The Other Summer Movie

While I am immeasurably excited about Superman Returns for religious reason, there's another summer movie I'm pretty big big big big time excited for.





I've always loved Miami Vice, I loved how serious it was. I still love how serious it was. For some reason people who haven't seen it in a while seem to have a conception of it as a "goofy" show just because we don't wear pink shirts and white jackets any more.



The show was so 80's, but it did such an incredible job. I wonder if Miami Vice was so 80's or were the 80's SO Miami Vice? That show is just a cultural juggernaut, like a cultural jet engine that you could drop existing cultural elements into like 80's Genesis and 80's Cocaine and 80's Fashion into and have them accelerated against the wall. People think this movie is going to be bullshit because of how HUGE it was, how it defined the 80's. It was ZEITGEIST in all caps.



People laugh and then you say it's directed by Michael Mann and then they wonder why the director of Collateral would do a Dukes of Hazzard Movie and then you tell them that he did the tv show. The whole strain of logic is weird to many because they never saw Miami Vice for what it was. Super serious. If it's comical for anything it's not for how they dress, it's for how fucking serious they are, but I love it, it is absolutely no less over the top dramatic than CSI. Exact same drama and when it comes to characters between those two shows I'll take Crockett and Tubbs every time. During these years where Michael Mann made all his post-Vice successes every time I went to the theatre all I ever saw was Miami Vice in those movies.



Thief



Manhunter



Heat



Collateral



All Vice

Do you remember Liam Neeson's episode where he plays an IRA bomber? Or Helena Bonham Carter was Crocketts troubled girlfriend. And long before Edward James Olmos was Galacticas humorless Captain he was Crockett & Tubbs' humorless Captain, fighting off the Yakuza demons of his past. Do you remember G. Gordon LIddy? or Bob Balaban as Crockett's Vietnam buddy? Goddamn what a great show. The best episode is Stranger In The Dark, which is basically the template for Manhunter. Crockett get into the mind of a serial killer and goes "too deep." The last scene has him pointing at Polaroids of houses and since he's the killer now, he knows. He's so serious in that last scene, I love it. Penn Jillette, Phil Collins. Bruce Willis who was in an episode with the best dramatic freeze-frame at the end.



Remember when Crockett got amnesia, thought he was a bad guy, and grew his hair long? They were stretching at that point. Remember they had that black car in season 1 and they got really well known for leaning against that black car and then in season 2 the first thing they did, maybe it was a "fuck you" maybe it was just that they wanted to shock their audience, but they go buy rocket launchers from this drug dealer and to test the weapon he fires it at the Spyder. Remember the Vietnam episodes with Bob Balaban where Crockett flashes back, I think G. Gordon Liddy was in that episode. Great episode.





watch the trailer. It's exactly what I expected since I heard Michael Mann was working on it because I've only seen Miami Vice in Heat and Collateral.