April Noir: Collateral (dir by Michael Mann)

Posted on April 15, 2025 by Lisa Marie Bowman

In 2004’s Collateral, Jamie Foxx stars as Max, a taxicab driver who is hoping, in those days before Uber, to start his own limousine company. When we first see him, he’s giving a ride to a federal prosecutor named Annie (Jada Pinkett Smith) and he’s even getting her phone number after he drops her off at work. Unfortunately, for Max, his next passenger is a bit less friendly.

Vincent (Tom Cruise), with his gray hair that matches his suit, is polite, quiet, and direct when he speaks. He carries a briefcase with him everywhere that he goes and anyone who tries to take the briefcase soon discovers just how far Vincent will go to hold onto it. Vincent pays Max $600 to drive him around Los Angeles for the night. Vincent has a lot of business that he needs to attend to. Max agrees, not realizing until it’s too late that Vincent is a hired assassin and that his business is killing people. Vincent has been hired to wipe out a collection of crooks and lawyers and, though Vincent is careful not to reveal his emotions, it’s obvious that he’s looking forward to the challenge.

To his credit, Max doesn’t really have any interest in being a part of Max’s killing spree but he soon finds himself unable to escape from Vincent and being forced to drive from location to location. Along the way, Vincent and Max engage in debates of both morality and philosophy. Vincent sees death as just being a part of the job. Max is horrified, especially when people who haven’t done anything wrong end up as collateral damage in Vincent’s killing spree. The truth of the matter is that, even if Max hadn’t picked up Vincent, there’s no guarantee that he wouldn’t have picked up some other madman. As a taxi driver, Max surrenders his control once he unlocks the door and allows someone to get in the backseat. Sometimes, he gets a passenger like Annie. Other times, he’s going to get a passenger like Vincent. Somewhat improbably, Vincent and Annie turns out to be connected and Max’s chance encounter with her becomes even more important.

Because this is a Michael Mann film, Los Angeles is as much a character in this film as Max and Vincent. Mann captures the shadowy darkness of the city at the night and the feeling that both opportunity and danger could lurk around every corner. Claustrophobic scenes in the taxi cab are mixed with scenes in an equally claustrophobic (though for different reasons) club. The film’s haunting final image takes place not in the cab but instead on a train. Everyone is heading somewhere and, at some point during the film, both Vincent and Max deal with the feeling of having no control over where they’ll end up.

When Collateral first came out in 2004, I remember that a lot of people were shocked to see Cruise playing a villain. Cruise does give one of his best performances here, playing yet another one of Mann’s cool and efficient professionals. Strangely enough, Jamie Foxx is the one who was nominated for an Oscar, even though he’s actually a little on the boring side as Max. (In all fairness, Max is meant to be the conventional member of the film’s involuntary partnership.) The film is dominated by Cruise and his performance is still powerful to this day.

The Unnominated #13: Heat (dir by Michael Mann)

Posted on April 15, 2025 by Lisa Marie Bowman

Though the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences claim that the Oscars honor the best of the year, we all know that there are always worthy films and performances that end up getting overlooked. Sometimes, it’s because the competition too fierce. Sometimes, it’s because the film itself was too controversial. Often, it’s just a case of a film’s quality not being fully recognized until years after its initial released. This series of reviews takes a look at the films and performances that should have been nominated but were, for whatever reason, overlooked. These are the Unnominated.

First released in 1995, Heat is one of the most influential and best-known films of the past 30 years. It also received absolutely zero Oscar nominations.

Maybe we shouldn’t be too surprised that Academy — especially the Academy of the 1990s — didn’t shower the film with nominations. For all of its many strengths, Heat is still a genre piece, an epic three-hour crime film from director Michael Mann. It’s a film about obsessive cops and tightly-wound crooks and it’s based on a made-for-TV movie that Mann directed in the late 80s. While the Academy had given a best picture nomination to The Fugitive just two years before, it still hadn’t fully come around to honoring genre films.

And yet one would think that the film could have at least picked up a nomination for its editing or maybe the sound design that helps to make the film’s signature 8-minute gun battle so unforgettable. (Heat is a film that leaves you feeling as if you’re trapped in the middle of its gunfights, running for cover while the cops and the crooks fire on each other.) The screenplay, featuring the scene where Al Pacino’s intense detective sits down for coffee with Robert De Niro’s career crook, also went unnominated.

