Which Hollywood Director Has Destroyed the Most Cars?

With movie awards season in full flow, Michael Bay has claimed a unique title, as a new study has revealed him as the director that has wrecked the highest number of cars, across his fifteen-movie filmography. 

Conducted by Scrap Car Comparison, who previously crowned Vin Diesel as the actor that has crashed the most on-screen cars, researchers turned their attention to the director’s chair. They analysed the films of popular action directors, totalling the number of cars that each director has either damaged, such as bullet-holes in the bodywork, or completely written off, in their films. 

Best known for his appetite for destruction, Michael Bay ranks as a worthy winner, having damaged and written off a hefty total of 354 cars, averaging 24 cars wrecked in each of his fifteen films. This carnage includes crashing a vintage Shelby Cobra 427 into a concrete wall in his 1995 directorial debut Bad Boys, and writing off a huge 37 cars in the first Transformers film. 

The sheer amount of cars Bay has crashed, crushed and blown up in his movies is made even clearer, by second-placed Justin Lin being a whole 219 cars behind. Famed for his work on the Fast & Furious franchise, Lin is joined by the likes of John Landis, the director behind the infamous police car pile-up in Blues Brothers, and Lana and Lily Wachowski, who directed the highly lauded car chase in 2003’s The Matrix: Reloaded. 

The Movie Directors That Have Wrecked The Most Cars: Top 10 

Directors outside of the top ten that proved to be a little kinder to the cars featured in their films, included Kathryn Bigelow, James Cameron and somewhat surprisingly, John Wick director Chad Stahelski, and Mad Max creator George Miller, both of which are known for films that involve high-speed chases and big-budget wreckage.