Xixax Film Forum

The Director's Chair => The Director's Chair => Topic started by: MacGuffin on June 03, 2003, 09:37:53 AM

Title: Michael Mann
Post by: MacGuffin on June 03, 2003, 09:37:53 AM
Mann Wants Tom Cruise For Collateral

Variety reports the following:

Michael Mann will next direct the DreamWorks drama "Collateral," and he has Tom Cruise in his crosshairs to play the lead role of a contract killer.

Written by Stuart Beattie, with a rewrite by Frank Darabont, the script takes place on a single night. After a cabbie picks up a passenger, he and his car are taken hostage as a killer travels around Los Angeles to conduct his business. Mann has mined the visuals of L.A. streets for "Heat" and the TV series "Robbery Homicide Division."

Mann last directed "Ali," and he and Cruise have been trying to find a film in which they could work together. (Both are repped by CAA.) Filming will start in October.

Cruise doesn't have a deal yet, though one is expected. The actor has long expressed a desire to play a villain, and he may get his chance with the charismatic yet lethal passenger.

Cruise is coming off the Ed Zwick-directed "The Last Samurai" and will work in "Collateral" before starring in and producing "Mission: Impossible 3", to be directed by "Narc" helmer Joe Carnahan.
Title: Re: Michael Mann
Post by: ©brad on June 03, 2003, 09:51:39 AM
sweet. would love to see cruise play another badboy a la frank mackey.

what is the CAA btw?

tom cruise is the best actor ever.
Title: Re: Michael Mann
Post by: Cecil on June 03, 2003, 10:06:56 AM
Quote from: ©bradtom cruise is the best actor ever.

well, i wouldnt go as far as to say that.....

i think his best role was in risky business
Title: Re: Michael Mann
Post by: MacGuffin on June 03, 2003, 10:08:42 AM
Quote from: ©bradwhat is the CAA btw?

Creative Artists Agency
Title: Re: Michael Mann
Post by: Fernando on June 03, 2003, 01:23:24 PM
Quote from: cecil b. demented
Quote from: ©bradtom cruise is the best actor ever.

well, i wouldnt go as far as to say that.....

i think his best role was in risky business

Do you mean that's his best he ever had? Like the part he was born to play?

My favourite performances would be Interview, Magnolia, Rainman and his best either film or performance (IMO) is EWS.
Title: Michael Mann
Post by: Victor on June 03, 2003, 02:50:04 PM
i heard mann was gonna do Miami Vice: The Movie. damn...but this thing sounds pretty on.

this info sounds like something that should be in The Grapevine, so instead i'll start a discussion --

Heat fucking rocks, though The Insider is better. Thoughts?
Title: Michael Mann
Post by: godardian on June 03, 2003, 03:53:35 PM
I really enjoyed Heat and The Insider. I remember Manhunter being pretty damn solid, too. I'd be there if he and Cruise made one together.

Mann seems to make good, old-fashioned, solid, mainstream entertainment that doesn't insult the audience, which is something you don't take for granted. He's not intellectual, but he's intelligent, and that works perfectly for what he does.
Title: Michael Mann
Post by: Mesh on June 03, 2003, 04:02:16 PM
Quote from: godardianI really enjoyed Heat and The Insider. I remember Manhunter being pretty damn solid, too.

Ali isn't an utter success in every way, but I do think it's pretty underrated.  The very weight of Ali himself as a mythological sports and media figure held the film down.  No one could've been big enough to fill those shoes—a black Brando, even.
Title: Michael Mann
Post by: Duck Sauce on June 03, 2003, 09:25:16 PM
A 80s Miami Vice movie would be too fucking perfect, but they might ruin it with cameos... anyway


This movie sounds fantastic, and Cbrad, Cruise IS the best actor ever
Title: Re: Michael Mann
Post by: Cecil on June 03, 2003, 10:13:38 PM
Quote from: Fernando
Quote from: cecil b. demented
Quote from: ©bradtom cruise is the best actor ever.

well, i wouldnt go as far as to say that.....

i think his best role was in risky business

Do you mean that's his best he ever had? Like the part he was born to play?

My favourite performances would be Interview, Magnolia, Rainman and his best either film or performance (IMO) is EWS.

well the thing is that hes much better in all of the movies youve just mentioned, but when watching them all i can think is "man, tom cruise is actually pretty good in that. hes NOT just a pretty boy" so it kinda ruins it.
Title: Michael Mann
Post by: MacGuffin on June 05, 2003, 09:41:49 AM
Adam Sandler possibly to join Collateral
Source: Reuters

LOS ANGELES (Hollywood Reporter) - Adam Sandler, who stepped out of his usual comedic mold to star in Paul Thomas Anderson's "Punch-Drunk Love" last year, appears to be eyeing another left turn in his choice of characters.

On Wednesday night, Sandler was scheduled to meet with filmmaker Michael Mann to discuss the possibility of starring opposite Tom Cruise in the director's "Collateral" for DreamWorks.

If he joins the project, Sandler would play Max, the meek cab driver who picks up a passenger (Cruise) who takes him hostage.
Title: Michael Mann
Post by: Fernando on June 05, 2003, 10:42:57 AM
Quote from: MacGuffinAdam Sandler possibly to join Collateral
Source: Reuters

LOS ANGELES (Hollywood Reporter) - Adam Sandler, who stepped out of his usual comedic mold to star in Paul Thomas Anderson's "Punch-Drunk Love" last year, appears to be eyeing another left turn in his choice of characters.

On Wednesday night, Sandler was scheduled to meet with filmmaker Michael Mann to discuss the possibility of starring opposite Tom Cruise in the director's "Collateral" for DreamWorks.

If he joins the project, Sandler would play Max, the meek cab driver who picks up a passenger (Cruise) who takes him hostage.

That sounds great, I don't see a problem (IMO) for Sandler to sign, whether with Tom I wouldn't assure anything, this could be (or sounds like) a great chance for the type of role, it depends of the shooting dates of MI3, don't know if they already have one though.
Title: Michael Mann
Post by: godardian on June 05, 2003, 01:04:50 PM
It would be interesting to see Sandler do the most dramatic project of his life, or Mann doing the most comedic project of his life, depending on how this Collateral cookie crumbles...
Title: Michael Mann
Post by: Ghostboy on June 05, 2003, 09:25:31 PM
This sounds really great! It's the right kind of project for Sandler to flex his dramatic talents while not totally alientating most audiences (not that there's a problem with it, but I'd like to see him get more recognition from the public than Punch Drunk Love did).

