In John Horn’s July 17th L.A. Times piece about Michael Bay’s various struggles in the making and marketing of The Island (DreamWorks, 7.22), he describes an early meeting between Bay and the film’s producers, Walter Parkes and Laurie MacDonald, in which Bay “didn’t want to discuss cinematography [or] outline stunts…he wanted to argue plot.” And then Parkes says, “I was expecting Michael to start talking about shots and cranes and camera rigs, but he was focused on the story and its moral questions. That really surprised me.” In other words, Parkes didn’t expect Bay to have a single exploratory thought in his head about the inner content of this film — he expected him to just talk logistics because….well, it’s obvious what he’s saying, isn’t it? He saw Bay as pretty much an empty vessel. Is there any other way to read it?