Transformer-inflicted mayhem, real-life and on film. (Above) During a break in filming on July 25, 2010, people walk past an intergalactic war zone recreated on Wacker Drive for Transformers: Dark of the Moon. The northeast turret of 35 East Wacker Drive has fallen. Cars are wrecked. A bus is burned. Debris litters Wacker Drive near Wabash Avenue and Marina City. (Photo by Steven Dahlman.) (Below) Frame from the movie, depicting a battle between two warring Transformer clans, the good Autobots, such as Optimus Prime at left, and the evil Decepticons. (Paramount Pictures/Di Bonaventura Pictures.)

An ancient conflict between two extraterrestrial clans came to the Chicago River in 2010, and Marina City was in the middle of it.

Unlike The Dark Knight, filmed in Chicago mostly at night, filming for Michael Bay’s third Transformers film was going to be in broad daylight.

Based on the animated television series from the 1980s, the Transformers films featured robots – good Autobots and evil Decepticons – that can change into various things, mainly vehicles.

Transformers: Dark of the Moon, released in 2011, starred Shia LaBeouf, Tyrese Gibson, Josh Duhamel, Frances McDormand, John Malkovich, Patrick Dempsey, and Victoria’s Secret lingerie model Rosie Huntington-Whiteley.

Starting on June 9, 2010, and continuing into August, there were stunts, car crashes, explosions, fireballs, smoke, and simulated gunfire, with the action captured on the ground and from helicopters. Lured to Illinois by a 30 percent tax credit, it was estimated Paramount Pictures and Di Bonaventura Pictures would spend as much as $20 million in Chicago and create 200 jobs.

(Left) A Chicago police officer guards fake debris – including bicycles, traffic lights, lampposts, patio umbrellas, file cabinets, car bumpers, and a child safety seat – piled along Wacker Drive in front of Marina City on July 22, 2010. (Click on image to view larger version.)

Marina City offered role

Before filming started in Chicago, producers negotiated with Transwestern, manager of commercial property at Marina City, for at least a camera position to film action on the Michigan Avenue Bridge and Wacker Drive.

But the role got bigger. A daring stunt was planned to send four burning cars off the west tower parking ramp. A date and time was even determined – August 8, 2010, at 7 a.m.

It would have been the fourth, fifth, sixth, and seventh time a car had flown off the circular ramp at Marina City and into the Chicago River. The first time was on September 21, 1979, when a green 1980 Grand Prix Pontiac dived from the ramp for a Steve McQueen movie, The Hunter. On October 15, 2006, a black Oldsmobile Cutlass summersaulted for a TV commercial for Allstate. That stunt was done twice, using two different cars.

In July 2010, as filmmakers were turning River North into a disaster area for the Transformers movie, they approached Transwestern about doing the stunt again.

Bay had remembered Marina City from The Hunter, according to Rich Moskal, director of the Chicago Film Office. “Michael Bay is always trying to do more and more,” said Moskal. “He said, ‘they did one car, I want to do four. And I want them to be on fire. I want there to be four burning cars.’” (Right) Michael Bay on set of Transformers: Dark of the Moon. Photo by Jaimie Trueblood.

But in the days leading up to August 8, the stunt fell through.

“As far as I know, it was all set to go,” recalled Moskal.

Bay ran out of time, needing to get to a filming location in Detroit that was a popular tourist destination and offered him limited opportunity to film there.

And there was the steep location fee that Transwestern wanted.

According to Bay, the reason the stunt was cut was a $40,000 location fee the property management company wanted.

“I told my producer we are not paying that,” said Bay. “Why? Because I like to stay on budget, and I also don’t like to get ripped off.” Besides Marina City, other locations for the movie were planned but never filmed. A final scene, according to Moskal, was going to be at Millennium Park, with a smoldering city reflected in the Cloud Gate sculpture. (Left) A helicopter has just flown through the raised bridges at Michigan Avenue, Wabash Avenue, and State Street, and is seen here starting to turn around directly in front of Marina City on August 21, 2010. The bridges were raised simultaneously shortly after 9 a.m. on a Saturday morning. From a camera mounted in front, crew members in the back seat of the helicopter were filming the riverfront for Transformers: Dark of the Moon. (Click on image to view larger version.)