I also had a guilty nerdo thrill because I figured out why the dudes were all going to the same location but never meeting face to face.
― mh, Wednesday, 21 January 2015 14:55 (nine years ago) link
Actually, the more I think about it, or rather the more I forget about it - why did the hacker baddie even need a heavily armed cohort of paramilitary hardcore killers? I suppose that question is related to my earlier query as to why, if he can manipulate stocks and accounts and stuff at will for millions of dollars, he even needs a scheme to amass more money. If he hadn't taken down a nuclear power plant (possibly the most ho-hum incidental nuclear disaster in a movie since they set off a nuke near Key West in True Lies, and that was a comedy), then he'd be an ambitious white collar criminal rather than an international terrorist, and therefore wouldn't need a militia. I get this is Michael Mann, but I wish this was more nerds and less guns.
― Josh in Chicago, Wednesday, 21 January 2015 15:11 (nine years ago) link
why does anyone with shitloads of money keep doubling down to make even more?
― mh, Wednesday, 21 January 2015 15:23 (nine years ago) link
Yeah, but one way was subtle, the other ... involved destroying a nuclear power plant, killing or injuring lots of people, and requiring a payroll of goons. Just seems strange to me that the guy would commit major, historic crimes in service of mundane robbery. Like, he's not manipulating the market to raise money to take out a power plant, he's blowing up a power plant to raise money to blow up a dam and flood a region to bump up tin prices. I'm no expert in these things, unlike every single person in this movie, but I would think blowing up dams and nuclear power plants and killing or injuring dozens is all the bigger crime, and the one more likely to get you targeted and caught. That is, the gains are more than offset by the losses. It'd be like blowing up the White House as a distraction that lets you secretly rob banks.
― Josh in Chicago, Wednesday, 21 January 2015 15:30 (nine years ago) link
Like I said, would have made more sense if he was just being a hacker dick.
― Josh in Chicago, Wednesday, 21 January 2015 15:31 (nine years ago) link
imo it's made clear he's a sociopath who doesn't give a shit about human life and is just about fucking the system to maximize his points ($$)
― mh, Wednesday, 21 January 2015 16:09 (nine years ago) link
which is a completely unnuanced view of actions, but viewing some of the really destructive hacker types like that with nuance is buying into bullshit
― mh, Wednesday, 21 January 2015 16:10 (nine years ago) link
I'm not sure that the movie establishes for certain that the malware activated at the nuclear power plant was intentional, although the soy futures trading definitely was. It was a test run of the ability to crash those water pumps, and the fact the nuclear power plant was affected might have just been a crime of opportunity. Malicious dude really just needed to crash some somewhere to make sure his later tin plan would work.
― mh, Wednesday, 21 January 2015 21:31 (nine years ago) link
Oh, and at the same time, his other test run with the US reactor didn't work.
― bit of a singles monster (Eazy), Wednesday, 21 January 2015 21:34 (nine years ago) link
Isn't this discussion a bit like in Die Hard where they fake a terrorist attack to steal money? That does not make sense either. Also, I've been sick these last few days, so haven't seen it, and now I don't have the time.
― Frederik B, Wednesday, 21 January 2015 21:37 (nine years ago) link
You take that back, Die Hard makes perfect sense. They knew they needed to appear something global so that it got passed from the police to the FBI, because the FBI protocol meant shutting down the power, which turned off the electronic lock on the vault, which got them access to the bearer bonds. The fake demands and stuff were all a smokescreen, and they would have gotten away with it, too, were it not for ... John McClane!!! Just a fly in the ointment
― Josh in Chicago, Wednesday, 21 January 2015 22:22 (nine years ago) link
The future, Mr Gittz!
