*cker!" That's not how it should be.
Posted 03.25.10 by BrentJS -
This morning Michael Bay broke some big casting news about Transformers 3 on his blog.
Transformers 3 has been going very well. We are going to shoot in LA, Chicago, Washington DC, Florida, Texas, Africa, Moscow, and China. On the talent front, we just locked in Frances McDormand and John Malkovich. Both amazing actors I've always wanted to work with. We also just got Ken Jeong, he is the super funny actor stuck in the trunk from "Hangover" and the Doctor from "Knocked Up."
We start shooting pre-shoots in about one month.
While we certainly appreciate the influx of talent these stars bring, the news came as quite a surprise after last week's announcement that Bay planned an updated look for the third installment.
Posted 03.22.10 by reelz -
Josh Duhamel isn't done fighting robots. The actor spoke to Cinema Blend at ShoWest and announced that the script for Transformers 3 has been completed, which Duhamel discovered after a meeting with director Michael Bay. This more or less confirms Duhamel's appearance in Transformers 3, which may be disappointing to those Duhamel fans who hoped he would hold out for a When in Rome sequel (sorry, there's no such thing).
Also returning are Megan Fox, Shia LeBeouf, and Tyrese Gibson. Bay's official site says shooting will occur in Chicago and Moscow this summer. Bay says that the robots will get an "updated" look in the sequel, and while Bay won't shoot the movie in 3-D, the movie will be converted to the format before it reaches theaters on July 1, 2011.
Posted 03.21.10 by Ryan -
Samuel Bayer was an unusual choice to direct the remake of A Nightmare on Elm Street, which will see Jackie Earle Haley take on the iconic role of Freddy in what hopes to be a reboot of the franchise. The former music video director will make his feature debut with Nightmare, though Bayer told ShockTillYouDrop that production company Platinum Dunes had tried to hire him for their remakes of Amityville Horror and The Texas Chainsaw Massacre. He was finally convinced to take on Nightmare by Michael Bay.
Initially, I said no [to Nightmare]. [Then] Michael sent me an e-mail and made a lot of sense. Just talking about the business and why this was a good movie to make. There was a lot of opportunities in doing this that might not have happened with another film. I think what he said made a lot of sense and I think it's hard to argue with the richest guy in Hollywood.
What also helped draw Bayer to the project was the remake's different take on Freddy.
We've gone in a slightly different direction with our take on Freddy and I like that. We delve a little deeper into him as a person. How he became the thing he was. That's certainly attracted me to this character. He's not a mindless guy with an axe. He's a thinking, talking, psychologically disturbed character.
With a second trailer released, Bayer is aware of what fans have been saying about it.
I do read what they say. I think everybody has to realize this is a movie made by fans of the genre. Platinum Dunes respects the genre. People should understand this was made for the fans and not to disrespect the series. I read stuff and there's a lot of venom. Some people can't wait to see it and others ... they want Platinum Dunes to burn in hell. Or, "why don't they get a real director to do this?" Listen, for every one of those, there's something really clue. I read a lot of great responses to the new trailer. I don't think people get it's a big movie. Sometimes horror movies feel like they weren't made on big budgets, we tried to make a movie that looks and feels really big.
With Bayer understands that fans may be against remakes, the first-time director has no issues with the current crop of remakes being produced in Hollywood.
People think Hollywood does remakes because we're out of ideas. I think it's less we're out of ideas, it's more: If something's done cool one way, maybe there's another way to do it really cool. I get criticized for this, I'm not Chris Nolan, but I like what he did with Batman. That's not to knock the TV show, [Tim] Burton's vision, or the Val Kilmer version, but there are ways to reinvent stuff. I don't think everything needs to be remade. The Exorcist, Citizen Kane, I don't think they all need to be redone.
Posted 03.05.10 by Ryan -
Only a month after director Michael Bay said that 3-D technology "might be a fad" and that it isn't suited for his "old school" style of filmmaking, Bay conceded that he was "testing" 3-D conversion on his first Transformers to see if it will be viable to release Transformers 3 in 3-D. Now, it appears that the Transformers, themselves, might be getting a makeover along with the movies in which they star.
In a recent interview with SciFiWire, Scott Benza, animation supervisor for Industrial Light & Magic, said that at least two of the featured robots will be getting upgrades in Transformers 3.
Our two lead characters, Optimus and Bumblebee, needed to be updated for the next chapter in the Transformers series. Bumblebee's matured a little bit, so I would just say look for subtle changes to his physique that have him look more mature.
Scott Farrar, the visual effects supervisor on Transformers 3, said that the changes to Optimus Prime will be more subtle.
[Prime will have] little tiny things that maybe the average viewer isn't going to notice but probably the fanboys will. You actually will run into pieces that are maybe always in the way, and wouldn't it be nice if that part wasn't there? Maybe you make a shift in the shoulder, in the chest or what have you. So it might be proportioning, but it also might be for usability, so [the animators]' task could be easier, too.
Farrar also offered the first update on the progress of Ehren Kruger's script for Transformers 3.
There's an outline and most of the script is done. It hasn't been released to us completely because they want to keep that under wraps, but we certainly know enough. Michael turns over sections of the script, and then the art department is full steam ahead right now, the L.A. art department. We also have an ILM art department working on this at the same time. So we take their 2-D work and start turning it into 3-D models, because we like to get a jump-start on this. Any model that looks like it could start, we want to get going, because it'll take us 30 weeks to build it.
