Movie Review: Collateral

*This review contains some minor spoilers*

There are two ingredients I've noticed are almost always present in good Thriller films, and I think they're the fundamental difference between a Thriller and an Action film - theme and tension.

Action films are a genre that I personally find tedious and stale the great majority of the time. Musclebound stars making tiresome quips as they mow down Faceless Baddie #79451 get me frowning. Even more so when the plot can usually be summed up in three words. Man gets revenge. Man kills things. Manmade gratuitous explosions.

That's all old tat. So back to Thrillers and themes.

To use an example: No Country For Old Men, a thriller that holds a fond place in my heart, has themes which encompass greed, guilt, the breakdown of social morals and fate. These themes combine with a terrifying use of tension to create an edge-of-seat experience. Guns don't fire every five seconds, but when they do it almost always means a character we care about is in dire peril.

Collateral is a similar film, in that although it does have action-filled scenes, it also cranks up the tension, and focuses on characterisation far more than gunfire and explosions.

Don't make him angry

Set in L.A., the plot primarily features cab driver Max (Jamie Foxx), who has been planning for a long time to start his own Limousine business, but somehow has never got around to it. Early in the film he meets a high-profile lawyer named Annie (Jada Pinkett Smith) when she rides in the back of his cab.

It's clear the two like each other, but unlike many films, where vulgar lines start getting hurled around immediately, the scene comes across as pretty natural and realistic. The two simply chat and get on well. Max starts to become a character we can empathise with, due to both a good script and an admirable performance from Foxx.

Annie leaves him with her card and departs. The next fare Max has is a strange man named Vincent (Tom Cruise), who dresses in a sharp suit, but sports a messy stubbled look. He is friendly, but also cynical of human nature.

He tells a story of a man dying on the LA metro, and his corpse only being noticed six hours later despite passengers sitting next to him in all that time. This theme of social apathy and urban dehumanisation continues throughout the film, even influencing the plot at several key points.

It soon turns out that Vincent is a hired killer, and a good one at that. I'm not usually a huge fan of Tom Cruise, but here he plays Vincent perfectly. He is both disturbingly cold and yet endearingly animated at the same time, striking a mix between likable intelligence and frightening ruthlessness.

Vincent offers Max $600 to drive him to several different spots around the city. Max drops him off at an apartment first, and then is horrified when a body suddenly lands on top of the taxi from a window above.

Vincent is quite calm, and forces Max at gunpoint to clean the taxi and stow the corpse in the boot of the car.

From there on the film proceeds at a menacing but measured pace, with Max strongarmed into taking Vincent to the rest of his victims. Following the trail of bodies is LAPD officer Fanning (Mark Ruffalo), who believes members of the FBI are wrong to suspect Max as the murderer.

Between killings Vincent and Max talk to each other in the car, and gradually more is revealed about both. Unexpected and very tense scenes occur. One has the police pulling over the taxi for its broken windscreen.

Another has the duo meeting a jazz club owner (Barry Shabaka Henley) and having an intriguing (and very sad) conversation.

In a particularly good scene, Max is required to pose as Vincent to Vincent's criminal client Felix (Javier Bardem). He explains they've never met him in person before, and so Max can take his place if he can improvise well enough. If not, they'll probably kill him. Either way Vincent is able to sit safely outside in the car.

Javier Bardem is a very skilled actor. In No Country For Old Men, he put in an iconic performance as the unstoppable psychotic Anton Chigurh.

Here, in his portrayal of the laid back but intimidating Felix, he switches instantly from friendly chit-chat to weighting every word with solid malice.

"If Santa Claus were to make a list...and [his assistant] were to lose it...how f***ing furious do you  think Santa Claus would be?"

From there on the film ploughs ahead, with several surprising twists. The film manages to remain firmly in the realm of plausibility. There is a car crash not followed by an explosion, something which stunned me.

In fact, I don't think the film contains any explosions, and it's a very refreshing change indeed.

Vincent is one of the most interesting movie 'villains' I have seen in a recent film. His rationalisation of his job ("Millions of galaxies of hundreds of millions of stars, in a speck on one in a blink. That's us, lost in space.") raises some very interesting questions on morality. Does morality even exist in a purely atheist, scientific outlook on life, or is Vincent simply a sociopath? Why does it matter, ultimately?

The ending is a final release of the tension throughout the movie, and neatly sums up the themes in the film as things seem to go full-circle.

Final Word:

I went into Collateral expecting your typical crappy explosion fest, but left with a satisfied smile on my face. The film balances action with a fresh cast of characters and a plot that really does introduce some interesting questions. Performances all around are solid.

I'm going to give the film 5 stars, not because it is perfect (no film is), but because it is a very entertaining piece of cinema.

One thing I noticed throughout the film was the pleasing lack of swearing. F-bombs are dropped, but they are not generally used in casual conversation, and not to anywhere near the level I've seen in other films recently. It's amazing how much more impact they have when they're not coming out of someone's mouth every two seconds. Definitely a plus.

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5/5