I'm glad Mann isn't doing Miami Vice...he's really developed into a fantastic filmmaker, and I'm happy to see him moving on to new things. I've seen all of his films (except for the TV movies he did way back in the day), and from the Last Of The Mohicans onward they've been quite excellent (except for Ali, which was still pretty good for the most part). The Last Of The Mohicans and The Insider are probably his best, and show the two sides of his talent -- action/adventure and intense drama. Heat was a perfect merger between those two.

Has anyone else seen The Keep? That was interestingly lame.
Title: Michael Mann
Post by: Gold Trumpet on June 05, 2003, 10:40:09 PM
I trusted Sandler more when hearing how PDL was going to be and how PTA was still very much making an adam sandler film, but an art film. Now Adam Sandler much be someone else now and to get past all the feeling his look, way of talking and past history of films when seeing his face may be the toughest challenge and intrude on the work. He also may be regulated to some comedic work, or maybe, some part that rids him of his normal appearance to get by.

~rougerum
Title: Michael Mann
Post by: oakmanc234 on June 06, 2003, 01:44:33 AM
I like Mann a lot. Especially his under-rated 'Ali'.

'Collateral' sound great, kind of a mix of 'Taxi Driver' and 'Phone Booth'. Though when I hear of its title, I immediately think of that seriously plain Schwarzenegger flick, 'Collateral Damage'.

I really hope Sandler signs on.
Title: Michael Mann
Post by: Duck Sauce on June 06, 2003, 03:28:53 PM
I hope Sandler signs on for this and for Quentins new movie, that would be one hell of a stable of more serious roles. Cant go wrong with those guys
Title: Michael Mann
Post by: oakmanc234 on June 06, 2003, 05:52:47 PM
Duck Sauce wrote: I hope Sandler signs on for this and for Quentins new movie, that would be one hell of a stable of more serious roles. Cant go wrong with those guys

EXACTLY!!!!!!! Sandler to do 'Collateral' and 'Bastards' back to back would be soooooo sweet. Mann and Tarantino. I can't see it happening, though. He'd probably get his Hapy Madison withdrawls or somethin.
Title: Michael Mann
Post by: oakmanc234 on July 15, 2003, 03:28:56 AM
Now for the worst movie news I've heard in a while. Sandler's out of 'Collateral' and Jamie Foxx is in. Sandler (who has started a new comedy CD instead) is out of the project and Jamie Foxx ('Any Given Sunday') has taken over the role of Max the taxi driver. Suddenly, 'Collateral' just isn't as exciting as it used to be........
Title: Michael Mann
Post by: Johnny Cusavo on July 20, 2003, 07:26:39 PM
I don't know about that.. I think Jamie Foxx could make it fly. I loved him in Any Given Sunday. I think he's getting better and better in dramatic roles and adding a lot of depth to the characters he portrays. Ali, rocked.
Michael Mann is the greatest!!
Title: Michael Mann
Post by: MacGuffin on August 19, 2003, 02:30:55 PM
Val Kilmer Chasing Tom Cruise in Collateral
Source: The Hollywood Reporter

Val Kilmer is in talks to join Tom Cruise and Jamie Foxx in the Michael Mann-directed Collateral. The DreamWorks Pictures/Paramount Pictures co-production will start filming in October.

The project, written by Stuart Beattie, stars Foxx as a Los Angeles cab driver forced to serve as a chauffeur to a contract killer on a string of hits. Kilmer will star as a detective on the trail of Cruise's character.

Kilmer has an incredible seven projects in the can awaiting release, including Wonderland, Blind Horizon, Stateside, Mindhunters, The Missing, Delgo and Spartan.
Title: Michael Mann
Post by: Alexandro on August 19, 2003, 02:50:30 PM
Quote from: Johnny CusavoI don't know about that.. I think Jamie Foxx could make it fly. I loved him in Any Given Sunday. I think he's getting better and better in dramatic roles and adding a lot of depth to the characters he portrays. Ali, rocked.
Michael Mann is the greatest!!

Right on...Jammie Foxx was great in Any Given Sunday and if you ask me, the Ali supporting actor nomination should have been for him instead of Jon Voight...he's really good...

As for Cruise, back when I saw Eyes Wide Shut I left the thetre thinking he just had his way paved for an academy award nomination for best actor...he should have got a double nod that year, one for EWS, one for Magnolia...I mean it wasn't that far out...
Title: Michael Mann
Post by: Disco Stu on August 23, 2003, 05:25:32 PM
I'm a huge Michael Mann fan.  I was really pissed when CBS canceled Robbery Homicide Division.  That was the best new show of last season.  I remember reading somewhere that Mann has said he wants to focus more on directing rather than writing so maybe Collateral is the first step he's making toward this.  I've heard the Miami Vice thing too but I can't see that happening.  He wouldn't stoop to that would he?
Title: Michael Mann
Post by: oakmanc234 on August 24, 2003, 03:35:16 AM
I got nothing against Foxx, I just find the prospect of Sandler & Cruise in a Mann thriller a lot more enticing.
Foxx is great, he went off in 'Any Given Sunday' and was under-rated in 'Ali'.
Title: Michael Mann
Post by: Anachronism on August 24, 2003, 08:58:08 PM
Very valid points by all. I guess I would be said stem from the school of the fence sitter. While Sandler has held a special place in my heart since his old SNL days, his foray into less slapstick oriented entertainment, namely "Anger Management" and "Punch Drunk Love." has really impressed me. Not to say that I consider him a true thespian, at this point he is more of a work in progress, and from the sounds of his withdrawal to work on his comedy cd, I would suggest that there is still quite some work to be done before his transition could be said to be complete. That being said, I think Jamie Foxx will be able to do just as good, if not better, a performance as Max. His recent performances in "Any Given Sunday," and of course "Ali" have really opened up my appreciation for him. While Willie Beeman(sp) wasn't the most demanding of roles, it certainly showed his ability to take on a non-comedic lead role while playing up against a legend, Pacino. What really revealed how dynamic he was though was of course "Ali," where his crack addicted balding character stole the show in my opinion and gave Will Smith the palpable energy to lend a convincing human edge to his dialogues. I am thoroughly looking forward to this film and am even more excited because two of my favourite actors are taking the reigns. Kilmer and Cruise need an excuse to work together, I mean come on Top Gun was a generational icon of manhood. "Heat" in my humble opinion was one of the best films of the 90's, chiefly thanks to Pacino, Kilmer, Sizemore and De Niro. What I'm really trying to say is that Kilmer+Cruise+Foxx/Mann=Oh yeah.

