Movies On Second Thought: Miami Vice

There are several films now out on DVD that I missed in the theatre for one reason or another. Either I was too cheap, too busy or too disinterested to make the trip to the multiplex. Now that it's January and there's nothing on TV, I've gotten fairly well caught up on last year's videos, and this week I'm going to review each one of them. Too little, too late, I'm sure. Spoilers will be included.

Miami Vice

Did you ever rent a two-disc DVD and put the second disc in first by accident? If it hadn't been for the credits across the opening scene and the fact that there was only one disc for this movie, I would swear that's what I did here. I even looked over at Tim and said "did they just kind of pick up in the middle of the story?" The movie just kinda drops you right in the middle of the action, and you spend the first 15 or 20 minutes trying to figure out who's who and what they're doing. It doesn't help that several characters introduced in those first few minutes never show up again. Weird movie.

There was much oddness in this picture, but by far the strangest thing was the casting. I was addicted to the TV series when I was a kid. Don Johnston ans Crockett was pure distilled hotness. Laugh if you must but that guy exuded sex appeal all over the place. The Colin Farrell version was a skeevy long-haired dude who looked like his idea of a hot date was a Monster Truck Rally followed by some meth-brewin'. Not sexy. Then we have the problem of poor Jamie Foxx. Tubbs was a thankless character on the TV show. Nothing has changed here. In fact, I'm not quite sure why Tubbs was in this movie, other than to serve as the Cop Whose Girlfriend Is In Jeopardy. It'll be years before Jamie Foxx is anything other than Ray Charles to me. Sorry, Jamie. Actually I'm more sorry that you don't have better roles offered to you. Tubbs was a waste of space.

Oh, and might I add that he's also an idiot?

Let me explain something to all of you, even though you will most likely never find yourselves in this situation.

Say your loved one is in a trailer with a giant bomb consisting of big barrells of explosives tied to C-4 and sticks of dynamite. You and the rest of your merry band of maybe-they're-cops-we're-not-sure-because-the-movie-had-a-lousy-first-act storm the trailer, kill the bad guy holding the detonator and wipe out his thugcrew. While I realise that you and your loved-one have a very good reason to be both upset and relieved, it is still a good idea to leave the trailer. Do not tell your loved-one to wait in the trailer right next to the bomb. [Yeah. Three guesses what happened THERE.]

On the upside, I have to say that I absolutely loved the soundtrack to the movie, and will probably end up getting it on iTunes one of these days. The songs were very mood-driven and lush in a techno way. Even though they didn't have the original show theme. (?!?)

All in all, I'd have to say that I can't recommend the film, but I do think the album is worth $13.95.