― touch of a love-starved cobra (Dr Morbius), Wednesday, 21 January 2015 22:24 (nine years ago) link
I'm not sure that the movie establishes for certain that the malware activated at the nuclear power plant was intentional
The movie is actually clearer on this point than most! The fans in the reactor he disabled were the same brand as the fans in the Indonesian dam. Sure, blowing them up was a test run, but he blew them up on purpose. No idea why he wanted to blow up multiple reactors, but then, the movie doesn't make a ton of sense, motivation-wise. Like, even if it was just a test run, who tests things out by targeting a nuclear reactor first, especially when that kinds of fans are apparently a ... dam a dozen
― Josh in Chicago, Wednesday, 21 January 2015 22:26 (nine years ago) link
who tests things out by targeting a nuclear reactor first
some people just want to see the world burn, Josh
― mh, Wednesday, 21 January 2015 22:27 (nine years ago) link
Bad guy in this was so not written - like, literally, did he even have a name? - that there is no way to parse his motivations. The future? He may as well have been planning to build a space base near Mars.
― Josh in Chicago, Wednesday, 21 January 2015 22:27 (nine years ago) link
And again, I would have at least been on board a bit if he just wanted to see the world burn. But what little we know of him was just $$$, which is zzzz.
― Josh in Chicago, Wednesday, 21 January 2015 22:28 (nine years ago) link
Alternate version: the test run knocks out the freezer in two delis, one in Manhattan and one in Tokyo.
― bit of a singles monster (Eazy), Wednesday, 21 January 2015 22:32 (nine years ago) link
Yeah, seriously. The cost of the Fukushima disaster was something like $100 billion, and that's just money. Sort of an insanely disproportionate target. It'd be like him dumping millions of gallons of crude in the Gulf to corner to shrimp market.
― Josh in Chicago, Wednesday, 21 January 2015 22:50 (nine years ago) link
(Incidentally, just googled, and the shrimp market and the tin market are valued about equally, around $50 billion!)
― Josh in Chicago, Wednesday, 21 January 2015 22:52 (nine years ago) link
would you say that the shrimp market is "jumbo"?
― I dunno. (amateurist), Friday, 23 January 2015 02:06 (nine years ago) link
"I'm a fiend for jumbo deep-battered shrimp."
― bit of a singles monster (Eazy), Friday, 23 January 2015 02:08 (nine years ago) link
*aerial shot of Eazy driving a trawler to the gulf of Maine*
― $80 is absurd and very ridiculous! (Sufjan Grafton), Friday, 23 January 2015 02:17 (nine years ago) link
wow at dropping die hard in as an example of bad movie plot. login rescinded for 6 months imo
― local eire man (darraghmac), Friday, 23 January 2015 02:22 (nine years ago) link
Something admirable about this movie just popped into my head: it's called Blackhat, and they may even invoke the term "black hat," once, but they never explain what a black hat is, or counter it with "white hat," a term that afaict does not even get used. So hats off, Mann, for respecting the viewer a little.
― Josh in Chicago, Friday, 23 January 2015 22:16 (nine years ago) link
http://www.dvdbeaver.com/film4/blu-ray_reviews_60/thief_james_caan_blu-ray_/large/large_thief_12_blu-ray_.jpg
― I dunno. (amateurist), Saturday, 24 January 2015 01:25 (nine years ago) link
need to click on that to see it in HD, fellas
― I dunno. (amateurist), Saturday, 24 January 2015 01:26 (nine years ago) link
beaver? i hardly even know her.
― deliberately clunky, needlessly arty, (contenderizer), Saturday, 24 January 2015 01:28 (nine years ago) link
Are there any action - hacking scenes
― Hammer Smashed Bagels, Saturday, 24 January 2015 02:20 (nine years ago) link
http://www.chicagoreader.com/Bleader/archives/2015/01/27/blackhat-isnt-a-failed-action-movieits-a-big-budget-avant-garde-film
i guess i should see this, but i'm skeptical of the sort of defense mounted here (and elsewhere). i don't think mann's digital imagery--at least in the previous few films--is all that interesting, really. i also think it's a little too /clever/ to suggest that blackhat is an "avant-garde film," since that clearly wasn't mann's intention, and it seems to overlook the fact that at his best, mann was much more than just a maker of startling or appealing images (and juxtapositions of images). a lot of this stuff reads like special pleading to me. but i guess i need to see it now, just so i can have an opinion. :)
― I dunno. (amateurist), Wednesday, 28 January 2015 01:25 (nine years ago) link
The same is basically true of Miami Vice, which is better as both an action film and an a-g film.