P.S Willow was the single most inspiring film of my pre-formative years, and Kilmer was the first actor I wanted to emulate.
Title: Michael Mann
Post by: Ghostboy on August 24, 2003, 09:04:19 PM
Hey, I just finished watching Willow and then logged on and noticed you mentioned it! Star crossed coincidence? Maybe. I love it too...it came out when I was seven, and I went nuts over it.
Title: Michael Mann
Post by: aclockworkjj on August 24, 2003, 09:06:37 PM
Quote from: Anachronism"Anger Management"
I will give you the latter of your post here....but this movie sucks big time.  I was very much looking forward to it...when I went to see a sunday afternoon matinee of this...and they said, "7.50 please."...I said, "7.50 for a matinee?...what the hell is the regular price?"...she replied, "$9.50"

needless to say...I was pissed I spent $7.50 on this flick.  The whole Yankee thing (and I am a yankee fan....I know, I know) was fuckin' retarded beyond belief.  Had so much more potential than it presented.
Title: Michael Mann
Post by: oakmanc234 on August 25, 2003, 01:01:15 AM
I loved Anger Management. "Why don't you sing me the 'I'm A Crazy Asshole' Song! And take me home you psychotic piece of whacko!".

It's a classic in my eyes, but that's me.......
Title: Michael Mann
Post by: modage on August 25, 2003, 10:41:11 AM
sure, i dont doubt that Foxx COULD do the part. i'm sure he'll be fine. just the idea of adam sandler getting out of an "adam sandler movie" for a change, and playing a supporting character opposite tom cruise, THATS GEEKTASTIC!  foxx can show up in lots of roles, he doesnt bother me.
Title: Michael Mann
Post by: jasper_window on August 25, 2003, 02:35:45 PM
Jamie Foxx is all right, Sandler would've been interesting for the role, but I think it would great to get Benicio del Toro instead.
Title: Michael Mann
Post by: Fernando on September 04, 2003, 12:24:51 PM
Possible casting news from Latinoreview.

According to The Hollywood Reporter, Jada Pinkett Smith is in negotiations to jump into Michael Mann's "Collateral," the DreamWorks Pictures/Paramount Pictures co-production. Dates are still being worked out for the actress to join the Tom Cruise starrer, which is scheduled to begin lensing next month.
Title: Michael Mann
Post by: MacGuffin on September 26, 2003, 01:00:38 AM
Val Kilmer Leaves Collateral for Alexander
Source: The Hollywood Reporter

Val Kilmer, who was to have played a leading role in director Michael Mann's Tom Cruise thriller Collateral has left the project in favor of Oliver Stone's untitled Alexander film.

Kilmer's role in Intermedia's Alexander the Great project, currently filming, left him unable to do both projects at the same time. The role he was to have played in "Collateral" is open.

Meanwhile, Dennis Farina is stepping into another of the parts in Collateral, which is a DreamWorks/Paramount co-production.

Shooting starts next month on the Stuart Beattie-penned project, which stars Cruise as a contract killer who forces a taxi driver (Jamie Foxx) to chauffeur him around on a series of hits. Farina will play a detective on the run after Cruise's character. Jada Pinkett Smith and Irma Hall also star.
Title: Michael Mann
Post by: modage on October 13, 2003, 01:07:15 AM
Ruffalo Replacing Kilmer in Collateral
Source: The Hollywood Reporter Sunday, October 12, 2003

Mark Ruffalo (In the Cut) is in talks to replace Val Kilmer in Michael Mann's Collateral opposite Tom Cruise for DreamWorks Pictures.

The project, written by Stuart Beattie, stars Cruise as a contract killer who forces a taxi driver (Jamie Foxx) to chauffeur him around on a series of hits.

Ruffalo would play a detective on the heels of Cruise's character. Jada Pinkett Smith, Dennis Farina and Irma Hall round out the cast.
Title: Michael Mann
Post by: modage on October 26, 2003, 06:16:19 PM
holding back laughter...

First Look at Tom Cruise on the Collateral Set
Source: The Movie Box

(https://xixax.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fmembers.fortunecity.com%2Fthemodernage%2Ftomcollateral.jpg&hash=fdf6f00a67bf633f161e398973404dea41f55c84)

In the DreamWorks action-thriller from director Michael Mann, Jamie Foxx plays a Los Angeles cab driver forced to serve as a chauffeur to a contract killer (Cruise) on a string of hits. Mark Ruffalo will star as a detective on the trail of Cruise's character, while Jada Pinkett Smith plays an Assistant State Attorney on Cruise's hit list.
Title: Michael Mann
Post by: Find Your Magali on October 26, 2003, 06:33:15 PM
Wasn't Adam Sandler going to be the cabbie in this movie at one point? I missed when that fell through. ...  Too bad.
Title: Michael Mann
Post by: Gold Trumpet on October 26, 2003, 09:37:35 PM
Jeez, Cruise looks like he is trying revive Miami Vice with that look. I'm not sure what to think of this project. Lets say the premise is even hard to believe in movie land logic.  Cruise and Mann are talented, but can easily make bad films and this seems like an offering of potential good action film at best. Cruise, playing the first time a contract killer, seems out lately to play every movie star persona he can play, the kind of role one dreams to play as a kid. Him and Crowe have been doing this lately. Cruise can do great work, but really hasn't lately.

~rougerum
Title: Michael Mann
Post by: Gloria on October 26, 2003, 09:42:29 PM
Cruise reminds me of Guy Pearce in that picture.  Anyone else see it?  Maybe its cause the pic has a little bit of an LA Confidential feel to it.
Title: Michael Mann
Post by: Weak2ndAct on October 26, 2003, 09:48:53 PM
Quote from: GloriaCruise reminds me of Guy Pearce in that picture.  Anyone else see it?
I don't remember.
(https://xixax.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fi.imdb.com%2FPhotos%2FSs%2F0209144%2F3.jpg&hash=4a639f7ff2c2f144c007e5d2c32f54fceaa662ce)
Title: Michael Mann
Post by: MacGuffin on October 28, 2003, 08:57:29 AM
Michael Mann Directing Arms and the Man
Source: Variety

Universal Pictures and Michael Mann's Forward Pass has optioned Arms and the Man, a Peter Landesman-penned New York Times Magazine feature about shadowy arms dealer Victor Bout. Landesman will write the screenplay and Mann is attached to direct. This is how Variety describes the article and film:

The Aug. 17 article was an account of Landesman's interview with Bout, who is widely reported to be the world's largest arms trafficker. The great achievement of the interview that took place in Moscow was the sleuthing that made it happen. Bout has been incredibly secretive and spent most of the article deflecting assertions about how prolific a mover of weapons he is. Landesman's research, and the dangerous places he went to unearth information will help inform a drama he will begin writing immediately.

