Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #14079 in DVD
• Released on: 2005-01-17
• Rating: Suitable for 15 years and over
• Aspect ratio: 2.40:1
• Formats: Anamorphic, Box set, Dubbed, PAL, Special Edition, Widescreen
• Original language: English
• Subtitled in: Arabic, Bulgarian, Czech, Danish, Dutch, English, Finnish, French, German, Hungarian, Icelandic, Norwegian, Polish, Romanian, Swedish, Turkish
• Dubbed in: French, German
• Number of discs: 2
• Running time: 115 minutes

Amazon.co.uk Review
Collateral offers a change of pace for Tom Cruise as a ruthless contract killer, but that's just one of many reasons to recommend this well-crafted thriller. It's from Michael Mann, after all, and the director's stellar track record with crime thrillers (Thief, Manhunter, and especially Heat) guarantees a rich combination of intelligent plotting, well-drawn characters, and escalating tension, beginning here when icy hit-man Vincent (Cruise) recruits cab driver Max (Jamie Foxx) to drive him through a nocturnal tour of Los Angeles, during which he will execute five people in a 10-hour spree. While Stuart Beattie's screenplay deftly combines intimate character study with raw bursts of action (in keeping with Mann's directorial trademark), Foxx does the best work of his career to date (between his excellent performance in Ali and his title-role showcase in Ray), and Cruise is fiercely convincing as an ultra-disciplined sociopath. Jada Pinkett-Smith rises above the limitations of a supporting role, and Mann directs with the confidence of a master, turning L.A. into a third major character (much as it was in the Mann-produced TV series Robbery Homicide Division). Collateral is a bit slow at first, but as it develops subtle themes of elusive dreams and lives on the edge, it shifts into overdrive and races, with breathtaking precision, toward a nail-biting climax. --Jeff Shannon

Synopsis
Jamie Foxx plays Max, a Los Angeles cab driver who has a pretty wild night in this thriller from Michael Mann (HEAT, THE INSIDER). First, Max picks up, flirts with, and gets the number of Annie (Jada Pinkett Smith), an attractive District attorney. Next, Vincent (Tom Cruise) climbs into his cab. He is a professional hit man who reserves Max for the night with a whole shopping list of victims he needs to visit. As the night moves forward and the body count rises, Max must wrestle with the question of how to do the right thing while staying alive. Gradually the two men bond in unlikely ways, as each learns survival mechanisms from the other, and it all doubles as a metaphor for morality vs. capitalism. Mark Ruffalo and Peter Berg play cops who eventually get on Max and Vincent's trail, leading to a spectacular action set piece inside a night club. Irma P. Hall (2004's THE LADYKILLERS) gets laughs as Max's hospitalized momma, and Javier Bardem (BEFORE NIGHT FALLS) is a sinister drug lord. With a capable director like Mann at the wheel, this remains a smooth, enjoyable ride while also being fast, bumpy, and full of twists and turns. The streets of urban, nighttime Los Angeles--captured via a specially modified digital camera--never looked so beautiful or desolate. As typical of the director, the film is both artistic and action-packed; operatically over-the-top while never skimping on the little details.

DVD features
The seemingly obligatory director's commentary is not on this two-disc set of Michael Mann's slick thriller yet the extras are so good you won't miss it. On the surface, there's nothing out of the ordinary here with the exception of a few minutes of rehearsal footage, but everything is just so darn interesting to watch. Mann and his stars dish about the making of the film, including the creation of Cruise's assassin. The nighttime shooting (shot digitally and transferred sublimely) is examined along with a single deleted scene (with a clear explanation on why it was cut). Think the climatic finale aboard a train was shot on a subway for convenience? No, Mann just wanted to control the backgrounds! Best of all, hit "play all" and view the entire second disc with no return-to-menu nuisance. --Doug Thomas

Customer Reviews

"A man dies on the subway. Do you think anyone will notice?"
Definitely in my top three films ever. Collateral manages to get the right balance between action and a multi-dimensional plot. At times the suspense is phenomenal, and while there is violence and gore, it is superbly done and integral to the story rather than being gratuitous and repetitive. The storyline is gripping and frequently surprisingly moralistic and thought-provoking, and the gunfight in the Fever club shows some outstanding choreography coupled with a great trance/electronica tune (an Oriental-language version of "Ready Steady Go!" by Paul Oakenfold). Excellent film all round with a great cast and an excellent storyline: buy it.

Possibly the finest thriller ever made
There are few Cop thrillers, which use real deep human emotions as their core, instead of the tom clancy style global politics, and get away with a sucess, and this is one of them! This the pinnacle of Mann's film Career, the pinnacale of Jamie Foxxs (yes it is better than Ray), the pinnacle almost certainly of tom Cruis', putting to right all those naff films he did like MI2 and Vinilla sky. Quite simply cruise should stick to a cold calculating hit man that he is in colatteral, instead of a grinning gink in shody romance or action films. As for Jamie Foxx he is a real actor who fits like a shoe into any role, weather it be a slick, blind jazz player or a hopless loser of a taxi driver, he plays the role perfectly. The film is filled with brilliant moments of cinamatography and deep meaning, and as for the action scenes, if you are not into people leaping around or massive gunfights, this is not for you, but the actions scenes are as elecric as all of the other tense moments in the film, they feel real, they are chaotic, the police are not always in control, Vincent the hitman draws in the bodygaurds of the one he wants to assasinate slowly and then pounces.

The finest action moment you will have seen in the nightclub is worth taking a look at, as the level of sophistication is so great, and the electric atomosphere is masterfully created by Mann's superb cinamatography and not thousands of rounds flying through the place, at the same time each gunshot that is fired you feel a deep pound in line with your heartbeat, mann perfectly recreates the deep sound of real gunshots, bring your subwoofer for this one, cus you'll, "smell the cordyte".

As for the cinamatography form the moment you star the film, you see it in mans world, an world of reflections and distortions, and odd cammera angles, this Mann sees things in a way no-one else does, and his other work in Aviator, is a clear example of the extrodinary talent this director has.

This film is an undeniable classic, a simple but orriginal idea executed perfectly, in the backdrop of this recurring theme of a lonly washed up town of LA, or any city for that matter, where no-one knows anyone else. A thriller that casts aside myths of city life for the harsh reality of it. A film that despite its mixed critical acclaim will be seen as it is now as a classic film that will stand the test of time, well beyond other modern classics like matrix. As far as cinamotography is concerned this is the modern day Citizen Cain, and if you don't agree that this film is great you are a philostine, and a shallow person.

Cabbie with a heart of gold
Feet up, popcorn ready, a great night in with this film.

Mr Tom Cruise effortlessly slides into his baddie role, I hadn't seen Jamie Foxx before but thought he was superb.

Did I hear right, when Max went to meet Felix in the nightclub, did Felix look at him critically and say, "I thought you'd be taller?" Well for all his lack of height in real life I still think Tom Cruise made a convincing villain and I enjoyed the scenes with Max the good guy, esp in the hospital visiting Max's mum.

Thinking of TC's hair colour in this film, can't help wondering how either Richard Gere or George Clooney would have played Vincent...

Lots of excitement, some twists, and the odd bit of sly humour too. Only once they were out of the taxi did it falter, the last 20 minutes and ending could have been sharper, hence 4 and not 5 out of 5.