― Eric H., Wednesday, 28 January 2015 03:20 (nine years ago) link
Jesus, my Letterboxd is crawling with 5/5 Mann reviews from all over his career. They're outta control.
― touch of a love-starved cobra (Dr Morbius), Wednesday, 28 January 2015 03:26 (nine years ago) link
Eric otm
― mh, Wednesday, 28 January 2015 13:12 (nine years ago) link
eric, sorry, i had a hard time interpreting your last post. when you write that "the same is basically true," what are you referring to as "the same"?
― I dunno. (amateurist), Wednesday, 28 January 2015 17:13 (nine years ago) link
what is letterboxd, btw, and where did the third "e" go?
it is a viewing log/diary site for cinemaniacs
― touch of a love-starved cobra (Dr Morbius), Wednesday, 28 January 2015 17:29 (nine years ago) link
I've got one of those: http://letterboxd.com/quartzcity/
― Elvis Telecom, Thursday, 29 January 2015 06:51 (nine years ago) link
what a waste of time (he writes, while posting to ILX)
― I dunno. (amateurist), Friday, 30 January 2015 19:02 (nine years ago) link
Poor Ralph (Heat). Two or three of the most ignominious movie minutes ever.
― clemenza, Friday, 20 February 2015 03:11 (nine years ago) link
my only complaint with Collateral is the epic "Max, I do this for a living!" should've been the last words Cruise spoke instead of that dead body riding the T crap.
― Western® with Bacon Flavor, Saturday, 21 February 2015 06:08 (nine years ago) link
blackhat seems to inspire the contrarian in a lot of reviewers. cant say i was convinced. chris hemsworth is totally the wrong person. not sure if it was the cinema's sound, but everything he said sounded like a huffy mumble.
― StillAdvance, Wednesday, 25 February 2015 16:58 (nine years ago) link
No, that's Mann.
― Insane Prince of False Binaries (Gukbe), Wednesday, 25 February 2015 17:00 (nine years ago) link
I think he is Mann's nu-Val Kilmer and I agree 100% with his casting
also I am a swole hacker
― mh, Wednesday, 25 February 2015 17:12 (nine years ago) link
He might as worked had he just been a hacker, but turning him to action hero, too, really underscores his ridiculousness as a hacker. Like, pick one, because depicting him as both was silly.
― Josh in Chicago, Wednesday, 25 February 2015 18:14 (nine years ago) link
imo all great hacking films have feats of athleticism in them, often by the computer experts -- Sneakers, Hackers, Goldeneye
― mh, Wednesday, 25 February 2015 20:31 (nine years ago) link
film was ridiculous and the casting is what really broke it imo. he looked like someone who gets flummoxed sending an email.
― StillAdvance, Wednesday, 25 February 2015 20:50 (nine years ago) link
who doesn't, really
― mh, Wednesday, 25 February 2015 21:51 (nine years ago) link
and the way he almost magically got the girl with virtually zero effort was beyond dumb. for a film that seems to be selling the diversity of its cast, it would have been more novel if the agent/brother got a girl rather than the norse god.
― StillAdvance, Wednesday, 25 February 2015 22:05 (nine years ago) link
I loved how that courtship was handled.
― Insane Prince of False Binaries (Gukbe), Thursday, 26 February 2015 05:50 (nine years ago) link
You mean like this?https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mKLizztikRk
― Josh in Chicago, Thursday, 26 February 2015 14:47 (nine years ago) link
Another new interview
― bit of a singles monster (Eazy), Thursday, 26 February 2015 14:51 (nine years ago) link