Al Pacino was not nominated for playing Vincent Hanna and maybe we shouldn’t be too surprised at that. Pacino yells a lot in this movie. When people talk about Pacino having a reputation for bellowing his lines like a madman, they’re usually thinking about the scene where he confronts a weaselly executive (Hank Azaria) about the affair that he’s having with Charlene (Ashley Judd), the wife of criminal Chris Shiherlis (Val Kilmer). And yet, I think that Pacino’s performance works in the context of the film and it’s often forgotten that Pacino has quite scenes in Heat as well. Pacino’s intensity provides a contrast to Robert De Niro’s tightly controlled career criminal, Neil McCauley. McCauley has done time in prison and he has no intention of ever going back. But, as he admits during the famous diner scene, being a criminal is the only thing that he knows how to do and it’s also the only thing that he wants to do. (“The action is the juice,” Tom Sizemore says in another scene.) If any two actors deserved a joint Oscar nomination it was Pacino and De Niro. In Heat, they’re the perfect team. Pacino’s flamboyance and De Niro’s tightly-controlled emotions come together to form the heart of the picture.

No one from the film’s supporting cast was nominated either, despite there being a wealth of riches to choose from. Ashley Judd and Val Kilmer come to mind as obvious contenders. Kilmer is amazing in the shoot-out that occurs two hours into the film. Ashley Judd has a killer scene where she helps her husband escape from the police. Beyond Judd and Kilmer, I like the quiet menace of Tom Sizemore’s Michael Cheritto. (Just check out the look he gives to an onlooker who is getting a little bit too curious.) Kevin Gage’s sociopathic Waingro is one of the most loathsome characters to ever show up in a movie. William Fichtner, Jon Voight, Danny Trejo, and Tom Noonan all make a definite impression and add to Michael Mann’s portrait of the Los Angeles underworld. In an early role, Natalie Portman plays Hanna’s neglected stepdaughter and even Amy Brenneman has some good moments as Neil’s unsuspecting girlfriend, the one who Neil claims to be prepared to abandon if he sees “the heat coming.”

I have to mention the performance of Dennis Haysbert as Don Breedan, a man who has just been released from prison and who finds himself working as a cook in a diner. (The owner of the diner is played by Bud Cort.) Haysbert doesn’t have many scenes but he gives a poignant performance as a man struggling not to fall back into his old life of crime and what eventually happens to him still packs an emotional punch. For much of the film’s running time, he’s on the fringes of the story. It’s only by chance that he finds himself suddenly and briefly thrown into the middle of the action.

Heat is the ultimate Michael Mann film, a 3-hour crime epic that is full of amazing action sequences, powerful performances, and a moody atmosphere that leaves the viewer with no doubt that the film is actually about a lot more than just a bunch of crooks and the cops who try to stop them. Hanna and McCauley both live by their own code and are equally obsessed with their work. Their showdown is inevitable and, as directed by Michael Mann, it takes on almost mythological grandeur. The film is a portrait of uncertainty and fear in Los Angeles but it’s also a portrait of two men destined to confront each other. They’re both the best at what they do and, as a result, only one can remain alive at the end of the film.

I rewatched Heat yesterday and I was amazed at how well the film holds up. It’s one of the best-paced three-hour films that I’ve ever seen and that epic gunfight is still powerful and frightening to watch. Like Martin Scorsese’s Casino, it was a 1995 film that deserved more Oscar attention than it received.

Heat (1995, dir by Michael Mann, DP: Dante Spinotti)

Previous entries in The Unnominated:

April Noir: Thief (dir by Michael Mann)

Posted on April 15, 2025 by Lisa Marie Bowman

1981’s Thief tells the story of Frank (James Caan).

Frank is a professional diamond thief, one of the best in the business. He’s so cool that he even has his own Tangerine Dream soundtrack. After doing a stint in prison, Frank lives his life very carefully and with discipline. He’s determined not to return to prison. His mentor (played by Willie Nelson) is still behind bars and will probably die there. In fact, Frank has even found himself thinking about abandoning his criminal lifestyle. He’s got two front businesses, both of which are doing well. (Frank’s used car lot looks like some sort of alien world.) He’s fallen in love with a cashier named Jessie (Tuesday Weld) and it’s starting to seem like now would be a good time to settle down and become a family man. The only problem is that Frank is working for Leo (Robert Prosky) and Leo has absolutely no intention of allowing Frank to walk away. As Leo puts it, Frank belongs to him. That’s not a smart thing to say to someone like Frank.

