Blackhat

Blackhat is the latest from maverick director Michael Mann...it also happens to be his worst film ever. Yes, I am even factoring in The Keep. It is THAT bad. Starring Chris Hemsworth and Viola Davis, this film is a misfire and criminally misuses a talented cast and a talented crew. Nick is a furloughed convict trying to nail a destructive hacker who is damaging the financial stabilities of countries all around the world. Now, on the list of people better suited for this role, Chris Hemsworth shouldn't even be on this list. Watching him as a hacker is as painful as watching Adam Sandler in drag seduce Al Pacino. Working off a screenplay from Morgan Davis Foehl, Mann seems to focus more on having the shakiest hand-held cinematography not in a Paranormal Activity film than actually telling a coherent story with good characters. And for those of you who were expecting Michael Mann to deliver a film like Heat or The Insider, you will walk away from this thoroughly disappointed. The action is short, rare and very tame while the scenes that are attempting to explain what the hell is going on are so convoluted, long and boring that it creates a very uneven film that borders unwatchable. One of the biggest gripes I have with this film is the cinematography. It is entirely too shaky for a film like this and, on a serious note, reminded me more of End of Watch. While that style fit End of Watch perfectly, it doesn't fit this film. It doesn't make it look gritty, it just makes it look painfully under-produced and underfunded. Overall, Mann's Blackhat serves as one of the biggest disappointments in recent memory considering the fact this is Michael Mann we're talking about here...the guy who did Heat, Thief and Collateral. Unfortunately, if this is the best Mann has to offer, I fear it is only going to get worse as time goes on. Blackhat is underdeveloped, unrealistic, and filmed terribly. Watcher beware!!!

This film currently has an undeservedly low rating here on IMDb so it was with a bit of apprehension that I sat down to watch it and it proved to be much better than I had expected. The reason for the low rating I think is that the audiences today got too used to dumb 'action packed' crap like Taken that consists of little more than clichés and boring camera work. This movie dares to be different, it dares to be slow paced, watching it is like reading a book, it actually requires a mental effort on the part of the viewer to keep track of what's going on and naturally people these days don't like that. This film is from a different epoch, it's just too big and too multi-layered for the short attention span of the modern viewer weaned on vine videos. If you want to get an idea of what this movie is like without spoilers - think Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy. Don't be discouraged by the low rating, it's just that slow-burn thrillers are not everyone's cup of tea these days.

It should also be noted that it's not just in its approach to story telling that this film dares to be different it's also in its cinematography. Once again, it feels like a film from a different time period that hearkens back to the classic noir movies of yesteryear, something like Three Days of the Condor.

And last but not least, it's quite refreshing to have a main character that thinks ahead rather than simply barging in and relying solely on the script writers to help him prevail in whatever situation they may find themselves in.

After a Chinese Nuclear plant is hacked, FBI agent Carol Barrett (Viola Davis) insists the FBI work with the Chinese government to track the hacker down. She is finally convinced that this needs the help of super hacker Nick Hathaway (Chris Hemsworth) who is serving a 15-year prison sentence.

I think most movies have an obligation to get the audience engaged, especially in the beginning. The beginning of this movie tried to dazzle us with computer hacking showing us what happens inside a computer with the CGI going wild, but it went on for too long and we started thinking of other things we needed to do like reorganizing our sock drawer. This was the first step in losing the audience.

The rest of movie slowly comes around trying to locate the hacker with huge amounts of Geek Teckno-babble losing us once again. Then with Nick's help we come to realize that this hack was not political, but something else. Yes, this is the "Twist" we come to believe is in every movie. And it is here the movie begins to make sense as more hacks come about disrupting economies throughout the world. Ah, so it's all about the money. Ah, we thought so. Once that is realized, the movie settles down to something we can finally understand: good guys vs the bad guys.

However, it is still slow-going as players stand around waiting for their lines. Add to this too many sub-titles that were too long to read before the scene changed and we lost the last 6-words or so. What were they thinking? Don't they know I never took that speed-reading course? Hey, I meant to.

A U.S. Marshall was supposed to stick with Nick everywhere he went, but we see him go to a restaurant to meet one of the hackers and no Marshall is in sight. Did the Continuity Girl (yeah, it's usually a girl) not read the script and mess up? Of course, there is a big fight here and, of course, Nick prevails, of course. Actually, this was a very good (read brutal) fight scene. Ouch. Ouch. Ouch. Probably the best part of the movie. Hey, who needs THOR?

This is tedious, but watchable because we keep hoping this will get better and it does in the last 15-minutes. The love interest between Nick and Chen (Tang Wei) is forced, but so were a lot of things in here. So what else is new? Most scenes were so short no player had any time to show off any acting talent. Long shots of player grimaces don't count. Now, about that sock drawer…………. (4/10)

Violence: Yes. Sex: No, we only see a make-out session. Nudity: No. Language: yes, some not much.

"This isn't about money. This isn't about politics. I can target anyone, anything, anywhere." After a terror attack hits a Chinese factory it is tracked to a malware attack. When it is found that parts of the code were written by Nick Hathaway (Hemsworth) he is brought in to help find the attacker. With his freedom on the line he must now work with the FBI in order to track down the cyber terrorist before they strike again, and execute a more horrific attack. Michael Mann is a very interesting director. Unlike most directors he assumes the audience can catch up to what is happening and doesn't treat us like we are incapable of figuring out the plot without exposition after exposition. He uses technical language throughout this movie, but as you watch you can figure out what is happening. I really appreciate that. As for the movie itself it is tense and exciting. Michael Mann has done movies like, The Insider, Heat, Collateral, and Miami Vice and this movie has the feel of those. Deliberately paced and tense with enough intrigue to keep you guessing. This is a good movie that I liked, but not something I think I would watch again. Overall, If you a fan of Michael Mann you will enjoy this. I give it a B.

This is one of the few, say past fifteen years, films with science and or high tech as an important plot element, whether sci-fi or just drama, that did its research and got the science/tech mostly right. And, it did so in a way that explained it with some entertaining clarity e.g. the opening, and a couple of other scenes, showing packets of data traveling through computer architecture was about as good as it can be. The rest of the film that dealt with cyber hacking was presented with accuracy and surprising clarity for a mass marketing film. Great location authenticity with filming in L.A. (OK, that's not so great), Indonesia, Malaysia, Hong Kong.

On the other hand the action scenes were basically just movie entertainment and at times a bit overboard. Such as, and a bit far-fetched, that our lead character (Hemsworth) is a world class coder (programmer) and some how had the time to become a world class action killing machine. Talk about being a Renaissance man! More of an international cast would have been interesting. Davis (with Tina Turner wig which made no sense for an agent) was stereotyped into filling the black FBI agent role which seems to be a popular character placement in film in recent years (e.g., recently, "Powers").