Collateral (2004)

Director: Michael Mann
DreamWorks

Reviewed by Popcorn and the Kernels - 5/1/05

Before Ray, Jamie Foxx was a taxi driver named Max, in the City of Angels.

Not just an ordinary cabbie, mind you, he carefully inspects his vehicle every morning, cleaning any residue from the seats or dash, making sure the integrity of the machine is the best it can be.  We learn he has ambitions one day to be an entrepreneur in the limo business and even have a girlfriend, a prospectively tantalizing Jada Pinkett Smith.

But he is very carefully planning his steps, saving his money, learning what he needs to know to succeed.  And he’s the perfect gentleman; his demeanor in taking fares is well-spoken, friendly, caring.  In other words, you’ve never met a cabbie like Max!

Enter Tom Cruise, i.e. Vince, serial hit man, with a seriously destructive agenda.  The job is, naturally, drug-related.  He has to kill five individuals associated with a trial that can be embarrassing to his employer.  He offers Max $600 to be his chauffeur for the evening, which Max warily accepts.  Then, with the first killing, the nuts come off the buggy, literally.

The remainder of the movie is a power struggle and a personality struggle between the two men, carried in a tension-filled, film-noir dialog, accentuated by occasional quick, ugly violence.  Max is trying to find a way to extricate himself, become a free man again, while Vincent is hanging on to Max as an unexpectedly valuable asset in his sordid business—Vince runs into a few snags.

Vincent is Darkness and Max is Light, or considering being on the verge of becoming Light.  That is the main character development of the movie.  Vince is not going to change, but appears as a fact of reality Max must deal with.  In the course of their interaction, Max comes to the conclusion he must act—both to get out of the immediate predicament and to move forward decisively in his life.

(Max is letting his sick mother determine the pace of his move into entrepreneurship; he’s been the best cabbie in LA for the last 12 years!)

Vince is quite the adversary, ruthless and efficient, even with a sense of honor.  It is difficult for Max not to appreciate the raw excellence of this man.  The decisiveness.  Indeed, Max sees that is going to be required to get free… free from Vince and free from his mother.  Michael Mann does a great job creating the conflict and clearly defining Max’ character development in action.

Though the action keeps us drawn into the movie, it doesn’t cloud the true plot, which is what will Max do inside himself to prevail over the adversity near term and far term.  Foxx does a terrific job and deserved his Oscar nomination for best supporting actor (which Morgan Freeman won for Million Dollar Baby).

Some of the internal and external plot is not crystal clear in retrospect when the lights come on, but the style and cinematography make it seem so while the reels are running in the dark.  Superbly entertaining.  3½ or 4 puffs.

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