Frank’s an interesting character. He’s the film’s hero, not because he’s a good guy but because he’s a smidgen better than most of the other bad guys. He’s a professional, one who goes out of his way avoid unnecessary complications. When we see him on the job, it’s impossible not to admire just how good he is at stealing stuff. When he uses a blowtorch to break into a store or a safe, the screen is full of sparks and, for a few minutes, Frank looks like some sort of cosmic super hero brought to life. We admire Frank but we discover early on that he’s willing to get violent. He’s willing to pull a gun and threaten his way out of a situation. Frank is loyal. He visits his mentor in prison. He takes care of his partner-in-crime, Barry (Jim Belushi, making his film debut). He truly loves Jessie. But, at heart, he’s a criminal who doesn’t hesitate to pull the trigger when he has to. The question the film asks is whether one can just go straight, after years of breaking the law and living in the shadows. Can Frank abandon the lifestyle, even for love? Or is he destined to always be a thief?

Thief was Michael Mann’s feature film debut. (The Jericho Mile was Mann’s directorial debut but it was made for television.) Thief is full of the usual Mann themes and also Mann’s signature style, showing that Mann knew exactly what type of films he wanted to make from the start of his career. The nights are full of shadows. The days are deceptively calm. The neon of Frank’s car lot glows like another dimension. The final bloody shoot out takes place at night, in the type of suburban neighborhood in which most people would probably love to live. And holding the film together is James Caan, giving a coolly centered performance as a man who has learned to hold back his emotions and who won’t be controlled by anyone. Halfway through the film, Caan delivers a seven-minute monologue about life in prison and it’s an amazing moment, one in which Caan shows just how good of an actor he truly was. Thief is an effective and stylish neo-noir, one that sticks with you as the end credits roll.

Artwork of the Day: Hornblower

Posted on April 15, 2025 by Dazzling Erin

by Erin Nicole

Have you paid your taxes yet?

Made For TV Movie Review: The Jericho Mile (dir by Michael Mann)

Posted on April 15, 2025 by Lisa Marie Bowman

1979’s The Jericho Mile tells the story of Larry Murphy (Peter Strauss).

Larry is serving a life sentence at Folsom Prison, convicted a crime that he admits to having committed. Larry murdered his father, specifically to protect his stepsister from being raped. Larry feels no guilt for his crime and, at the same time, he’s willing to quietly serve his sentence. He’s a loner, avoiding the rival racial factions in the prison. (Brian Dennehy leads the Aryans while Roger E. Moseley leads the black prisoners and Miguel Pinero is the head of the Mexican Mafia.) Larry just wants to spend his time running around the prison yard.

When Dr. Bill Janowski (Geoffrey Lewis) sees how fast Larry can run, he arranges for a local track coach, Jerry Beloit (Ed Lauter), to come up to the prison with a few potential Olympians so that they can race Larry. Larry manages to outrun all of them. Jerry becomes convinced that Larry could qualify for the Olympics, if only he had a regulation track to run on. The Warden, knowing good publicity when he sees it, assigns the inmates to build the track but doing so means dealing with Folsom’s highly charged racial politics. No matter how fast Larry can run and no matter how inspiring it would be for Larry to go from serving a life sentence to competing in the Olympics, Folsom is still a prison and Larry is still a prisoner. And while the guards may have the guns and may be the only ones who are allowed to go home at the end of the game, it’s the prison gangs who have all the power. When the Aryans go on strike and refuse to work on the track, it puts Larry’s chances in jeopardy.

Of course, Larry’s chances are already in jeopardy just because of who he is. Larry is a prisoner who refuses to show remorse. While other prisoners embrace religion or politics and try to convince outsiders that they’ve either reformed or been wrongly convicted, Larry just wants to run. Running is when he’s free. (The film’s title refers to the Walls of Jericho coming down.) And, for the other inmates, watching Larry run is a reminder that there are many ways once can escape from the drudgery of being locked away.

The Jericho Mile is a tough and rather cynical prison film, one that manages to combine downbeat social drama with a uplifting sports story. You’ll want to cheer Larry while he’s running, even if you secretly suspect that he’s ultimately chasing something that will never happen. Making his directorial debut, Michael Mann shot the film on location at Folsom and the cast is full of actual prisoners, all of whom bring some much need authenticity to the film’s story. Mann never lets us forget that this is a film about people in a very dangerous situation and, even at its most inspiring, the film leaves you feeling as if violence could break out at any moment. Peter Strauss, who usually played somewhat more refined characters, is totally believable as the taciturn Larry and character actors like Dennehy and Mosely skillfully blend in with the actual prisoners in the cast. The Jericho Mile is a portrait of crime, punishment, and dreams. It’s a movie that will stay with you.

Icarus File No. 22: Revolution (dir by Hugh Hudson)

Posted on April 15, 2025 by Lisa Marie Bowman

1985’s Revolution opens on July 4th, 1776. The Declaration of Independence has just been published. The streets are full of people celebrating. A statue of King George is pulled down. In her carriage, the wealthy Mrs. McConnahay (Joan Plowright) turns up her nose to the enthusiastic rebels, including the fanatical Liberty Woman (Annie Lennox). Mrs. McConnahay’s daughter, Daisy (Nastassja Kinski) is intrigued by this idea of freedom and equality.

