|
|
|
Collateral
R2 - United Kingdom - Paramount Home Entertainment Review written by and copyright: Mathew Buck (19th January 2005). |
|
The Film
 **WARNING** The following review will contain spoilers about the film's content. They are in white to hide them. Highlight the sentence to read them. I strongely urge you not highlight them until you have seen the film. Cruise and Mann combine for the first time in Collateral, a tense action thriller. But while Cruise may get top billing, the real lead is rising star Jamie Foxx, who, despite being a comedian, is a damn fine actor, as seen in his more recent role in Ray. Collateral, if anything else, is a film that proves that Foxx does have acting muscles. Foxx stars as Max, an LA taxi driver. It's a job he's had for 12 years, but despite this, he still considers it temporary. He dreams to get out the job and start his own limo company. Vincent (Cruise) is a hitman, in LA for one night to dispatch five people helping to prosecute a crime lord. Vincent gets into Max's cab and asks to be taken to the first stop. Max takes him there, and Vincent pays him to stay. A few minutes later, a corpse falls on Max's cab. He then finds out that Vincent killed him. And despite reluctant to do so, Max is forced by Vincent to drive around the city to get him to each hit. And so a long night begins... The writing is generally good, but there moments when Vincent can sudden shoot off (no pun intended) into a monolouge (particularly his "adapt to the enviroment" speech), which I'd doubt a real contract killer would do. The third act is also a savage disappointment compared to the two acts before, mainly because the evolution of Max from shy, nervous cab driver to gun-totting action hero does not work. While I'd believe he'd fight back, he does it in such an cliche way, it's hard to feel you're watching the same character. Cruise is not exactly my favourite actor to watch, mainly because his style of acting is often that of posing to the camera (watch Mission: Impossible 2 to see what I mean). But here, because of his more limited screen time than usual, there is a lack of that, which makes his performance as cold blooded hitman more believable. Cruise is often at his best when he says nothing at all, and just does his hitman duties without hesitation (best seen in the "Fever" nightclub shootout). But as I have said before, the focus of the film is not with Cruise, it's with Foxx, who is such a good actor that he almost manages to make the film get away with the ending it has. The actors are supported by Jada Pinkett-Smith, Mark Ruffalo and Peter Berg (best known as the director of The Rock veichle The Rundown AKA Welcome To The Jungle). Apart from Ruffalo, most of these supporting actors only appear once or twice during the running time. Mann's direction is also very good, but he should be, seeing as this is the man who did Heat.
Video
Presented in 2.35:1 anamorphic, the transfer is no less than stunning. Like Once Upon A Time In Mexico, this film was shot on HD, and the HD captures the night time streets of LA well. The film has a lot of red, blues and greens, and the transfer handles them in it's stride. The transfer reaches peaks of 11mbps at points. The subtitles are provided in various languages, including English, German, French, Dutch and Turkish.
Audio
Sadly, the DTS track did not cross the pond and has been disposed of to get 2 dub tracks - German and French DD 5.1 tracks. English is provided in DD 5.1 and this is the track I listened to. I'm sure the DTS would be hard pressed to be this. While it may not be the most active soundtrack in the world, when it gets it's chances, it certainly takes them. According to my DVD player, English is the 2nd language - German is the first, unusually...
Extras
This is the single disc version, so the only extra here is the audio commentary by director Michael Mann. He talks throughout the entire film with few pauses. He likes to tell you his intentions as a director on how he wanted to make the film, but he also goes on to talk about the benefits of shooting on HD and the music score. Very informative to those who want to listen. Subtitles for this extra are included in French, English and German.
Overall
Collateral is a decent crime thriller with excellent acting and direction and is only let down by flaws in the writing. It's complemented on a good disc audio and visual wise, but extras are sparse to improve on the video. If you don't care about extras, get this option.
|
|||||
|