Perhaps the best premise for thrills since Speed, only this time the bad guy's on board and the battle of wits is more philosophical debate than pop quiz.
Collateral (2004)
Tomatometer
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Reviews Counted:221
Fresh:191
Rotten:30
Average Rating:7.4/10
Consensus: Another taut and stylish thriller by Michael Mann.
Runtime: 2 hrs
Genre: Dramas
Synopsis: Three-time Academy Award® nominee Tom Cruise ("Magnolia," "Jerry Maguire," "Born on the Fourth of July"), Jamie Foxx ("Ali," "Any Given Sunday") and Jada Pinkett Smith ("The Matrix Reloaded," "The... Three-time Academy Award® nominee Tom Cruise ("Magnolia," "Jerry Maguire," "Born on the Fourth of July"), Jamie Foxx ("Ali," "Any Given Sunday") and Jada Pinkett Smith ("The Matrix Reloaded," "The Matrix Revolutions") star in the thriller "Collateral," under the direction of three-time Academy Award® nominee Michael Mann ("The Insider"). Max (Jamie Foxx) has lived the mundane life of a cab driver for 12 years. The faces have come and gone from his rearview mirror, people and places he's long since forgotten...until tonight. Vincent (Tom Cruise) is a contract killer. When an offshore narcotrafficking cartel learns they're about to be indicted by a federal grand jury, they mount an operation to identify and kill the key witnesses, and the last stage is tonight. Tonight, Vincent arrived in L.A...and five bodies are supposed to fall. Circumstances cause Vincent to hijack Max's taxicab, and Max becomes collateral-an expendable person in the wrong place at the wrong time. Through the night Vincent forces Max to drive him to each assigned destination. And as the LAPD and FBI race to intercept them, Max and Vincent's survival becomes dependent on each other in ways neither would have imagined. Jada Pinkett Smith stars as United States Attorney Annie Farrell. Rounding out the main cast are Mark Ruffalo ("In the Cut"), Peter Berg ("Cop Land"), Oscar® nominee Javier Bardem ("Before Night Falls") and Bruce McGill ("Runaway Jury"). A co-production of DreamWorks Pictures and Paramount Pictures, "Collateral" is being produced by Michael Mann and Julie Richardson from a screenplay by Stuart Beattie. Frank Darabont, Chuck Russell, Rob Fried and Peter Giuliano served as executive producers. -- © DreamWorks [More]
Starring: Tom Cruise, Jada Pinkett Smith, Jamie Foxx, Mark Ruffalo
Starring: Tom Cruise, Jada Pinkett Smith, Jamie Foxx, Mark Ruffalo, Peter Berg, Javier Bardem, Bruce McGill, Irma P. Hall
Director: Michael Mann
Director: Michael Mann
Screenwriter: Stuart Beattie
Producer: Michael Mann, Julie Richardson
Composer: James Newton Howard
Studio: DreamWorks Distribution LLC
Reviews for Collateral
Awesome vision and a compellingly villainous Tom Cruise save this cool contemporary noir from its lukewarm patches.
A stylish, impressively directed, smartly written thriller with superb performances by both Cruise and Foxx.
For Vincent's sharp-witted command of the cab and the echoes of The Third Man and Heat, Collateral is well worth targeting.
A superbly well-structured screenplay and an unhurried, sure-handed directorial style. Otherwise, alas, there's not much to it.
[Mann's] still looking out the car windows for something to make a movie about as he's filming the convictionless scenes.
Could someone please let Michael Mann know that we're in the 21st Century, Miami Vice has been cancelled and he can move on?
Cruise has almost nothing going for him this time around in the way of props, and even less than usual in the way of character.
It's too bad that halfway through, Collateral turns into a series of loud, chaotic, over-the-top action set pieces in which the existentialist Mann proves he's lousy at action.
A sort of dud-brained Taxi Driver on the slick streets of Los Angeles rather than the steaming streets of New York.
Somewhere along the way, the gimmick and suspense had worn out leaving the only real gray matter as the product coloring Cruises’ hair.
While engaging the senses, it starves the brain...the picture is all flash and no light--but the flash is brilliant.
If there was ever an example of a movie's visual language leaving its verbal and narrative components in the dust, this, unfortunately, is it.
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