Collateral

Heat was very blue, the Criterion remaster of Thief is also very blue. Collateral is yellow. LA doesn’t look cold or distant, it feels grimy, almost matching the lack of any reverence for life that Vincent has. Mann also is a master of using focus. Again, I don’t know how else to spell out to an audience the term ‘indifference’ than putting Tom Cruise in a shot and having him be out of focus. A lot of the handheld camera angles also remind me of the claustrophobic shots of Good Time, especially when Max and Vincent are talking in the cab or the entire club sequence.  The dynamic between Vincent and Max, their moral, philosophical and even physical battle rivals the dynamic of Neil and Vincent (De Niro and Pacino) in Heat, and that’s saying A LOT.  Comparing this movie to Thief and Heat, I think it exhibits a kind of moral maturity from Mann. While both Caan’s and De Niro’s characters were sympathetic, from Heat onwards it’s evident that Mann tries to instill more of a moral message. In Collateral, Tom Cruise is the bad guy. Granted, he is an assassin, not someone who does heists but he still fits the cool criminal type. And Mann says, no he ain’t. His nihilistic worldview exposes him for a husk of a human being, a person devoid of empathy. And against him, Mann places not a cool, equally rough and tough badass lead man, he puts an ordinary cab driver. Max’s hopefulness, his dream, his unwillingness to submit to Vincent’s worldview ultimately causes him to prevail. That I think makes for a great story.  Narrative wise, the different callbacks and mirror images that are created throughout the movie just speak to how meticulously it is constructed.  Jamie Foxx and Tom Cruise are excellent of course but I think it’s worth to also mention Mark Ruffalo’s character and performance. If you, like me, thought that he was gonna save the day, then this movie has subverted your expectations of a Michael Mann movie. It’s no longer cops and robbers, the real struggle is philosophical. Michael Mann might just be one of the greatest to ever do it, and I’ve only seen 3 of his movies.