Fur trader Tom Dobbs sails his boat into Hudson Harbor. Tom is Scottish, illiterate, and very much a man of the 18th Century. However, he’s played by Al Pacino, who was none of those things. After Revolution was released to desultory reviews, Pacino took four years off from the movies and watching this film, one can see why. Pacino is miscast as Dobbs and, as a result, he gives the type of truly bad performance that can only be given by a great actor. Unable to disguise the fact that he had the accent of a modern-day New Yorker, Pacino resorts to mumbling the majority of his lines. Tasked with playing a character who has no idea how to deal with the history-making events in which he finds himself, Pacino alternates between a blank look and with bulging his eyes like a madman, proving that it’s far more difficult to play an uneducated character than an educated one. Why cast Pacino, who can be one of our most exciting actors, as a character who can barely speak and who has neither the intensity of Michael Corleone or the subversive wit of Tony Montana? Due to Pacino and Kinski having zero chemistry, the scenes where Tom falls in love with Daisy are almost painful to watch.

The film follows Tom as he and his son, Ned (Simon Owen when the film begins, Dexter Fletcher by the time the action moves to Valley Forge), as they find themselves conscripted into the Revolutionary Army. Eventually, Ned is abducted into the British army and serves as a drummer boy under the sadistic watch of Sgt. Major Peasy (Donald Sutherland). The idea behind the film isn’t a bad one. It attempts to portray the American Revolution through the eyes of the average citizen. Instead of focusing on the Founding Fathers, Revolution tries to tell the story of the everyday people who found themselves in the middle of the war. Tom loses his boat and (temporarily) he loses his son. Fortunately, this is one of those films where people are constantly running into each other by chance, regardless of whether it makes any sense or not. Daisy goes from seeing Tom in New York to randomly coming across him in a field to eventually finding him in Valley Forge. It’s not because she’s specifically looking for him. Instead, he just happens to be there.

Why does Revolution fail? A lot of it comes down to Pacino’s performance, though Pacino certainly isn’t the only talented actor to give a not-quite good performance in Revolution. (Donald Sutherland has never been more wasted in a film.) The script is full of dialogue like, “My mouth belongs where I place it.” (Pacino gets stuck with that one.) Hugh Hudson directs in a leaden manner. Towards the end of the film, there is one brilliant sequence where Tom wanders through the streets of New York and, for a few minutes, the film comes to like with a spontaneity that was previously lacking. Unfortunately, it’s just one sequence in a very long movie,

To be honest, we could use some good films about the American Revolution and I’m not talking about elitist nonsense like Hamilton. No taxation without representation. It’s still a good message for us all.

Previous Icarus Files:

Music Video of the Day: Love & Money by Luvcat (2025, dir by Ollie Bradley-Baker and Luvcat)

Posted on April 15, 2025 by Lisa Marie Bowman

It’s Tax Day! Bleh. Normally, I’d say don’t pay them because it only encourages them to ask for more but I don’t want to get anyone in trouble. Here’s a song about the moon, love, movies, and money!

Enjoy!

Late Night Retro Television Review: CHiPs 3.16 “Jailbirds”

Posted on April 14, 2025 by Lisa Marie Bowman

Welcome to Late Night Retro Television Reviews, a feature where we review some of our favorite and least favorite shows of the past! On Mondays, I will be reviewing CHiPs, which ran on NBC from 1977 to 1983. The entire show is currently streaming on Prime!

It’s a holiday week so tonight’s review is going to be a mini-review. Let’s quickly talk about the time two highway patrolmen ended up in jail!

But first….

Episode 3.16 “Jailbirds”

(Dir by Bruce Kessler, originally aired on January 12th, 1980)

Ponch and Baker go to jail!

Actually, Baker goes to jail twice. Ponch is only sent to jail once. It’s all because they refuse to reveal the name of the confidential informant that allowed them get the drop on and arrest a smuggler named Nick Ferris (Ray Duke). Getraer calls the Attorney General’s office. Officer Turner drops by to check on Baker. The Judge (Allan Rich) says that he sympathizes with the cops but unless they’re willing to name their informant, he’ll have to dismiss the charges and let Ferris go free due to insufficient evidence.