The film will be a "Heart of Darkness" hunt into the depths of global arms trafficking. An American agent pursues a missing orb of plutonium that was swiped during a raid in the Ukraine. The trail spans from the Middle East to Africa and the Soviet Union, and Landesman and Mann will introduce a love story element as the agent navigates between the old Soviet world and a new brand of lawlessness and arms brokering in the country.
Title: Michael Mann
Post by: Derek on October 28, 2003, 03:49:13 PM
This is one of my most anticipated movies, that Cruise photo looks cool and Tom Cruise wasn't good in Minority Report, a modern classic?
Title: Michael Mann
Post by: Gold Trumpet on October 28, 2003, 10:04:40 PM
Quote from: DerekTom Cruise wasn't good in Minority Report, a modern classic?

He was fine. Its just that role really required little of him acting. Sure, a couple scenes of emotional outburst/breakdown, but thats not really too hard and he was running action hero most of the time.

~rougerum
Title: Michael Mann
Post by: Ghostboy on November 05, 2003, 01:12:03 AM
I watched Last Of The Mohicans again this evening as I was doing some programming, and I just wanted to sing its praises once agian. A truly beautiful and affecting and epic action film, if ever there was one...and one of the few films made that's an improvement on a work of literature (although, in fairness to James Fenimore Cooper, I haven't given the book a second chance since I tried it when I was eleven).

I'd also put the score on a list of the best scores ever.
Title: Michael Mann
Post by: MacGuffin on December 18, 2003, 04:56:23 AM
Javier Bardem Starring in DreamWorks' Collateral
Source: Variety

Javier Bardem (Before Night Falls) has been cast in the Tom Cruise starrer Collateral, which Michael Mann is directing for DreamWorks.

Bardem will travel to Los Angeles to shoot what is described by Spanish newspaper El Pais as "a small role" in the film which also stars Jamie Foxx.

Foxx plays a Los Angeles cab driver forced to serve as a chauffeur to a contract killer (Cruise) on a string of hits. Ruffalo will star as a detective on the trail of Cruise's character.
Title: Michael Mann
Post by: soixante on December 23, 2003, 02:47:07 PM
Just watched Michael Mann's Thief, which I haven't seen since 1981.  The film was ahead of its time, visually speaking.  Also, the hand of producer Jerry Bruckheimer was evident, from the visual gloss and intricate details of high-tech criminal tools.  In 1981, few films had this sort of look, along with the synth Tangerine Dream score (Risky Business used Tangerine Dream for its score).  Pretty impressive for a first film.  Caan was great, as was Willie Nelson (not just playing himself, he was convincing as a convict).  All in all, a nice 80's flashback.

The commentary wasn't very interesting, and I could hardly understand a word Mann said due to his thick Chicago accent.

Haven't seen The Keep or Last of the Mohicans.
Title: Michael Mann
Post by: pookiethecat on December 25, 2003, 02:19:21 PM
See Last of the Mohicans, Soixante.  An excellent and exciting piece of action filmmaking- as well as a ferally erotic romance between Madeleine Stowe and Daniel Day-Lewis.  I think Mann really does a lot with that film and sort of brings his emotions to an orgasmic level that i had never seen before- especially at the conclusion which i won't spoil for you.  i think mann is one of the best filmmakers working today.

i suggest manhunter too,- better than silence of the lambs in a lot of key ways.
Title: Michael Mann
Post by: godardian on December 26, 2003, 10:42:41 AM
Quote from: pookiethecatSee Last of the Mohicans, Soixante.  An excellent and exciting piece of action filmmaking- as well as a ferally erotic romance between Madeleine Stowe and Daniel Day-Lewis.  I think Mann really does a lot with that film and sort of brings his emotions to an orgasmic level that i had never seen before- especially at the conclusion which i won't spoil for you.  i think mann is one of the best filmmakers working today.

You know, the best people all recommend this very highly. I'll have to bump it up higher on my "to-rent" list.
Title: Michael Mann
Post by: pookiethecat on December 26, 2003, 05:54:34 PM
godardian, get the hell off your ass and rent this movie.  :-D it's unashamedly romantic and would make a great thing to see with yo' honey.
Title: Michael Mann
Post by: MacGuffin on January 23, 2004, 01:19:40 PM
According to dvdign's Most Anticipated DVDs of 2004:

Heat
Publisher: Warner Home Video
Publication Date: July

The Pitch: Michael Mann's cult classic gets the two-disc treatment.

Why it's Going to Rock: The 2000 issue of Heat earned its share of kudos here at IGN, but when you cram a three hour film on one DVD there isn't room for much extra. This will be a two-disc set, so expect lots and lots of extras. Well, there better be lots and lots of extras.
Title: Michael Mann
Post by: modage on January 23, 2004, 01:33:48 PM
that's great. i was just thinking they'd probably be doing that soon.  i held out on recently getting Heat AND Enemy of the State which are both being put out in good editions soon, so my patience will be rewarded.
Title: Michael Mann
Post by: Myxo on January 23, 2004, 01:51:31 PM
Quote from: MacGuffinAccording to dvdign's Most Anticipated DVDs of 2004:

Heat
Publisher: Warner Home Video
Publication Date: July

The Pitch: Michael Mann's cult classic gets the two-disc treatment.

Why it's Going to Rock: The 2000 issue of Heat earned its share of kudos here at IGN, but when you cram a three hour film on one DVD there isn't room for much extra. This will be a two-disc set, so expect lots and lots of extras. Well, there better be lots and lots of extras.

Sigh..

I guess that means I've gotta go sell my current copy of Heat just like I did with Memento and dozens of other DVDs I own.
Title: Michael Mann
Post by: Henry Hill on January 26, 2004, 11:27:53 AM
i decided to sell my copy of HEAT a while back. i figured eventually a better edition would come out. i am pleased to here it's sooner than later. one of the great ensemble casts of the last 20 years. seeing de niro and pacino together on film was just amazing. even though they shared what, one scene together? it was a long time coming. it's an epic in my mind. natalie portman was great too.  8)
Title: Michael Mann
Post by: jasper_window on June 22, 2004, 02:25:46 PM
Quote from: MacGuffinAccording to dvdign's Most Anticipated DVDs of 2004:

Heat
Publisher: Warner Home Video
Publication Date: July

The Pitch: Michael Mann's cult classic gets the two-disc treatment.

