Friday, August 04, 2006
Review: Miami Vice
Miami Vice is one of the quietest yet loudest films I have ever seen. All the major emotional peaks are told through gazes and tenses; eyes lingering with passion or mouths twitching with hard-boiled animosity. At the same time there are explosive moments with gunfire booming in your ears and music melting comfortably with its visuals, all of it being amplified by the carefully built tension before it. It's as if Michael Mann wants to peel away the confines of the theater around you and keep you tethered to the realism of this glowing stylistic world he's created. And at not one point does he patronize you, telling you the why and the what of the world. Instead he trusts you to simply know or learn from your experience, enlightening you no matter how you might see his influential vision.
That vision is one without forced commentary and one focused upon overloading your senses. When the film jumps open and that curved silhouette rattles and shakes on the screen and a Jay Z/Linkin Park collaboration flows on the music track, you find your eyes widen and your ears open to everything that is going on in the thick atmosphere. As a viewer you want more and more of these perfectly framed images as you gaze at the aimless camera that wanders about the kaleidoscopic club. It overwhelms you so much that when you finally see Sonny Crockett and Ricardo Tubbs (Colin Farrell and Jamie Foxx) lingering about the sidelines with terribly concentrated faces, you barely are reminded of being in a film and are still trying to revel in the digital environment.
It is also something to be said when music you would usually ignore is made into something you want to amass and never stop listening to. The mere experience of the opening scene found me immediately partaking of Encore/Numb and repeating it to pieces, remembering every bit of Miami Vice's introduction. Because of the film I now have an excuse for kind of liking Linkin Park.
Much like many other scenes in the movie, the introduction not only allows one to take in the pleasure of the sound and sights, but you're simultaneously deciphering the narrative around you. Your mother isn't here any more with a spoon and baby food to nourish you, you're a grown up now, trying to figure out your surroundings and its meanings. If you don't watch how Tubbs reacts to the hassling of a drugged out prostitute, how Crockett briefly flirts with his desperate charm, or how they both support each other, you will think there is very little to nothing in these characters. This movie demands your attention and it's solely up to your passiveness or awareness how you are going to walk away from it.
The problem - which is best explained early - is that at times Mann's vivid approach to storytelling has a void, a distant emptiness that seems needed to be filled. Assuredly, when the plot starts on its sprint after the introduction of a undercover drug deal gone wrong (which briefly features John Hawkes and Pavel Lychnikoff from Deadwood) you feel further dedicated to the film. It's moments in between, like when Crockett, Tubbs, and their crew work towards integration with South American drug lord Montoya's (played magnificently by Luis Tosar) operation do things seem distant. The narrative is there, but it initially feels secluded, perhaps because as viewers we are trained to be told and not to be taught.
It could also be because there is very little emotional resonance - either visual or expository - in these scenes. Though I would admit that is not so true in Naomi Harris's (playing Tubbs' charming no nonsense love interest Trudy) and Jamie Foxx's love scene together. It's a scene that elegantly introduces how this film is defined by relationships, built and broken ones that reflect the two main characters. Again, it’s the wandering, exploring camera work and music that really makes the moment special, and it tenses and reinforces a later plot point in the film. However, it was not until Crockett and Tubbs encountered John Ortiz's antagonistic José Yero or 'Crazy Pig' did everything really pick back up for me again.
Not long after the whole crew gets thrown into the very throes and essences of undercover work does Crockett give a daring attempt at his own relationship with Isabella, a strict business woman involved with Montoya and his drug trade. From the get go when Tubbs briefly questions what his partner is doing, you know this is more desperation for connection and substance in Crockett's life rather than a life line into their investigation. This is another moment where the body and expressions plays as the dialogue. No more than a few sentences are traded between the two before the relationship becomes sexual, but if you ponder on Farrell's desperate eyes and Gong Li's assertive presence (that subtly softens every moment she's with Crockett) you can tell there is a lot there that they both want. It's a beautiful way of telling their stories, and if it wasn't for both actors’ exceptional abilities it wouldn't come off nearly as genuine.
In fact, most of the actors in this film are quite phenomenal. All of them have to be able to reflect their feelings without one word, and because of their proficiency and precision in doing such it all comes over as strong characterization. You believe Tubbs' latent ferocity in the third act just by the tensed and cold expression in his eyes. Montoya is the same way, and Mann seems to realize how unsettling Tosar's gaze can be since he always finds moments to linger on it. When Montoya is shown some incriminating evidence regarding Isabella and Crockett's relationship, you've seen his stare so many times that all the camera has to show is a beautifully framed shot of the back of his head. Just by pure instincts you know what he's thinking; and it isn't about puppies and kittens.
It is all this emotional build up from the characters that makes the action in Miami Vice so thrilling and unforgiving when it finally happens. There are two scenes in particular that reminds you this is the same man who orchestrated the bank shoot out in Heat. Sharp sounds rip and explode from the barrels of these guns too, and if that doesn't get your attention everything else will.
This review can't end without citing how lovely the film is in both look and composition. Miami certainly is a character in and of itself, with roaring, red thunder clouds filling the skies at night and hard saturating sunlight during day. It gives an imperfect charm to Miami and the other locations, making you want to book a plane to all of them. Mann is obviously (and always has been) in love with the landscapes he uses, and he takes every moment he can to make the experience of viewing them real and inspiring. People are going to be torn because of the digital camera use, however, especially its tendency to make night scenes look grainy. I find it strengthens the movie more than it hampers. I also find that Mann experimenting with different applications to both narrative and visuals is rousing and fresh. Hopefully, we won't just see him but also others following his lead in the near future.
When you walk into Miami Vice, don't expect the 80s glitz and glamour of the original. Don't expect some ceaseless action ride that hands you all the cards. Do expect to think, and do expect to drink in the bountiful amounts of intelligence, style, and innovations this film brings to the world of cinema. Michael Mann has created another fulfilling character study in the world of crime and conflict, and let us hope he will continue to do so for quite some time.
9 awesome speed boats out of 10
Read or Post a Comment
The Onion AV Club used a nice turn of phrase when talking about this, calling it "majestically slight", which incedentally sums up almost all of Mann's work.
It is slight in the narrative department. It is awesome in its everything else.
What is funny is that it uses the same nu-metal music as a lot of crappy teen oriented actioners and vampire/werewolf films, but Miami Vice makes it awesome and really emotional.