In Hollywood, where size matters and mega-budget movies draw a corresponding amount of hype, "Pearl Harbor" may be the most anticipated movie of the moment. Like James Cameron's "Titanic," which generated a tidal wave of publicity when its budget soared to $200 million, the World War II epic was an "event" picture from the moment it was announced.

Directed by Michael Bay ("The Rock") and produced for Disney by blockbuster king Jerry Bruckheimer ("Armagedddon," "Remember the Titans"), "Pearl Harbor" was budgeted at $135 million "with a

$5 million cushion," says Bruckheimer.

It stars Ben Affleck, Cuba Gooding Jr. and newcomers Josh Hartnett and Kate Beckinsale in a love story set against the backdrop of Dec. 7, 1941, when the Japanese staged a surprise attack and the United States entered World War II. Randall Wallace ("Braveheart") wrote the screenplay.

Already, "Pearl Harbor" is getting a major promotional push. A three-minute theatrical trailer went into theaters Nov. 22, even though the picture won't open until Memorial Day 2001.

"We originally wanted to come out on Pearl Harbor Day," Bay said by phone from Los Angeles. "But the movie started out too expensive and we had to bring the budget down."

"There's an enormous amount of visual effects that have to be done," Bruckheimer said. "Also there was a change of management (at Disney). . . . The picture was canceled a number of times. We were put on hold and held hostage for a bit."

Bruckheimer isn't complaining. In the end, "Pearl Harbor" will benefit from the delay -- and the extra months of publicity it guarantees -- just as "Titanic" did when its June 1997 release was pushed back to Christmas.

In his research, Bay interviewed 80 World War II veterans who survived the Pearl Harbor attack. Nearly 3,000 U.S. military personnel and civilians were killed that day -- and 10 battleships damaged or destroyed.

"There's something you get from these guys," Bay says of the vets he met. "You know, you look in their eyes and they're not bull-- you. They were ready at the drop of a dime to give their lives for this country . . . There's something very heroic about the whole story."

Bay also found that military historians frequently contradict one another with facts and figures on the death toll and the number of planes. "Then you've got these old guys who were there and say, 'This is how it happened to me.' Much of the time I'll side with the (veterans), even though they flower up the story a little bit."

"What we're doing is not 100 percent historically accurate," said Bruckheimer, who knows that his film will inevitably be nitpicked for its diversions from fact. The characters played by Affleck and Hartnett, for example, are roughly based on two U.S. fighter pilots who managed to get up in the air during the Japanese raid.

"Pearl Harbor" may loom as the blockbuster of 2001, but Bay and Bruckheimer both see it as a prestige picture, not as the kind of brawny, testosterone- charged action flick on which they've built their careers.

"It's shot very classically," Bay said. "There's no fast cutting. The action is really epic, but there's this whole other element to the movie: There's a great love story that goes on."

The trailer for "Pearl Harbor" supports Bay's claim. Instead of promising bigger explosions and an ear-splitting soundtrack, it emphasizes the idyllic lives that military personnel and their families enjoyed in Hawaii -- the calm before the storm. Scored by Hans Zimmer ("The Thin Red Line"), the trailer goes for an elegiac, heart-stirring tone that feels more Spielbergian than Bruckheimeresque.

Bruckheimer's past films, many of which were produced with the late, controversial Don Simpson, weren't the kind of pictures that courted Oscars or dealt with emotional nuance. In reviewing "The Rock," the Los Angeles Times said Bruckheimer's movies "epitomize trends in Hollywood filmmaking that have made many people very rich while impoverishing movie audiences around the world."

Although Bruckheimer resists the notion that he makes just one kind of film,

he said "Pearl Harbor" is "definitely a departure" for him. "I've never made an out-and-out love story like this. . . . It's also about the brotherhood of man and how to protect your buddy."

"Pearl Harbor" was shot over a five-month period in England; in Corpus Christi, Texas, where the USS Lexington doubled as a U.S. and a Japanese warship; at the enormous Mexican water tank that Cameron built for "Titanic"; and in Hawaii, where the Pearl Harbor base was re-created.

Ultimately, Bay sees "Pearl Harbor" as tapping into a nostalgia for a time when Americans could feel an unequivocal pride in country and unite behind a war.

"It's about how a country rises up to protect itself," he said. "There's a line in the script that basically says, 'There's nothing stronger than the heart of a volunteer.' That's the sense of what this movie's about: the spirit,

the devotion to this country. It's something you don't find today."

Pearl Harbor and Hollywood

The Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor has inspired a number of films before "Pearl Harbor." Here's a partial list:

"December 7th" (1943): John Ford directed this Oscar-winning documentary, produced by the U.S. Navy's Field Photographic Branch, Office of Strategic Services. Two versions exist: the released version, which re-creates the Japanese attack and its aftermath, and a longer, unreleased version with fictional sequences and a cast including Walter Huston and Dana Andrews. Not on video.

"So Proudly We Hail" (1943): Claudette Colbert and Paulette Goddard play U. S. Army nurses who leave San Francisco for a tour of duty in Hawaii in December 1941. On video.

"From Here to Eternity" (1953): Fred Zinnemann's Oscar winner emphasizes relationships over combat footage and boasts a terrific cast: Burt Lancaster, Deborah Kerr, Montgomery Clift, plus supporting Oscar winners Frank Sinatra and Donna Reed. Based on the James Jones best-seller. On video.

"In Harm's Way" (1964): Otto Preminger's overblown epic isn't restricted to Pearl Harbor but surveys U.S. warfare in the South Pacific. On video.

"Tora! Tora! Tora!" (1970): Both sides of Pearl Harbor are examined in this U.S.-Japanese production, which won an Oscar for special visual effects. On video.

"If Tomorrow Comes" (1971): Patty Duke and Frank Liu play a white girl and a Japanese American youth who marry in California on Dec. 7, 1941, minutes before the bombs drop. Not on video.

"From Here to Eternity" (1979): A miniseries adapted from the Jones novel, with Natalie Wood and William Devane in the Kerr and Lancaster roles, Steve Railsback in the Clift role and Joe Pantoliano as Sinatra's character, the trumpet-blowing Maggio. Kim Basinger also stars. On video.

"The Final Countdown" (1980): Kirk Douglas and Martin Sheen star in this sci-fi "what-if" picture about an aircraft carrier entering a time warp just before the Pearl Harbor attack. On video.