20 "Twin" Films That Were In Competition With Each Other

Rotten Tomatoes: 39%/44%

IMDb: 6.7/6.2

Us:

Michael Bay started his career as he's still probably carrying on, listening to loud, 80s rock, growing out his hair and snorting the remainder of Don Simpson's ashes.

But his initial impact was fairly low key - just a handful of music videos and an underwhelming buddy cop feature called Bad Boys. Then came the Rock. Collectors of significant DVD releases no doubt took notice when Bay's The Rock and Armageddon were given 2-Disc Criterion Collection releases and were probably flabbergasted. But in retrospect, it stands to reason a purveyor of excess, concerned more with looking cool than being cool, would be some sort of auteur, even if what they're peddling is of the lowest common denominator.

The Rock is not the lowest common denominator. In fact, it's probably his best film. The same can't be said for Armageddon, a film whose logic is so flawed that when star Ben Affleck pointed out to Bay that it'd be easier to train astronauts to drill rather than the reverse, the director told him to "shut the f**k up."

At the same time, director Mimi Leder took the same concept - a giant, world-destroying asteroid is headed toward earth - but with a drastically different approach.

It's really a question of what one expects from their disaster film. Those looking for a somber, more scientifically accurate, meditative examination of the potential extinction of the human race went for the latter. Audiences happy to suspend their disbelief for over 2 1/2 hours might have gotten a so-bad-it's-good experience out of Bay's opus.

But it also aided and abetted songwriter Diane Warren and an over-the-hill Aerosmith to success, which is less forgivable.