I'd imagine the worst thing most taxi-drivers have to put with is a couple drunk fuckers in the back seat asking them the same damn question twenty times and then they puke, but at least they opened the door, even though it still splattered all over the interior. For sure, that's a thing and a half for a man to endure, but it's hardly the worst thing in the world.
"What time you on tae, anyroad? Aye, knows the score. Knows the score that cunt there. He's a fuckin' good man. What's your name anyway taxi driver? Oh aye. So what time you on tae anyroad? Three? Fuckin hell. Here, you ever see that film about the taxi driver. Oh, hire it out, hire it out, I'm telling ye. Martin Scorsese. Knows the fuckin score that cunt Scorsese. Oh aye. So what time you on tae?"
And so on and so forth.
Turns out, though, there are worse things for a taxi driver to put up with, especially if you're a taxi driver by the name of Jamie Foxx, and happen to be part of a motion-film by the name of Collateral. I'm guessing Jamie Foxx would pay good money for to have a fella ask him what time he's on till and then puke over the back of his neck. Anything, thinks Foxx, for a fella that falls asleep and forgets where he wants to go.
What Foxx gets saddled with though, is none other than Tommy Boy Cruise. He probably assumed that the worst that could happen would be maybe Cruise would start yacking about the time he was in Days of Thunder, or try to palm off some Scientology literature of some kind. Turns out, though, Tommy Boy Cruise is nothing less than a grey-haired motherfucking hitman.
What Tommy Boy suggests is that Jamie drive him around L.A so that he might perform the "hits" lingering on the old "hit-list" for that particular evening. I'd imagine you might not be too fussed on the idea, but there is the fact that probably Tommy Boy'll kill your guts off if you refuse, and then kill your bed-ridden mother, and then probably rope you into some film about he hangs off of a mountain in the trailer, but that's all anyone knows since they missed it at the cinema and never bothered hiring it out.
What Collateral illustrates, is that Michael Mann is still among the finest directors in Hollywood. It's just that everyone seems to forget between pictures. It's not like with Coppola, where everyone assumes that he's brilliant just cause he made these couple flicks back in the day that you read about all the time. Mann has to keep up the quality, is what. He'll fling out The Insider, and it'll rule, and everyone loves it, but next thing you know they've forgotten all about it. He'll remind you again with Ali, and again, you forget ten minutes later. So here he is reminding you again. What Collateral is saying to the world is "I made Heat and Manhunter for fucks sakes. Did Scorsese ever get De Niro and Pacino to share a scene? No he didn't, but I fucking did. Pay me some damn attention, would you ever?"
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