Epic Pearl Harbor
film will be
shot in Hawaii
Production of the big-budget
By Tim Ryan
picture is to begin in January
and continue here for 8 weeks
Star-BulletinFilming of a big-budget love story set during the period of the Pearl Harbor bombing will begin here early next year. The picture was written by an Academy Award-winning writer and will be overseen by one of Hollywood's hottest directors.
Filming here will run about eight weeks, beginning in January. Michael Bay, who directed the 1998 blockbuster "Armageddon" and earlier "The Rock," and Jerry Bruckheimer, who produced the films, head the production team for the $100-million-plus "character-driven love story" tentatively titled "Tennessee.
Randall Wallace, who won the Oscar for "Braveheart" starring Mel Gibson, is the screenwriter.
The picture, a Disney Touchstone film and the second most expensive ever produced in Hawaii after "Waterworld," will spend "tens of millions of dollars" here, much of it on special effects including a "re-creation of the Pearl Harbor bombing," Bay told the Star-Bulletin in a telephone interview from Los Angeles.
"You will see what happened at Pearl Harbor like you have never seen in any other movie," Bay promised. "Our goal is to stage the event in the utmost realism."
Though no stars have been signed, Bay said he's after Oscar winners Gene Hackman to play President Franklin Roosevelt, and Gweneth Paltrow for the romantic lead of a Navy nurse.
The story centers on two brothers caught up in the events that drew the United States into World War II. One becomes a U.S. pilot and the other flies for Britain's Royal Air Force. Both get involved with the same woman. The story begins several months before the Pearl Harbor bombing.
"Tennessee" is a temporary title and has been a code name for the production for several months, Bay said. The film could be called "Pearl Harbor," he said. The code name was used to keep the project secret, he said. (Writer Wallace is a Tennessee native.)
"I want this to be the classic movie about Pearl Harbor by which all other such films are measured," Bay said. "I consider "Tora Tora Tora" more of a documentary. All of these other films glorified war; there were no characters to latch onto."
Bay said Wallace's script is "really poetic, huge in scope.The story makes you cry."
Bay this summer scouted Oahu for locations with his production designer, visual effect supervisor, helicopter pilot, helicopter camera coordinator, and local location scout Stephanie Spangler. In the last three months Bay and Wallace have interviewed several Pearl Harbor attack veterans, and the production's special effects staff has begun its research.
Bay expects the film to require 130 shooting days with locations also including England, Los Angeles, San Francisco, and at Baja Mexico, at the "tank" set used for the film "Titanic." The Baja set is ideal for some very large special effects, including, apparently, the sinking of the USS Oklahoma, said Bay.
"I use lots of live explosions rather than just those computer-generated ones," he said.
In "The Rock," Bay had a scene in which a cable car blows up and flies 75 feet in the air.
In the Pearl Harbor film Bay said he plans to "take real ships and twist them up through the air."
Most of the Hawaii filming will be done at Oahu military bases, said Bay, who's also considering filming in Chinatown and at the summit of Maui's Haleakala. The production team has met with military officials on the mainland and expect their "approval and cooperation" like they got for "Armageddon" because this film is about "such an American historical event."
Bay will bring a production staff to Hawaii but also expects to hire a large number of local crew. Interviews may begin as early as this month when Bay returns here for additional scouting.
The production company has not selected a production base, though Bay said he "really liked Ford Island." The Hawaii Film Studio is being used by two production companies, including the television series "Baywatch Hawaii."
Bay, 35, said the Pearl Harbor bombing was "the end of American innocence."
"When you talk to these survivors -- they were just kids, they hadn't been to war, didn't know a thing about it," he said. "Pearl Harbor was a seminal event in American history, the first time we have ever been surprise attacked. The first time we ever felt vulnerable."
Bay and Bruckheimer, two of Disney's marquee filmmakers, have had box office gold with "Armageddon" and "The Rock" for Buena Vista and "Bad Boys" for Columbia.
Bay spent his 20s garnering awards as the director behind advertising campaigns for Coca-Cola, Nike, Budweiser -- which he filmed in Hawaii -- and milk. He put his directorial stamp on videos for Meat Loaf, Tina Turner, and the Divinyls and earned a number of MTV Music Video award nominations. Bay's first film, "Bad Boys" grossed more than $160 million worldwide, catapulting him into the big league.
Producer Bruckheimer with the now deceased Don Simpson formed Simpson-Bruckheimer Productions in 1983. Bruckheimer set the trend for the big-budget, action/adventure films which dominated Hollywood's output throughout the decade. Their joint ventures include "Beverly Hills Cop" (1984) and "Top Gun" (1986), both among the 20 highest-grossing features of all time.
Wallace, who reportedly will receive more than $2 million to write this screenplay, has other experience with period epics, including writing, producing and directing "The Man in the Iron Mask" for MGM with Leonardo DeCaprio, and the WWII film "With Wings As Eagles."
