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Mann's Collateral doesn't disappoint! (PG-13)

10000 Views 79 Replies 21 Participants Last post by  TonyA, 
D
Went and saw Michael Mann's latest last night, Collateral, and this is the Mann we came to know and admire through his productions of Thief, Miami Vice, Crime Story, The Last of the Mohicans, Heat, and The Insider.

Collateral is definitely right up there with those, and for the same reasons why we took to the others: good dialogue, terrific mise-en-scene, a wonderful and dense music track, and some sensational visuals… there's one helicopter tracking shot (night-time, of course… the entire film takes place over one evening and into the pre-dawn hours) of a car on one of the LA freeways through an industrial section that's as visually arresting as anything I've seen all year. It's a gorgeous movie, and stylishly made as only Mann seems to be able to make them! Most impressive is that this was shot entirely in high-definition digital video. Mann creates an ominous shadow world of gritty indigo and silver, intermittantly jolted by garish and stark city lights.

And guns! I don't know with whom Tom Cruise trained, but he is even more impressive than was the Chuck Taylor-instructed James Caan in Thief, and he makes one move in an alley early on in the film that's as breath-taking as was Jim Zubiena's first season MV "Hit List"/"Death of Calderone" mozambique!

The performances are all top notch, from Cruise as a scary contract assassin, to Jamie Foxx as the hapless and philosophical hack who finds himself comandeered to drive the professional killer to each of his "hits," down to, in smaller roles, Mark Ruffalo as a plainclothes LA narcotics detective and Barry Shabaka Henley as a doomed jazz club owner.

Wow!, it's hard to believe that this Foxx is the same "I'm gonna rock your world" goofball cross-dresser on In Living Color a decade ago! He gives strong evidence that he will be a monster by the end of this year… he has the title role in the upcoming Ray Charles bio-pic, and in the product reel I saw last month, he looks good for an Oscar nomination!

Memorable dialogue:
  • (A horrified Foxx whose day-dreaming of his luxury limo service is rudely interrupted by a corpse landing on his parked cab): Hey! Hey, he fell on the cab! I think he's dead.[/*:u73b3bbk]
  • (A cool Cruise): Good guess.[/*:u73b3bbk]
  • (An incredulous Foxx): You... killed him?[/*:u73b3bbk]
  • (A matter-of-fact Cruise): No, I shot him. The bullets and the fall killed him.[/*:u73b3bbk]
Cruise gets to display his handgun technique throughout and in the one viewing so far… I will be returning to see it again!… he didn't make any mistakes!

Unfortunately, not so Mann in one instance, who joins our own Michael Bane as someone who should know better than to make reference to the odor of "cordite" in the aftermath of gunshots.

And there's some confusion in and around a club in which (many, many) shots are fired, but I'm not going to get too critical on that score until I see Collateral again!
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B
Second Opinion

After reading Dean's review I wandered over to the New York Times, and saw their review.

http://movies2.nytimes.com/2004/08/06/m ... .html?8dpc

Basically, they second his opinion.

When Dean AND the NY Times say it is worth seeing, it is time to look for tickets!
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SpecialEd
So Dean, does Cruise use a 1911, SIG or what?

Ed
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M
looked to me like a 3rd Generation S&W, but I may be wrong.

And, even my wife liked it!
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A
From the trailers, I thought it looked like a Sig P226. I guess I will have to go see this instead of waiting for the DVD.
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M
Alarmed said:
From the trailers, I thought it looked like a Sig P226. I guess I will have to go see this instead of waiting for the DVD.
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It is possible it is a Sig --- you have to remember --- with 2 in diapers, sleep is not somethng that happens alot in my household. Friday we escaped out without the kids, leaving them with a babysitter --- so we could go to the movies. I had to pick my wife up down the street so that the kids would not see me and then refuse to stay with the babysitter. Heck, it is 12:27 a.m. and I have my 12 month old daughter in my lap -- she is cutting teeth and has had a bad reaction to the MMR shot given at her 1yr appointment -- she had welts all over and carried a temperature for a week. JOYFUL JOY!

Mike
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D
More…

Before this degenerates into somebody's home movies, I got the name of Cruise's instructor: it's Mick Gould, and there's a pretty decent featurette showing some of Cruise's preparation for the action sequences at the stylish Collateral site. I can't direct link to the right clip, but it's #1 (ignore the image on #2… they've switched images!) at http://www.collateral-themovie.com/home.php | Video | Featurettes.