The idea of Ponch and Baker in jail has a lot of possibilities. Ponch is always going on and on about how he used to be a juvenile delinquent so I was half-expecting him to run into an old friend in the holding tank. That didn’t happen, though. Instead, CHiPs gave us a jail that was remarkably clean, well-run, and full of friendly prisoners and nice cops. I’ve often felt that CHiPs was essentially a commercial for Los Angeles tourism and the theme of this episode appeared to be, “L.A. …. even our jails are wonderful!”

Anyway. Getrear and the guys not in jail work to get more evidence so that they can put Ferris behind bars without revealing the name of Baker’s informant. Good for them! Teamwork, it’s what CHiPs is all about!

California Straight Ahead! (1937, directed by Arthur Lubin)

Posted on April 14, 2025 by Jedadiah Leland

Biff Smith (John Wayne), fired from his job as a school bus driver, becomes a partner in a trucking company. In order to show-up the railroads that are determined to put any potential competitors out of business, Biff and his fleet race a train to the Pacific Coast, where a boat needs to be unloaded before a labor strike begins. Making this personal for Biff is that he’s in love with Mary Porter (Louise Latimer), the sister of Biff’s late business partner. Embittered by her brother’s death in a trucking accident, Mary is now working for the head of the railroad, James Gifford (Theodore van Eltz). Biff not only wants to prove that his small trucking firm can compete with the big boys but also wants to show Mary that her new boss is nothing but a smooth-talking weasel.

This film is from John Wayne’s B-movie star period, before John Ford cast him in Stagecoach and made him one of the biggest stars in the world. California Straight Ahead! features Wayne in a contemporary role, though the movie still has a western sensibility. There’s not much difference between a wagon train and Wayne’s fleet of trucks and, as in so many westerns, the greedy railroad baron is the villain. This is one of Wayne’s better B-movie performances. He was clearly comfortable in front of the camera by the time he made this movie and was no longer as stiff as he was in his earlier films. California Straight Ahead! is a crowd-pleasing film that finds Wayne standing up for small businesses and their workers. Though this may just be a 61-minute B flick, California Straight Ahead! reveals the movie star that Wayne would soon become.

Retro Television Review: Miami Vice 3.24 “Heroes of the Revolution”

Posted on April 14, 2025 by Lisa Marie Bowman

Welcome to Retro Television Reviews, a feature where we review some of our favorite and least favorite shows of the past! On Mondays, I will be reviewing Miami Vice, which ran on NBC from 1984 to 1989. The entire show can be purchased on Prime!

This week, season 3 comes to a close with a threat from the past!

Episode 3.24 “Heroes of the Revolution”

(Dir by Gabrielle Beaumont, originally aired on May 8th, 1987)

The Vice Squad is investigating Orrestes Pedrosa (Shawn Elliott), a former Fidel Castro henchman who has since come to Miami and is now trying to set himself up a major drug supplier. There’s also a mysterious German named Klaus Herzog (Jeroen Krabbe) who appears to be following Pedrosa around Miami.

After getting wounded in a nearly-successful drive-by shooting, Herzog breaks into Gina’s apartment and introduces himself as the ex-boyfriend of Gina’s mother. He goes to explain that Pedrosa was also in love with Gina’s mother and that he killed her when Gina was just a baby. Pedrosa is still obsessed with Gina’s mother so Herzog suggests that Gina should get a job singing at a club. Pedrosa will come out of hiding to see her and Herzog will get his chance for revenge.

Gina agrees, even though it means violating every rule in the Vice book. The end result is that we get a lot of scenes of Saundra Santiago singing and eventually, she shoots Pedrosa dead when he attempts to shoot Herzog.

It’s an interesting choice for a season finale. Crockett and Tubbs are barely present in this episode, allowing Gina to finally have center stage. (Interestingly enough, the third season opened with a Gina episode as well.) Saundra Santiago was often underused by the show so it’s always good to see her getting a chance to do something other than telling Sonny that he got a call. She and the wonderful Jeroen Krabbe have an interesting chemistry in this episode. Pedrosa isn’t the only one who is still in love with Gina’s mother.

On the one hand, I was happy that Miami Vice finally featured a villainous communist. Politically, Miami Vice tends to be so left-wing that it sometimes verges on parody so a villainous Castroite was a change of pace. But then Krabbe’s character introduced himself by saying, “I am a communist.” It was as if the show had to make sure we understood that it was still on the side of Marx. It felt kind of silly, to be honest.

Anyway, the third season ended on a fairly good note. Neither Don Johnson nor Philip Michael Thomas really seemed that invested in their characters for much of the third season so it’s been nice to see Michael Talbott, Saundra Santiago, and Olivia Brown each get an opportunity to show off what they could do when given the opportunity. This was an uneven season but it had its share of good episodes. I’m still struggling to deal with the death of Larry Zito.

Next week, we begin season 4!