Poor story, but stylish

Rating: Null/10 (16 November 2004)

I loved Michael Manns "Heat", which for me was a realistic action thriller with a lot of depth and time for characters to develop.
In Collateral there are just two characters who are important, Vincent and Max. This is OK, but the plot is often so unrealistic that you just have to laugh and that makes it hard to get this movie as a thriller that lets you impressed and/ or exited.
Cruise is a mega-professional hit-man. So why in the world does he immediately chat with the cab driver like an old lady in florida?? Why does the first victim fall directly on the taxi? Here there would have been a great chance to make this movie more suspense, thus making Max slowly discover the goal of Vincents night trip, not so abruptly with the first victim falling down..
Unfortunately there are so many distractions and unrealistic parts in this movie which make the outline of the story, which was for me quite promising, so disappointing in the end. Too bad.