Why it's Going to Rock: The 2000 issue of Heat earned its share of kudos here at IGN, but when you cram a three hour film on one DVD there isn't room for much extra. This will be a two-disc set, so expect lots and lots of extras. Well, there better be lots and lots of extras.

Anyeone know is this is a truism?  For July that is?
Title: Michael Mann
Post by: Just Withnail on June 22, 2004, 03:16:37 PM
It probably ism't.

Seriously, though, we've seen no cover art, no specs. I'm doubting.
Title: Michael Mann
Post by: jasper_window on June 23, 2004, 08:47:50 AM
I don't think so either.  I usually go by DavisDVD, and Heat is still listed in the "To Be Announced" catergory for 2004.  Here's to hoping for a nice christmas present.
Title: Michael Mann
Post by: tpfkabi on July 24, 2004, 10:40:56 PM
Manhunter has been playing on AMC every once in a while.
i have yet to catch all of it though.
interesting editing//jump cuts

Collateral looks very interesting
Title: Michael Mann
Post by: MacGuffin on August 06, 2004, 12:46:42 PM
Quote from: jasper_window
Quote from: MacGuffinAccording to dvdign's Most Anticipated DVDs of 2004:

Heat
Publisher: Warner Home Video
Publication Date: July

The Pitch: Michael Mann's cult classic gets the two-disc treatment.

Why it's Going to Rock: The 2000 issue of Heat earned its share of kudos here at IGN, but when you cram a three hour film on one DVD there isn't room for much extra. This will be a two-disc set, so expect lots and lots of extras. Well, there better be lots and lots of extras.

Anyeone know is this is a truism?  For July that is?

From DVDAnswers:

Title: Heat SE
Starring: Al Pacino
Released: Early 2005
SRP: Price TBC

Further Details
Sorry folks, it looks like you may have a little while longer to wait for the special edition of Heat. Director Michael Mann recently confirmed that although the disc has been complete for quite some time, Warner isn't planning to release it until early next year. This is likely to coincide with the DVD release of the recent Michael Mann thriller - Collateral, which stars Tom Cruise and Jamie Foxx. Extras for Heat have yet to be confirmed, although Mann did state that an hour-long documentary will be included. This is set to feature newly recorded interviews with all the major cast and crew members. A new audio commentary with the director is also likely.
Title: Michael Mann
Post by: Myxo on August 06, 2004, 02:47:59 PM
The bank robbery shootout..

One of THE best tests of a great surround sound system..

I love using that to test stuff.
Title: Michael Mann
Post by: modage on August 11, 2004, 11:44:43 AM
Mann & DiCaprio Adapting Public Enemies
Source: Variety Wednesday, August 11, 2004

Collateral director Michael Mann and Leonardo DiCaprio will collaborate on a drama about the great crime wave of 1933-34, reports Variety. Universal Pictures has purchased screen rights to Public Enemies, the best-selling book by "Barbarians at the Gate" author Bryan Burrough.

The film will tell the story of how the government's attempt to stop Depression-era criminal legends John Dillinger, Baby Face Nelson and Pretty Boy Floyd transformed J. Edgar Hoover's FBI from a powerless agency into the country's first federal police force.

The trade adds that it is unclear yet which role DiCaprio will take, or even which side of the law his character will be on.
Title: Michael Mann
Post by: modage on September 12, 2004, 12:18:35 AM
Quote from: soixanteJust watched Michael Mann's Thief.  The film was ahead of its time, visually speaking.  Also, the hand of producer Jerry Bruckheimer was evident, from the visual gloss and intricate details of high-tech criminal tools.  In 1981, few films had this sort of look, along with the synth Tangerine Dream score (Risky Business used Tangerine Dream for its score).  Pretty impressive for a first film.  Caan was great, as was Willie Nelson (not just playing himself, he was convincing as a convict).  All in all, a nice 80's flashback.
i just watched Thief for the first time and although james caan was interesting/good, (his accent was a little THICK), and the story was interesting enough to keep you watching, it was one you've seen 1000 times before.  the score was funny/ridiculous/dated.  the ending was sort of cool in a man on fire kind of way.  the transfer was horrible on the MGM 'special edition', like muddy as hell and the blacks were terrible looking.  it was watchable, but not buyable, so unless youre really curious/huge mann fan, this is NOT RECOMMENDED.
Title: Michael Mann
Post by: RegularKarate on September 12, 2004, 12:33:24 AM
Quote from: themodernage02
i just watched Thief for the first time ... this is NOT RECOMMENDED.
Title: Michael Mann
Post by: MacGuffin on October 15, 2004, 12:11:38 PM
Universal Holds on to Its VICE
Colin Farrell and Jamie Foxx in negotiations to take the lead roles in a feature version of Miami Vice.

Still more news about TV shows getting the big screen treatment: Universal is in final negotiations with Colin Farrell to play Detective James "Sonny" Crockett and Jamie Foxx to star as Detective Ricardo Tubbs in the film version of Miami Vice.

Michael Mann executive produced the original series, which ran on NBC from 1984-89. Mann is also in negotiations to write, produce and direct the film version. Anthony Yarkovich, who created the TV series, will executive produce.

The project has been facilitated by the merger of Universal and NBC. Reviving Miami Vice on television is also under consideration. The newly merged company has also announced it will release the Universal-owned Miami Vice series on DVD.
Title: Michael Mann
Post by: Pwaybloe on October 15, 2004, 01:49:51 PM
Oh, come on.  This sounds fake.
Title: Michael Mann
Post by: MacGuffin on October 27, 2004, 01:38:40 AM
Mann, Berg given keys to Uni 'Kingdom'

Michael Mann and helmer Peter Berg are teaming up on the thriller "The Kingdom" for Universal Pictures. Mann will produce the feature through his Forward Pass shingle, with Berg directing. Berg most recently directed the football drama "Friday Night Lights." Matthew Michael Carnahan has been brought on to write the screenplay for "The Kingdom" based on an idea brought to the studio by Berg and Mann. "The Kingdom" follows the story of a team of U.S. government officials who work with a Middle Eastern government to investigate a bombing.
Title: Michael Mann
Post by: cowboykurtis on October 27, 2004, 02:31:20 AM
imay get shunned for this -- many say mann to be such a creative visionary -- i recently rewatched heat and mohicans -- i found them both tedious and sloppy -- i dont htink i can say there is one mann film i really like
Title: Michael Mann
Post by: jasper_window on October 27, 2004, 10:12:04 AM
even The Insider?
Title: Michael Mann
Post by: MacGuffin on November 09, 2004, 04:53:44 PM
Colin Farrell May Star in 'Miami Vice'

Colin Farrell says he's not bonded to Bond, but thinks it would be nice to star in "Miami Vice." The star of the upcoming historical epic "Alexander" said he's had no talks with producers to replace Pierce Brosnan as the superspy James Bond in a new 007 movie, and laughed at the idea of sporting the legendary tuxedo.

