Serious misfires

you never heard of the miami vice remake? dunno where you live but it was pretty big in new york. i haven't seen it but i heard it wasn't bad.

The movie got a lot of publicity when out in theaters. You must been sleeping extra that week or something.

Personally, I think the movie would have done much better if not named Miami Vice. It has none of the look or feel of the TV series. Fans of the TV show were turned off by the content, and folks who might have been interest in that dark a movie didn't check it out because of the name.

The Avengers

A little grittier, a little more violent than the TV show . Farrel and Foxx are certainly no Johnson and whatizname. Most of the plot was nonexistant. I still haven't figured out why they used an Asian actress to play the Cuban girl. No Latins available in Miami?

The movie had a few good spots, but it was waaay too slow in spots. And it was VERY dark - I had to crank up the brightness on my TV. In general, I wish I had spent the two hours doing something else.

Regarding the Cuban character: That cracks me up. I was so confused about her being Asian, and then we see the pictures of her Cuban family. I spent half the movie staring at her and going "huh?".

I never watched the show, ever- so I don't know how Don Johnson's character came across in the show. But Colin Farrel seemed to be playing him as a cross between George Clooney in Brother, Where Art Thou and Joe Dirt. It's not quite how I pictured it. Beyond that, same old same old plot wrapped in trademark exceptional Micheal Mann action sequences. Mildly worth seeing. Even Gong Li is pretty much wasted.

Is Gong Li the Cuban lead character that Crocket falls for? So she is Asian! (I assume so from the name.) What the hell?! Were we not supposed to notice? That's just weird.

What's so weird about that? I was born here and never consider whatever Asian country I came from my home. It's like you saying, "Go back to where you came from". Ummm, I'd be thinking "Oakland?" The character she played was probably born there and considered herself Cuban like I consider myself a Californian; which to most folks is a foreign country anyways.

Whoa, buddy. That "go back to where you came from" nonsense just doesn't apply. Don't start putting words in my mouth.

My issue was that she had Cuban parents, Cuban siblings, Cuban cousins, etc., but she was clearly Asian. Maybe she was adopted. Was that your point? OK, I give.

But can we agree the movie was lame?

Sorry about that; that was the first thing I thought of and for the most part doesn't apply here. All I meant was---so what if she was of Asian descent. She probably thought of herself as Cuban since she was raised there. What's so unlikely about that?

As for the movie; I thought it was okay. It actually felt like the last 2 season of the TV which took a darker turn when they tossed out the pastel look of the first 3 seasons.

Well, nothing now that you point it out but it's poor writing when you make a viewer jump through mental hoops to fill in a film's continuity holes One line of dialog could have fixed it...

Sure, if she's just an actor playing a role and I'm supposed to ignore her race, I'm ok with that. Suspending belief is part of watching movies. I suppose Crocket could have been black and Tubbs white. Heck, Steve Martin used to be a poor black child growing up, so anything is possible. (Hopefully you saw The Jerk, and don't think I'm being racist. It was a mildly funny movie.)

What are you talking about; that movie was hilarious.

people would have went to see MV if it didn't star Farrell sporting a porno moustache,he's box office poison.

Agreed.

Very lame of MM...he can do better than that.
I like his movies, but I think MV was just a money-grab on his part.

Did you even see the movie? She has no Cuban siblings, Cuban cousins or Cuban parents. The only image we see of her mother is in an old black & white photo; and she's obviously Asian.

In the movie, Gong Li's character clearly mentions having gone through several Asian countries before ending up in Cuba. She wasn't cast in the role of a native Cuban, but instead a Asian immigrant (of which there are many in Cuba).

The local Chinese restaurant where I grew up in New York was owned by a Chinese family that came from Cuba. Their menu included everything from fried rice to picadillo. And they spoke fluent spanish, english and chinese to their customers.

Sanjay

Mostly, but I slept through that part

I think people were expecting the TV show and were disappointed that it wasn't. Personally, it was one of my favourite movies from last year. There are two versions out on DVD: rent the director's cut, it improves on the theatrical version.

Sanjay

Yeah, I unfortunately saw it. I don't remember her talking about being an Asian immigrant. Are you making that up to make me feel bad? :-) That really doesn't sound familar at all.

And I know all her relatives weren't in the movie, but didn't we see a bunch of pictures? Weren't they Latino? And wasn't the old lady that owned the house they stayed also Latino?

Damn, maybe I fell asleep. I guess I'll believe you. :-)

Perhaps not a good idea to pass judgement on a movie and declare it a "serious misfire" without having actually seen it.

Chianese accounts only 1% of the population which is just over 11million.
Not exactly "many"!

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cuba

I watched the movie and enjoyed it very much. The part where Gong Li's character discusses her heritage/lineage was pretty clear I thought. Don't see how you could miss it, really. But, I guess if you hated the movie from start to finish, you might not be really paying much attention to most of it.

No matter how you slice it, it is odd that MM would project the character as being from "Cuba."
Unless, of course, that it was absolutely necessary for the purposes of the plot.

What would you call 114,000? "Few"? "Couple"?

Sanjay

Miami Vice got pretty mixed reviews. Myself, I am a big fan of Michael Mann, I think he's one of the best directors in hollywood. I enjoyed Miami Vice, but it was not his best, but it had a lot going for it in my opinion. But it has a seriousness that I don't think the mainstream really was expecting, I think a lot of people were expecting something more along the lines of Bad Boys. Mann makes adult films, and he expects a lot from an audience, and I think a lot of people just got bored or confused. His films stand up really well with repeat viewings because of a lot of the subtlety and the fact that they're rarely really about the plot that's going on so much as the characters involved. I thought Miami Vice was an odd one for him to pull off, but I think he did a pretty good job of it. It certainly did get a lot of publicity though, so not sure where you were Dean. But I think it was a kind of movie that got sold oddly, and so a lot of people went in expecting something stupider and more like a bad 80s TV show than a Michael Mann film. I agree with Peter Travers on this one, an appreciation of Mann films means you have taste. I think a lot of people just don't have any taste and wanted to see Bad Boys III.