It also shows how they film the close-up shooting scene without the stunt actor getting blasted with hot propellant. (And they time his "response drill" at 1.4 seconds from concealment, but I'd have to verify that when the DVD comes out.)

Cruise uses a number of handguns throughout, including a USP, a third generation S&W, what looks to be a suppressed High Standard, and perhaps even a Glock in one partial close-up… or mebbe it's just the H&K, but it seemed like a broader, flatter top of a slide. (In that featurette, he seems to be training with one of the newer SIGs.)
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SpecialEd
IIRC, Mick Gould is former SAS as is Andy Mcnab who also worked on HEAT.
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M
Re: More…

DeanSpeir said:
a USP, a third generation S&W, what looks to be a suppressed High Standard, and perhaps even a Glock in one partial close-up… or mebbe it's just the H&K, but it seemed like a broader, flatter top of a slide. (In that featurette, he seems to be training with one of the newer SIGs.)
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I did not think my first impression of it being a S&W was wrong --- I was not sure about the suppressed weapon.
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WaltGraham
Family's going to FL next week and I'm home alone with the dogs.
Reckon I'm going to the movies...
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D
 

Saw it again tonight, and the 3rdGen S&W Cruise uses in the final reel is one he lifts from the murdered Security Guard in the lobby of the office building.

His primary pistol is the one Jamie Foxx has in that last reel, and it looks like a SIG, although early on it looks as if it could be an H&K, and at one point, from a quick shot of the flat top of the slide, a Glock.

Hard to say without being able to freeze-frame it.

 
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M
I've not seen it yet, but I want to. Of course.
Mann's films are always fantastic. Gritty, stark and real. That have something other movies don't.
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SpecialEd
You better hurry if you want to see it in the theatre. I think this one is going to video fairly quickly. Even though it's the best opening Mann has ever had it does not appeal to the teenage girls that make up a great part of Tom Cruise's box office appeal giving it lackluster sales performance.

Ed
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M
Fast to DVD?
All the better.
I often prefer watching movies on DVD here at home than dealing with the jackholes that talk on cell phones at the theatre.
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SpecialEd
Yep, we prefer to watch our movies at home also but many movies are just made for the big screen!

I've dealt with plenty of idiots in theaters before but I think I would lose what little patiences I had if someone was actually talking on a cell phone during a movie.

Ed
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A
Greetings.

I too very much enjoyed the movie.
I'm a fairly new person to guns, but the gun action didn't seem to be of the usual Hollywood type. I look forward to it's release on video when I can peruse it again at my leasure.



****POTENTIAL SPOILER********************************

I do have one objection with the movie and that was the ending.
That being said, here is my alternative ending:

(Michael Mann please take note)

First, Max should have been able to talk the attorney out
of the building as Vincent was searching for her, they then both escape safely and into the hands of the feds and into a witness protection pgm.
Then Vincent would have to deal with that particular failure and the subsequent hits put on him from the drug cartel, would have made for more slick gun play action and killing badguys and ultimately those who contracted him. Of course that would have made the movie 3 hours or so, but with that nice gun action and Vincent's
ability for making the kill, it would have been some sweet BG on bg
action.

cheers, the action barbarian (refugee from the soon to be defunct
roundtable forum at THR)
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D
action barbarian said:
I just don't think a hitman of Vincent's caliber would have been taken out by a gun newbie.
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 Bad cest to you for posting a "spoiler" this early in the film's run, but while I initially had some reservations about the "exchanges" in the final reel, a second viewing clarified some of that for me, and I went with the resolution as presented.

I'm still unclear about the events in the Fever club, however….
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A
Ok, I fixed it in my post.

Same here re the club. Look forward to seeing it on video
release so I can repeat that scene several times. Damn fine bit of action though.

cheers,
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S
Hello. I took Mr. Speir's advice.

Go see it.

Best.

PS: I rather enjoyed the alley scene with the three punks.
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A
DeanSpeir said:
Saw it again tonight, and the 3rdGen S&W Cruise uses in the final reel is one he lifts from the murdered Security Guard in the lobby of the office building.

His primary pistol is the one Jamie Foxx has in that last reel, and it looks like a SIGs, although early on it looks as if it could be an H&K, and at one point, from a quick shot of the flat top of the slide, a Glock.

Hard to say without being able to freeze-frame it.
Click to expand...
Saw it last night, & I thought Max took a Bereta off the LAPD officer. When he tries to shoot the door, the gun won't fire, he looks at it & switches the saftey & then it fires.

Pricelss scene, near the end, Vincent goes to reload the Smith he took off the securty guard, & then realizes he doesn't have another magazine.
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