Collateral
 

Just got back from seeing this. Directed by Michael Mann (Heat) in that very polished way of his. I thought the movie was phenomenal. Acting is top-rate. Script and dialogue are absorbing. Even though I went into it kinda' knowing what it was about, it impressed me none the less.

Jamiee Fox plays his role well, but Tom Cruise is fucking awesome in this film. Mark Ruffalo also puts in a good supporting performance.

After Heat and now Collateral, Mann is becoming one of my favorite directors.

Excellent Movie! I really liked this movie beacuse they focused a lot on the characters and thier relationship with each other more so then just on action.

Spoiler: Anyone else think it was badass when Vincent was like "Hey Hommies" and just wastes those punks that stole Max's wallet?

Overall I give this movie 5/5, right up there with heat in my book.

Great direction. Great soundtrack. Great acting. Great camera work. Good story. Good action sequences. Good philosophy. Good symbolism.

This movie is a winner in my book. I was surprised that it was this good, considering the elements involved. Unfortunately it could not escape without a few product plugs.

The movie itself is not relevant or important... it's just a good movie.

I liked how Vincent seemed just unstoppable. Great movie.

I haven't seen it yet, but I wanted to. Gotta go see it sometime soon. Looks like it'll be a good one.

Saw it tonight. Really excellent movie. I reccomend it to everyone. Very entertaining, well directed, great acting. Just a really good film. 5/5

This is good to hear. Heat is one of my all time favs.

I thought it was a pretty good movie, not amazing, by any stretch of the imagination, but very well done. I particularily liked Vincent and his attitude - "Tell you boss to shove this car up his fat ass"
:lol:

can someone explain the symbolism of the coyote in the movie? i thought it was representing max being out of his element, but it was grey so maybe it was representing max? anybody?

I took it as a moment where both characters realized, that beyond and in spite of everything they were going through, they were just a couple of people, living on the same planet. It was a strange moment and a little ambiguous, but that's how I took it.

Excellent movie, far better then I had ever expected. I truely hope cruise does more *bad guy* action / drama movies before he gets to old.

As previously said, I truely loved how Vincent had that *unstoppable* appeal comming from his character.

9/10

i have been a fan of Micheal Mann ever since he did Miami Vice.

the Insider was also a great movie.

I thought it was a very good movie. Nice to be riding with the bad guy for a change, instead of hunting him. Cruise was great in that he was exactally what he was supposed to be, but Fox went on beyond that. As far as I'm concerned, he earned best supporting actor consideration with that one.

three words....GREAT FUCKING MOVIE!

I guess I gotta be the first person to say that I didn’t like this movie. True, the cinematography was amazing and the acting was good, but that’s about it. Was it supposed to be an action movie that was deep and thought provoking? It tried to develop the characters, but I just never connected; I never felt Max (Fox) was ever in danger. Then there’s the plot; I can think of a dozen holes, but here’s a few. Spoiler: Vincent is an Uber Assassin, but he doesn’t look over the details of all his targets at the start, he only reads up on them one at a time as he kills them? He walks into a club and starts killing people left and right, but nobody panics and starts running? The Prosecutor (Smith) is working in the library, but doesn’t take her cell phone with her? Vincent can hear her stockings as she crawls on the carpet in a silent room, but he doesn’t hear Max come in? And what happened in the final train shootout? Did Vincent just run out of bullets? I’m sure that someone can give me an explanation for each of these. I also didn’t like the way the movie developed a major plot thread with the smart cop (Ruffalo) figuring out what was going on, only to be entirely dropped after the club scene. Anyway, just my opinions.

wondash, by your logic, I'm surprised you find ANY movie to be enjoyable. Spoiler: Vincent just recieved the info about his victims at the beginning of the movie, when he arrived in LA. He quickly looks over them to get an idea of what he's after, but then focuses on one at a time to get the job done. Remember, he's on a time limit. And maybe you didn't notice, but people WERE panicking. People were running all over the place, left and right. When you're in a crowd full of people and shit is going down, you don't know what direction to run, you only know that you should. Why would the prosecutor take her cell phone with her? She doesn't know of any danger to her, it's late at night, and she is studying. What more do you WANT? And YES, Vincent DID run out of ammo. GEEZ!

Everything in that movie had a base and a meaning. I loved it and I thought *I* was picky... I've been outdone.

What was meaning of the whole Silver thing? Silver hair, silver suit, Silver Bacardi, silver fox?

Spoiler: And in the train shootout, did Vincent get off any shots? It seemed he did. Did he miss? It would have been really cool if the door turned out to be bullet proof and he killed himself with a deflected bullet.

I don't think of myself as picky, just Super Critical :D

wondash. I don't think there was any hidden tie between the color of Vincent's suit and the color of his hair. He's just a guy with greying hair wearing a greyish suit. It happens, you know?

As far as the Bacardi ad, it was only shown when the car was moving. It was a simple outside-the-vehichle shot, just like when they show a close up of a bumper or a moving tire in other films. There are always short moments like this in films, usually used for some type of transition from one scene to another.

Ever see Interview with the Vampire? Cruise is the ultimate bad-guy Vampire in it. It's just a shame that Anne Rice didn't have a chance to make a worthy sequel featuring Cruise as Lestat, it could have been incredible. :(

What a blast of a movie. Couldn't recommend it enough. Truly unexpected performances from Smith and Fox, and what can I say about Cruise? He was just amazing.

The scene at Fever has just taken the spot as one of my all-time favorite shoot-out scenes.

This was one of the things I hated about the movie.

I did not enjoy this movie as much as others. I enjoyed the scenes with Cruise and Fox, but all of the cop drama crap they brought in turned me off. I thought many of the parts were cliché / formulaic.