Brosnan, 51, who has played Bond in the last four 007 films, says Farrell would be his ideal successor.

"I'll give it to Colin Farrell. He'll eat the head off them all," Brosnan said following a recent entertainment awards ceremony in Dublin, Ireland.

But Farrell, saying that everyone keeps asking him about Brosnan's endorsement, says, "I never heard a thing. He probably wants 10 percent!"

While he nixed Bond, the 28-year-old actor confirmed that he's considering stepping into the role of police Detective Sonny Crockett for a movie version of the '80s TV drama "Miami Vice."

Farrell would play the part originated by Don Johnson. Jamie Foxx is negotiating to co-star as his Crockett's partner, Ricardo Tubbs, played by Philip Michael Thomas in the TV series.

Michael Mann, the director of "Collateral," "Heat" and "The Insider" and the executive producer of the "Miami Vice" TV series, is developing the story, which Farrell said wouldn't go the comedy route, like the films inspired by "Dragnet" and "Starsky & Hutch."

It's not a comedy at all. It's cool," said Farrell in an interview. "Michael Mann wrote it and when he writes it's good and it goes pretty deep."

Farrell said he wasn't sure whether his Crockett would have the three-day growth of beard that Johnson turned into an '80s fashion statement, but he would definitely have an updated wardrobe.

"I don't think I'll be wearing a silver shiny suit," he said.
Title: Michael Mann
Post by: Pwaybloe on November 10, 2004, 08:04:21 AM
Oh, come on. This sounds fake.
Title: Michael Mann
Post by: mutinyco on December 13, 2004, 04:53:08 PM
I just saw Collateral. This has to be one of the STUPIDEST movies I've ever seen! This shouldn't have been a super-cool neon-blooded Michael Mann thriller. It's a dark comedy! It should've been done in the dead pan manner of Kubrick or like the Coens' Fargo. What type of broke-ass hitman hires a cab to drive him around? What type of incompetent hitman shoots somebody out the window? What type of stupid hitman then gets into a damaged cab and hides the body in the trunk? What type of shithead hitman then STAYS in the cab with the dead guy in the trunk even AFTER it's already been pulled over by the cops? Then talks to the dispatcher, letting himself be known even after the dispatcher learned about the cab from the police report? And on and on...
Title: Michael Mann
Post by: Stefen on December 13, 2004, 04:55:28 PM
Um, the kind of hitman in a movie?
Title: Michael Mann
Post by: socketlevel on December 14, 2004, 07:27:57 AM
Quote from: mutinycoI just saw Collateral. This has to be one of the STUPIDEST movies I've ever seen! This shouldn't have been a super-cool neon-blooded Michael Mann thriller. It's a dark comedy! It should've been done in the dead pan manner of Kubrick or like the Coens' Fargo. What type of broke-ass hitman hires a cab to drive him around? What type of incompetent hitman shoots somebody out the window? What type of stupid hitman then gets into a damaged cab and hides the body in the trunk? What type of shithead hitman then STAYS in the cab with the dead guy in the trunk even AFTER it's already been pulled over by the cops? Then talks to the dispatcher, letting himself be known even after the dispatcher learned about the cab from the police report? And on and on...

i agree, and the HD looks like shit.  I don't know why everyone said Jamie fox was really good in it, i thought he was horrible.  The riding away in the subway at the end was the worst of it.

-sl-
Title: Michael Mann
Post by: pete on December 14, 2004, 11:42:10 AM
Quote from: mutinycoI just saw Collateral. This has to be one of the STUPIDEST movies I've ever seen! This shouldn't have been a super-cool neon-blooded Michael Mann thriller. It's a dark comedy! It should've been done in the dead pan manner of Kubrick or like the Coens' Fargo. What type of broke-ass hitman hires a cab to drive him around? What type of incompetent hitman shoots somebody out the window? What type of stupid hitman then gets into a damaged cab and hides the body in the trunk? What type of shithead hitman then STAYS in the cab with the dead guy in the trunk even AFTER it's already been pulled over by the cops? Then talks to the dispatcher, letting himself be known even after the dispatcher learned about the cab from the police report? And on and on...

I know, 'cause the hitmen in real life--they've NEVER been caught all the time and aren't in the news everytday, they never leave DNAs and fingerprints and messy corpses that lead them to testifying against the other dudes who've hire them.
Title: Michael Mann
Post by: mutinyco on December 15, 2004, 09:08:21 PM
Quote from: peteI know, 'cause the hitmen in real life--they've NEVER been caught all the time and aren't in the news everytday, they never leave DNAs and fingerprints and messy corpses that lead them to testifying against the other dudes who've hire them.

Exactly why it should've been a comedy. Like I said. Though it certainly held my interest longer that The Life Aquatic.
Title: Michael Mann
Post by: Stefen on December 15, 2004, 09:20:57 PM
Are you just trying to be different?
Title: Michael Mann
Post by: ono on December 15, 2004, 10:00:28 PM
He liked Gigli and hated Finding Nemo...
Title: Michael Mann
Post by: Weak2ndAct on December 16, 2004, 12:12:25 AM
Surprise abound on the Collateral dvd:

- A Mann commentary track that is not advertised anywhere (found under 'Audio Options')
- 5 Easter eggs on disc 2 (just hit left or right on each of the pages) with brief behind-the-scenes stuff, the most interesting detailing Cruise's staging in the cab, and why he changes it up during a crucial scene.
Title: Michael Mann
Post by: Stefen on December 16, 2004, 12:16:41 AM
Dude, you're the new school Harry Knowles. No diss, just cause your fat, Just props.
Title: Michael Mann
Post by: pete on December 16, 2004, 02:14:35 AM
Quote from: mutinyco

Exactly why it should've been a comedy. Like I said. Though it certainly held my interest longer that The Life Aquatic.

