Intense

Rating: 7/10 (19 May 2005)

Stuart Beattie gives Michael Mann a script that puts Vincent (Cruise) and Max (Foxx) together in an accidental meeting between an assassin with business on his mind and a cab driver who only wants to relax and enjoy life.
Mann gives the movie and characters and intensity that hasn't been seen since Heat and the last five minutes of Last of the Mohicans.
We're introduced to Max as a stressed cab driver who has a heart as he drops Annie (Smith) off to work. At the airport, Max tries to refuse Max's offer of an all-night rental, but Max, saving money, can't refuse the cash.
At this moment, the tension mounts as Max is put in a situation that wasn't ever in his life plan: the accomplice to an assassin.
Foxx plays the role beautifully in a mix of tenderness and naiveté that turns into self-defining bravado.
Cruise, on the other hand, is cold and menacing, his only function in life to manipulate and kill.
There are a few weaknesses in the plot, emphasized by the lack of development in side characters, including Annie and Fanning (a solid Mark Ruffalo).