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Michael Mann's films are among the coolest films in Hollywood history. Take a look at Last of the Mohicans, Heat, Manhunter and Public Enemies. The last film may not be his best achievement, but it is cool nonetheless. The calm, cool attitude of Johnny Depp rivaled the likes of Neil MacCauley and Hawkeye. This film's antagonist, Vincent, is probably the greatest of Mann's characters. Masterminded by Stuart Beattie and brilliantly played Tom Cruise, Vincent is a character who you don't want in your backseat or next to you but cannot help but be fascinated by the things he does and says.
Onto the film: A Delorean may need 88mph (and 30 minutes) to show some serious shit, but Collateral does that within a-minute-and-a-half. You know things are gonna be awesome when Tom Cruise bumps into Jason Statham. The 5 second less-than-brief meeting tells us volumes about Cruise's character, and paves the road to which all the other players drive onto. The turns are not dangerous, just unexpecting. The film introduces us to the character, Max, an ordinary taxi driver with extraordinary dreams. When he drops Annie at her location, and after when she gives him her company card - actually a secret way to saying to him "call me" - Max enjoys a rare moment of "Ah! It's good to be alive". But that is quickly silenced when Vincent gets in his taxi and gives him $600 to drive him to five locations. From the first kill onwards a new level of cat-and-mouse game starts, with the cat controlling the mouse and keeping his cheese at bay. If the mouse fails to do his bidding, then he will never get the cheese... or see the sunrise.
Some of the moments are just top-notch with a heavy foreboding atmosphere covering it. When Max and Vincent meet Daniel Baker, the scene was so impressively done that it was the first of the many times you're transfixed to the screen. The action, the tense-factor and the polar-distant characters of Max and Vincent all get brightly highlighted within the next 1 hour, only losing focus for a short period of time. Vincent is a loose bull on the streets of Spain, or in this case L.A. When he looks at Max, who is the sort of the person who wouldn't even swat a fly, he sees a person wasting his life. Vincent sees the others as people who are always running, either from someone or something, while he considers himself as just a guy "with a job attached to", making him not only an effective killer but also who is human enough to understand the other but not human enough to understand himself. Max, on the other hand, is Max. An ordinary taxi-driver thrown into an extraordinary adventure. Also, who says the final girl cliche is limited to horror films only? The 5th and final victim happens to be Annie, and Max saves her - obviously. Max not only turns from an ordinary citizen to a saviour but also has an (spiritual? psychological?) awakening along the way.
Performance-wise, Tom Cruise's grip on his character was as fierce as an eagle on a fish. An aggressively precise performance with a cool, calculated voice. I can't imagine anyone else replacing him. Jamie Foxx was equally good, too. His character had depth, and Foxx impressively fleshed it out, but he didn't really seem connected to it - There was a loose wire somewhere. Not to say it wasn't a great performance, - the way he passed off himself as a normal person had me impressed - but he didn't really altogether connect between him and his character, or at least that's how it felt to me. Mark Ruffalo is an actor, who after watching him in 13 Going On 30, became one of my favourite on-screen figures, but I must say, what the hell happened here? The dude was acting like as if he was missing out his favourite show and wanting to go to the bathroom at the same time. He just mumbled his way to his death. Maybe it really wasn't a good time to do a Marlon Brando impression!
In all, Collateral is an intense-filled thriller with unexpecting turns and some great focus on the 2 lead characters. And is it me or did Vincent's death seem... emotional?!?! Am I losing my marbles?
8.0/10