that sentiment totally made sense...ON OPPOSITE LAND!
Title: Michael Mann
Post by: mutinyco on December 16, 2004, 11:40:53 AM
Pete, you tool, I knew you'd get hooked on that one.
Title: Michael Mann
Post by: Gold Trumpet on December 16, 2004, 12:10:31 PM
I have to say of all the potential films, Collateral has to be the worst movie I've seen all year. Not only was the story implausible as well as dumb, it didn't even work as an action film. The ending twist to Cruise's kill fest in who he has to kill pandered to some of the very worst cliches of the genre. And besides, I know Tom Cruise sometimes tries too hard acting, but I've never seen him this desperate to be the bad guy. Use to be an actor, now just a star seeking bigger roles. But hey, Elephant was the very worst for me last year and many people saw it as the best, but as much as Mutinyco and I disagree, he's not alone on this one.
Title: Michael Mann
Post by: MacGuffin on December 16, 2004, 01:43:51 PM
Quote from: Weak2ndActSurprise abound on the Collateral dvd:

- A Mann commentary track that is not advertised anywhere (found under 'Audio Options')

Just seems silly not to advertise this, especially when I know Mann does commentaries now. I dropped going through the Return of The King extras to listen to it after you posted this. Thanks for the tip.
Title: Michael Mann
Post by: socketlevel on December 17, 2004, 08:35:24 AM
Quote from: MacGuffin
Quote from: Weak2ndActSurprise abound on the Collateral dvd:

- A Mann commentary track that is not advertised anywhere (found under 'Audio Options')

Just seems silly not to advertise this, especially when I know Mann does commentaries now. I dropped going through the Return of The King extras to listen to it after you posted this. Thanks for the tip.

seems like a stupid mistake to make, with early dvds this was more understandable, before the commentary became a selling point.  i remember scream didn't advertise one but had it, not to mention two single layers, both with widescreen on it???  fail to understand that one.

at least in the case with collateral you're getting something extra, unlike the bully dvd released by lions gate that advertised a commentary by larry clarke on the back of the case but never had one.  that was part of the reason i got the disc, i dig his washed up commentaries.

that one had me pissed to the point of emailing the company.  alas, no freebees.

-sl-
Title: Michael Mann
Post by: Ghostboy on December 17, 2004, 02:03:14 PM
Quote from: socketlevelunlike the bully dvd released by lions gate that advertised a commentary by larry clarke on the back of the case but never had one.  

-sl-

Lions Gate is becoming famous for that.
Title: Michael Mann
Post by: socketlevel on December 17, 2004, 05:49:10 PM
Quote from: Ghostboy
Quote from: socketlevelunlike the bully dvd released by lions gate that advertised a commentary by larry clarke on the back of the case but never had one.  

-sl-

Lions Gate is becoming famous for that.

i didn't know that, can you warn me of other titles?

maybe it's possible they didn't change the box insert paper for the canadian release.  lions gate is a canadian company though, or at least in part/origins.  so i'd imagine they'd get the rights to the commentary for canada.

mind you the "another day in paradise" (trimark) was different in canada, i got it on ebay from the states, but our domestic one didn't have the second side with the directors cut, and therefore didn't have that larry clarke commentary either.

-sl-
Title: Michael Mann
Post by: SHAFTR on December 31, 2004, 02:45:32 AM
Mann is quickly becoming one of my favorite directors.  I had seen Last of the Mohicans and Heat a long time ago, but besides that I hadn't seen much (except Ali, which I disliked).  Collateral kindled my interest in Mann (along with the fact that he went to the same school I am going to) and I have since gone back and watched Thief, Manhunter, Last of the Mohicans and The Insider.

As I have said before, I think Collateral is one of the best films this year.  The Insider blew me away, one of the better films of the 90s and Last of the Mohicans is a great action film with a little more (as are most Mann's films).  It is interesting to watch Thief & Manhunter, both films are flawed but you can see Mann's genius at work.  I'm really glad he has matured into films like The Insider & Collateral.

Spielberg & Mann are the most entertaining directors working today.  Their films are just great cinema experiences.
Title: Michael Mann
Post by: Myxo on December 31, 2004, 11:02:30 AM
Quote from: SHAFTRMann is quickly becoming one of my favorite directors.

Yep.

He's on my list of directors who can make a movie that I'll go and see no matter what the subject matter is. Oh, and Will Smith needs to stop pretending he's a dramatic actor and stick to action films.
Title: Michael Mann
Post by: ono on December 31, 2004, 02:44:02 PM
Quote from: MyxomatosisOh, and Will Smith needs to stop pretending he's a dramatic actor and stick to action films.
*coughsixdegreesofseparationcough*  Excuse me.  That time of year again, I guess.

Because, like, y'know, Wild, Wild West really reinvented the action/western genre seeing as how it succeeded in making it more crap and unbelievable than it already is.
Title: Michael Mann
Post by: cowboykurtis on January 21, 2005, 12:20:44 AM
collateral was a peice of shit - i think mann is overrated -- my opinion was always shaky, his last attempt solidified my opinion --  he's a decent director, but gets more credit then deserved - the insider is his best film -- collateral was just a bad movie all around
Title: Michael Mann
Post by: soixante on January 21, 2005, 01:07:03 AM
How bad can Mann be, if he directed Thief and Heat, two crime films that have been hugely influential on countless crime and action films.  Collateral had a unique nocturnal look that will doubtlessly be imitated by many future filmmakers.
Title: Michael Mann
Post by: Myxo on January 21, 2005, 02:15:21 AM
I have to agree.

Heat, Last of the Mohicans and the Insider are all first rate, quality films. Also, the guy wrote Heat, which is just a terrific script and has been hugely copied the last 9 years. Overated? I think you've gotta be rated period for somebody to be "over"ated. Most people on the street couldn't name a Michael Mann film, let alone having heard of him. He's really only well known to people who are cinephiles and so forth.

M. Night Shyamalan is overated..

Sixth Sense was great..
Unbreakable was great..

Then along came a stinker in Signs..
Uh oh, then he tried the same surprise formula yet again with The Village.

