Miami Vice (2006)

Summary: When an informant's family is killed, Crockett (Colin Farrell) and Tubbs (Jamie Foxx) go undercover as transporters for the Columbian drug lord José Yero (John Ortiz), who leads them to Arcángel nde Jesús Montoya (Luis Tosar) and Isabella (Gong Li).

Even though I went to this movie Friday night, I can't stop laughing at it. It's so bad. So bad it's funny, in my opinion, but not in the good "knows it's bad and therefore decided to be funny way." Sadly, it's the unintentional way.

Oh, Michael Mann. I can see why you would want to revisit your old stomping grounds, and I think you are one of the few writers or directors that doesn't rely on clichés to establish place. So, it's just your dialogue, characterization, casting, music, pacing, and eyesight that need work.

Dialogue: I liked it when Foxx said, "There's undercover, and then there's which way is up." I did not like it when he suggest that they "take it to limit. One More Time." One is a smart and fresh way of looking at something, and one is lyrics from an Eagles song. One of your male leads says he's "a fiend for mojitos," my response is not, "Sexy!"

Characterization/Casting/Eyesight: These three are tied up in the romance between Crockett and Isabella. I get that Farrell looks like that so that Crockett looks the undercover part, but, well, the actual drug dealers were better groomed. Also, drug dealers around the world should look at Farrell on the poster and decide that they need to step up. As for the supposedly white hot affair, Farrell looked alternatively bored and put upon. He always seemed to be going after Isabella because the script told him to and for no other reason. As for when Isabella and Crocket were having their super-sexy sex, they looked so uncomfortable. I think that, at least a little bit, their all-elbows sex was intended to come across as intense desire, but it just ended feeling awkward. Perhaps the negative chemistry between the two was part of it.

Music: Please get your bad 80s music away from me. I get that that's when the show was on, but you are going for a gritty, more realistic take on the vice squad, no? So drop it. I am practically a connoisseur of bad 80s music, and you do not have my support here. When I stop paying attention to think about how bad the music is, that's a bad sign.

Pacing: This movie is a marvel. No, really, I marvel at it. I don't understand how something with so much going on could also be so very flat. There was not a single moment of tension or suspense. It was all, "Oh, I guess that girl's gonna get kidnapped. Whatever, she'll live." and "Hmm, I guess it's time for that guy to get laid." Throwing lots of sex and violence in a movie isn't a surprise.

So, at least I could laugh at how bad it was. Too bad it couldn't just settle in and laugh at itself. D