Just saw it earlier, great movie. i'd give it a 9/10.

To hopefully end the train scene argument as I see it
Spoiler: when Max and vincent are shooting at eachother it is through 2 closed doors. about chest to eye level there are 2 windows separated by metal between them. Max pretty much closed his eyes and went for broke, going through the window and hitting max off to the side of his chest. Max, being trained somehow begins shooting in his regular pattern, 2 to the center of the chest and one to the head. So basically all of vincent's shots end up in the metal part of the door, exactly where Max's chest and forehead would be. So in my mind it was Vincent's training that eventually foiled him in the last shootout.

you are absolutely correct, confederate

Man, Tom Cruise in that movie was a badass. Just waltzes into the nightclub, kicks everybody asses and leaves

Wifey and I just saw it last night, and we were greatly thrilled. In reference to an earlier question about the coyotes, do you remember when he tried to explain to the cops that he'd hit a deer? Their general disbelief that there are "wild animals" roaming around LA was disproven many times during the night.

Didn't the muggers take Max's wallet? Yet he had it later. Wifey thinks they only took his money and not his wallet.

Also, I was greatly disturbed by the numbers of young people sitting in the theatre who were howling with laughter at stuff that was just not funny. And I keep experiencing this over and over. I mean. it's not that I didn't get the humor; they were laughing at stuff that was clearly intended to be suspenseful, dramatic, and threatening.

Anybody else notice this?

That's how I read that as well.

I though it was a great movie. Loved it all. Soundtrack was great as well.
" :thumbsup: :thumbsup: "

Great movie, even the wifey really liked it, as well as my stepmother. Jamie fox was great, seeing him play such a low-key role and not someone who morphs into a badass. I am looking forward to seeing him in Ray.

It's good thrill ride, and a nice turn for Cruise. Jamie Foxx does a good job without cheesing it up.
If you like the Directors style then check the classic Thief or The Insider.

Don't forget Manhunter. I loved that film.

just saw this movie. what a damn good movie. Tom Cruise and Foxx bring it together like clockwork. I'm glad to see Cruise in a different role than usual (you know what I'm talking about). I'm just astounded at how good this is. How did it not become more popular?


The soundtrack was topnotch, Tom Cruise did everything you wanted him to do (don't steal his fucking bag or the cabby's wallet) and did more. Damn good movie.

You see Cruise toss Fox his wallet back after he kills the muggers.

I really enjoyed this movie. Was refreshing to see Tom Cruise play a different role this time around.

OMG that was like one of my favorite parts, Spoiler: the speed and accuracy with which he kill those punks was awesome

it was just a great movie and im glad I bought it. its sorta scary buying a dvd when youve never seen the movie, but it was definitely worth it. :thumbsup:

Just watched the DVD, and I have to say I was disappointed by this movie.

On the upside, I thought Jamie Foxx was very good, and showed he can really act, instead of just be a goofball. The last 15 or so minutes is what did it in for me, in that the "suspension of disbelief" factor was way too high.

And there were two "plot flaws", that just stuck in my craw. Spoiler: Vincent is a "professional, 'best-of-the-best' hitman", but he doesn't wear gloves or collect his spent shells? (Yeah, yeah yeah, I know. He's so elusive that no one has records of his fingerprints, and he smelts his own guns and bullets so they are untraceable :rolleyes: ) The "ponytail cop" goes into a club that he knows will have quite a few armed people of questionable character, looking for an assassin, and will probably wind up in a firefight, and yet he doesn't put on a vest? Dumbass.

I thought the movie was great up until the scene when they were in the office building. Then it just lost its touch. The lights went on in the lobby and it just started to feel like a low-rate movie. I'd probably give it a 9/10 up until that point, and a 5/10 after that.

I loved this movie, actually saw it this past summer. Cruise and Foxx did a great job feeding off of each other. Cruise I thought was a good 'bad' guy!

I just watched Collateral and was pleased in general. Thought the story line was easy (almost too easy) to follow. But it did have me on the edge of my seat for a couple of moments. Found several issues where I wondered who studied the concepts of reality in cutting the power in the Fed Building and the windows breaking not setting of major alarms, but then movies are that way. It was an exciting movie to say the least. As for the symbolism of the coyotes I believe they represented Max in his naive animal base as a creature who didn't even realize the city that was built right under him. He stated throughout the movie his symplicity, his dream of grandeous and his 12 year "partime" job. His stating that he preferred to work at night because the people were "nicer" ?? In L.A.?? He is a simple man who has great dreams and little reality of what is around him (like the coyotes) they go where the food is regardless of the dangers, so did he. He is more lost in that great big city he calls home than those wild animals, they realize the dangers more than he did. He wised up pretty quick and joined the pack. Became a member of the real world around him (violence and fear), there is no going back to that innocence the coyotes represented. I think he finally saw the world as a participating member and not an innocent bystander. He sees the reality of what life is around him. He's not a coyote anymore.

I just watched this movie and was completely blown away. It's probably on my top ten list now.

To all of the people that are nitpicking the plot events: how do you enjoy any movie? Do you think the director didn't think of making the cop wear a jacket? Do you think that the director forgot to make Vincent wear gloves? Do you think the director truly forgot that Vincent was a trained assassin?

No, the director wanted this movie to be believable. Movies are truly great when their are little flaws that normal, everyday people would fall victim to. If every character in every movie remembered every little detail to make their lives go perfectly then movies wouldn't be believable.

This movie is the best of the best. The script, dialogue, camera work, and acting was simply amazing in every aspect. I can't imagine someone not feeling a great sense of accomplishment for the director and everyone involved after seeing Collateral.

-Lasereth

The acting was great but it was really slow.