Posted 03.04.10 by BrentJS -
Even before Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen (ROTF) opened in theaters, Paramount and DreamWorks announced that the next sequel, Transformers 3, was already in the works, and that it would open July 1, 2011. This apparently caught director Michael Bay off-guard because he immediately refuted the release date, saying that he needed "a break from fighting robots," and that he wanted to do a "small movie" before Transformers 3.
However, shortly after Bay's statements were widely publicized, he changed his mind and said that he was on for Transformers 3. So, what caused Bay to change his mind? Was it the fact that ROTF opened stronger than Transformers, ultimately surpassing it at the box office? It's likely that the large box-office numbers for ROTF translated into an even bigger paycheck for Bay to direct the sequel, but according to an interview he gave on Starz' "In the House," Bay was motivated to return by the prospect of saving jobs during a depressed economy.
The true story is we went to Vegas to celebrate [Revenge of the Fallen] crossing the $400 million mark domestic. I said, "I'm excited to do my small little movie." They said, "Well, we're here to talk about that." I've become friends with these guys that run Paramount and they [told me,] "We're going to get fired if we don't have a 2011 franchise," so I'm like you can't let these guys down.
The economy's been so rough, it's kind of important. When you say yes to [a] movie like this you automatically give 3000 people jobs. 1000 for the toys. 2000 for the filmmaking. I'm going to put [the small film] on hold and do it right after [Transformers 3].
As for what fans can expect from Transformers 3, Bay said that there will be new characters and "a lot of twists." And, though he previously stated that his style of directing is "too aggressive for 3-D cameras," he did say that he was willing to explore the possibility of converting Transformers 3 to 3-D after he shoots it.
It's a process we're testing with some Transformers scenes. How successful it is with my movie in terms of a lot of real stuff coming out of the frame, real dirt, real complicated little particles coming towards the lens, because hopefully that process will work. I've seen some tests that look great on other movies. I just want to see how it looks on my footage.
In other Transformers news, Bay's personal web-sitewas also recently updated with this new ROTF featurette showcasing the movie's Academy Award-nominated sound mixing.
Posted 03.03.10 by BrentJS -
With Transformers 3 not arriving in theaters until July 1, 2011, there has been little news to report other than Michael Bay proclaiming that Megan Fox will return for the sequel and that the movie won't be in 3-D. Leave it to Hasbro CEO and Transformers executive producer Brian Goldner to talk to MTV about what the sequel will include.
What we're really doing is getting back to some of the core character development and storytelling. And I think there's some elements of the core story that the filmmakers, Michael in particular, wanted to tell. He's really well-versed in the Transformers lore. So I think you'll see, you know, less bedlam, more characters.You're going to see that great core mythology brought to the fore, and Michael is hard at work at making this a reality and we're very excited about it.
Bay has also said that Transformers 3 will focus on "character," though the director did not talk about which robots will appear or which human actors will be involved. With Fox returning, the only other actor confirmed to return for Transformers 3 is Tyrese Gibson. Goldner went ahead and confirmed Shia LaBeouf as well.
Yes he is, and both Megan and Shia are both cast back for that.
Posted 03.02.10 by Ryan -
Over the past decade or so, Hugo Weaving has created two of the most memorable supporting characters in recent pop-culture. He oozed malice and evil as Agent Smith in The Matrix, and he found just the right blend of benevolence and regality as the elf lord Elrond in the Lord of the Rings trilogy. In both of those projects, Weaving seemed to have lots of fun diving into the roles.
But apparently, this wasn't the case when he voiced the villain Megatron for Michael Bay's Transformers movies. Weaving recently interviewed with The Age in his native Australia, and the idea of a sequel to Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen came up. Weaving's laughed and simply said: "Oh no. They're not making Transformers III, are they?"
Weaving went on to say that he actually knows very little about Bay's movies, and that the voiceover work was mainly just a paycheck for him.
Michael Bay talks to me on the phone. I've never methim. We were doing the voice for the second one and I still hadn't seen the first one. I still didn't really know who the chracters were and I didn't know what anything was. It's a voice job, for sure, and people assume I've spent my life working on it, but I really know so little about it.
Ouch. Well, Bay can refute the critics all he wants, but when Agent Smith-slash-Elrond says your movie isn't interesting, maybe it's true.
Weaving also stars in The Wolfman, which opened last Friday.
Posted 02.16.10 by reelz -
For those who saw Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen, you likely have a laundry list of "wants" for the upcoming Transformers 3. One of those may or may not have been answered: Tyrese Gibson will be back. He used his Twitter account to announce his return.
TRANSFORMERS 3: Is Full THrottle Full Steam Ahead..... Michael Bay gave me the start date.. And I can't share... But T3 is going to shake upthe WORLD!!!!!!!!!! Master Sergeant Epps is here to stay!!!
Gibson fans, you may now breathe your sigh of relief. Perhaps more notably to some, Megan Fox is also set to return, while Shia LeBeouf is still unconfirmed, though a leaked copy of the script has his character, Sam Witwicky, retuning to help the Autobots fight the Decepticons.
Posted 02.13.10 by Ryan