I have a new feature coming to the site that will be debuting tomorrow — Monday, August 27 — and while I watched Before Sunrise thinking it and Before Sunset would serve as the debut subjects of this piece, something inside me just decided to make Michael Mann’s 2004 thriller Collateral the recipient.
Watching it also made me think how I really ought to take a look at the films I love and start creating a list. Not so I can say one is better than the other, but so I can start looking at them a little closer as I will with Collateral tomorrow, though tomorrow’s piece is less exploratory than it is a whimsical look at the film in a way you probably didn’t expect.
I mention this because I absolutely love this film. I love, love, love it.
When I first saw Collateral I had only been reviewing movies for a little over a year-and-a-half. I’m sure if you go back and read through my reviews you can find hyperbole thrown around haphazardly and a lot of questionable opinions. While my 2004 review of Collateral is short and a little elementary, I stand by what I wrote back then and would beef that grade from an “A” to an “A+” were I to write it today.
Since I’ve started keeping tracks of movies as I watch them with this column, it looks like the last time I watched Collateral was back in April 2010 as I wrote about it in Issue #40 of the “What I Watched” column, that being near the date Dreamworks released it onto Blu-ray.
There are some films that are just so comforting to watch and Collateral, to me, is one of them. It never ceases to amaze me how Mann was able to make such a thrilling film feel like such a “warm bath” soother. Bathed in the amber glow of streetlights, Collateral gives Los Angeles a completely different feel amidst the gunfire.
One egregious Academy oversight in the last ten years is the absence of Dion Beebe and Paul Cameron from the nomination list for Oscar’s Best Cinematography, though the ASC wasn’t similarly shortsighted. How these two weren’t nominated for an Oscar for their stunning cinematography and to see Cruise overlooked for an acting nomination just makes me hang my head. The score, the soundtrack, the editing (which it was nominated for), the dialogue and the sound design and mixing are astounding. When gunshots ring out in Collateral they sound like gunshots. They feel like gunshots. The impact is felt and it is stunning.
What I love even more are the moments where Cruise, as the contract killer Vincent, shows his human side. The scene in Daniel’s jazz bar. The scene in club Fever where he protects Max (Jamie Foxx) and stares at him across the floor. To go along with that, the scene at the end of the movie after Max has shot Vincent and he sits there dying and despite all they’ve been through Max says, “We’re almost at the next stop.”
Though these two men have been through hell, Vincent has gained respect for the life Max leads, Max sees something in Vincent, a damaged soul behind a killer’s eyes. Even though he’s seen Vincent kill several people, he still tries to comfort him in his final hours. Even though Max has delivered a death blow to Vincent. Max still cares for him as a human being.
The level of humanity exhibited in this film on top of the craftsmanship and performances makes it one for the ages as far as I’m concerned.
It’s also a great example of how we’re able to overlook cinematic cliches, such as the cell phone battery dying, when everything else around a film comes together so perfectly. If I was to make a list of films I consider the absolute best I’ve ever seen, Collateral would undoubtedly be on it.
