Intensely Powerful (POSSIBLE SPOILERS)

Rating: 9/10 (6 August 2004)

I've been intrigued for awhile about hit men. It takes a certain type of person to kill someone for money and then go on and kill more people for more money. Movies about hit men are some of my personal favorites. There are two types of hit men in movies. The first is the kind who has fallen into the job by factors out of their control and they become saddened by the carnage after time and want to quit. The other is the crazy sociopath type that actually takes pleasure in the killings. The movie Collateral takes it in a slightly different direction. The story is simple: a hapless taxi driver played by Jamie Foxx happens to pick up a hit-man played by Tom Cruise. This hit-man, Vincent, is surely in the second group but at times we see tinges of group one in him. For all his insanity, there's always a sense that Vincent is deeper than even he might know. But that doesn't stop him from doing his job. He drags Max, the cab driver, into his world of murder for hire and the two form an unlikely partnership. At every step of the way, Max tries to get out and get help but Vincent is always right on his heels. The tension builds until the film reaches it's climax, which I'll admit, had me at the edge of my seat. One of the better hit-man movies.
Not as action packed as The Killer or even The Professional, but Tom Cruise does play one of the scariest hit men in recent films. A solid grade A movie.