RRP £19.99 Lowest New Price £12.49

Suitable for 15 years and over Universal Pictures UK Release date: Monday 24th of November 2008 Starring: Colin Farrell, John Ortiz, Naomie Harris, Luis Tosar, Gong Li, Director(s): Format: PAL, Running time: 133 minutes

RRP: £19.99
Too smart for its audience?
Review date: 2008-10-22 Rating: 10 out of 10

With Numb/Hardcore blasting on the soundtrack Michael Mann launches you straight into the seething underworld in which vice cops Crockett (Colin Farrell) and Tubbs (Jamie Foxx) operate, without opening credits or a title banner, and goes on steadfastly to resist the convention of slowing down to introduce the audience to who and what they're watching. The high-definition video photography - dark, lustrous, sometimes faintly grainy like a high-quality pirate - compounds the film's strange flatness.
The bottom line on the film is that is a very smart, tightly paced, action-packed police thriller with beautiful cinematography and great performances underscored by a compulsive tension that builds from frame 1 until the end of the movie.

The bottom line on the public is that because the film is so unconventional and densely plotted, it left many of our X-Factor lovin' brethren in the dust. Too bad. They're all lined up to take shots at a film which can only be described as "boring" by a reviewer who simply couldn't follow the bread crumbs.

When the film was released I read dozens of posts by moviegoers who had no clue what was going on in the film. To be completely honest, it took me two or three viewings to really understand how certain plot points worked together. But the movie moves so quickly that even when the heroes remove their ski masks to show us, the audience, that they are the perpetrators of a drug heist, there were still many on the internet asking who was responsible for the drug heist.

There is no excuse for that, other than simple viewers who were not paying attention. Again, this is a great film for people who will appreciate the clever, intelligent way director Michael Mann constructs the whole. This is not a great film for people looking for ticking alligators, goofy sidekicks, wacky informants and a Jan Hammer beat. This is a movie for grownups. The rest need not bother.
Turn your brain on and turn the sub titles on if you have a problem with the dialogue. Its not rocket science.

Regarding the music Michael Mann's jittery cop drama has an OST of two parts: the brash house/ hip hop of the clubs where Crockett & Tubbs do their under cover work, and the moody HEAT-like synths of the pair's respective private moments. You only really get the vibe of the former here with composer John Murphy's (28 Days Later, Snatch) excellent input reduced to 2 tracks.
This album loses a star due to the absence of the Linkin Park/Jay-Z mash-up that scored the excellent trailer and begins the movie