Transformers 3 opens in Moscow

(Above) Patrick Dempsey, Shia LaBeouf, Rosie Huntington-Whiteley, Michael Bay, and Tyrese Gibson arrive at the world premier yesterday of Transformers 3: Dark of the Moon in Moscow of all places. (Photo by Lucian Capellaro.)

June 24, 2011 – Never mind that Chicago stars in the new Transformers film, its world premier was last night in…Moscow.

Transformers 3: Dark of the Moon opened the 33rd Moscow International Film Festival at the Pushkinsky Cinema.

“Moscow is an emerging market,” explained director Michael Bay at a news conference on Thursday. “It’s becoming very important in the international world in terms of film. So we are actually travelling to certain countries, BRIC [Brazil Russia India China] countries…because they are big, emerging markets and it’s very important. So I’m really happy and proud that we’re here.”

Also during the news conference, Bay revealed the exact number of cars that were destroyed in his movie, 532. “But these are cars that are flood damaged. Car companies give them to us because by law they have to be crushed, so I am the perfect guy to do that.”

After the premier, Linkin Park, a band that is heard on the soundtrack of all three Transformers films, gave a concert for an estimated 20,000 people in Red Square.

The film opens in the U.S. on June 29.

(Above) In this frame from a video released to promote the film, Michael Bay (right) congratulates stunt performer J. T. Holmes after a precision skydiving jump off Trump International Hotel & Tower last July. (Click on image to view larger version.)