Whatever he makes next is going to define if he's officially jumped the shark. But, there is an example of a well known director to many who is very overated.
Title: Michael Mann
Post by: Gold Trumpet on January 21, 2005, 01:13:58 PM
What was so great about Heat? As a film that speaks about the ability for someone not being able to connect with people, it was average. As a film that is about two people who come from two worlds and are going to head-to-head, storywise nothing really struck me as that good. I personally think two things really made it what it was: 1.) the subject of underworld it explored and 2.) the length it did it too. The second point doesn't mean the film went beyond other films in exploring an underworld, but made the underworld epic in no way another film has. Robert De Niro has to do nothing because he did the same performance he did for every 90s action role he got. He just channeled Humphrey Bogart. Al Pacino was just Al Pacino. No character really had any meat to them at all and any storyline that seemed to develop outside the crux of the underworld story were carried out as meaningful 5 minute scenes only scattered around.

But, there is something to Heat. The story is paced perfectly for what its trying to do and the filmmaking never over steps the story. All Michael Mann was doing was handling a script that could have got very corny or very unbelievable. He managed to keep it all grounded. He did it so well that I think the film is now extremely overrated.
Title: Michael Mann
Post by: soixante on January 21, 2005, 01:28:03 PM
The best defense of Heat is an article in Vanity Fair from March or April of 2003.  I forgot who wrote the piece, but it makes a good case for taking the film seriously.

For me, what's cool about Heat is how it pumps fresh life and style into a stale genre -- how many bank robberies have I seen as a filmgoer?  Too many to count.  How many burnt out cops I have I seen as filmgoer?  Too many.  Still, Heat took these oft-used conventions and made them interesting.

Also, one of Mann's biggest influences is Tarkovsky.
Title: Michael Mann
Post by: Gold Trumpet on January 21, 2005, 04:50:11 PM
Quote from: soixanteFor me, what's cool about Heat is how it pumps fresh life and style into a stale genre -- how many bank robberies have I seen as a filmgoer?  Too many to count.  How many burnt out cops I have I seen as filmgoer?  Too many.  Still, Heat took these oft-used conventions and made them interesting.

I'll admit he revitalized a genre for many and even made a really good action film, but I don't think he climbed Mount Everest with this film. Of bank robbery films, I'd say Rififi is the pinnacle.

Quote from: soixanteAlso, one of Mann's biggest influences is Tarkovsky.

He can be an influence, but I don't see where it shows in his work. Tarkovsky is as Russian as they come, while Mann couldn't be more American. I'd love to hear someone correlate the two in defense.
Title: Michael Mann
Post by: Myxo on January 21, 2005, 06:23:06 PM
SPOILERS

I loved Heat for everything that it had which so many action movies don't.

You've got an action movie with a protagonist and an antagonist who genuinely respect each other. But they are both living in a world where neither man is in a position to let anyone get too close. So, you've got Pacino who abandons everyone he loves and Deniro who does the same. It's wonderful because in seeing the struggles of both men we can all relate and sympathize. This is perhaps one of the very few films in it's genre where I was genuinely sad when the bad guy got killed.

Then you've got all of these awesome side stories and supporting characters who are going through struggles of their own to stay sane. Val Kilmer is a gambling addict who is abandoning his family. In the end, we feel sorry for Kilmer but believe that he doesn't deserve his wife or his kids.

There is even a story of possible redemption in the black getaway driver just out of prison. He is faced with a decision. Stay clean and keep working for his dictator boss, or get back in the action and give in to the only thing he can understand being good at and the only people who accept and respect him.

Not to mention the great moments..

- Pacino explaining how the armored car robbery went down..
- The tense moments in the cafe before they try and murder the fuckup..
- The phone conversation with the banker and Deniro where he tells him "I'm talking to a dead man on the other end of this fucking phone."
- Pacino and Judd's scene in the motel room..
- The look that Judd gives Kilmer when she tips him off..
- Pacino finding his daughter in law in the tub..
- Deniro leaving his girlfriend in the car when he felt the Heat around the corner..

God, there are a ton of great scenes. It's just an all around wonderful film and Mann's best. The Insider is great, but I think Heat is his opus and always will be.
Title: Michael Mann
Post by: Gold Trumpet on January 21, 2005, 07:01:43 PM
Quote from: MyxomatosisThere is even a story of possible redemption in the black getaway driver just out of prison. He is faced with a decision. Stay clean and keep working for his dictator boss, or get back in the action and give in to the only thing he can understand being good at and the only people who accept and respect him.

Even though I'm just quoting this part, Myxomatosis does well to go the gauntlet of explaining all the situations that mattered to him. He felt the themes of the storyline bleed through. I never did and especially this one part here. As put here, this one supporting story could be its own film with the all the different notes it hits. What's always shocking is how little time in the movie is actually given to his story. Saying he is a supporting character even feels like too much. It almost feels like a cameo but with a little more to it and all of a sudden, he's involved in the heist and dead like that. Nothing more to be commented on. Thats the overall feeling I got from the story. Earnesty in attempt, but never enough time spent to everything it wanted to cover so all I could appreciate it for was what it is at its lowest dimension; an action film.
Title: Michael Mann
Post by: Ghostboy on January 21, 2005, 08:22:56 PM
Wouldn't you say, though, that the very fact that so little time was spent on it and yet the themes of that subplot were still so clearly evoked is a testament to the skill of the storytelling? Weak writing/directing would have thrown that subplot in and let it sink, but Mann, although keeping it extrememly minimal, also makes it memorable amidst so many other subplots -- to the point that one might even think it's more substantial than it actually is? I think that's quite skillful.
Title: Michael Mann
Post by: Myxo on January 21, 2005, 08:35:31 PM
Let's not forget that Mann also wrote Heat. That's really saying something when you consider films such as Die Hard and Lethal Weapon were directed by and written by different people.
Title: Michael Mann
Post by: Gold Trumpet on January 21, 2005, 09:40:19 PM
Quote from: GhostboyWouldn't you say, though, that the very fact that so little time was spent on it and yet the themes of that subplot were still so clearly evoked is a testament to the skill of the storytelling?

Honestly, no. It actually sank for me. Up until Myxomatosis (you need an easier name to spell) clarified the whole ramifications facing that character, all I remembered was just the scenes and thats it. Filmmakers can throw in subplots, spin them in so many ways and have the audience remember them and still be awful. Having something simply stay in memory does not attest to it being of quality. I'm forced to stick to my points, but I will say that even though I find Michael Mann to be overrated, I am always hopeful his next film will be a good one. He did it with The Insider.
Title: Michael Mann
Post by: Ghostboy on January 21, 2005, 09:51:57 PM
What did you think of Last Of The Mohicans?

(redirect if necessary)
Title: Michael Mann
Post by: Gold Trumpet on January 21, 2005, 09:53:17 PM
Quote from: GhostboyWhat did you think of Last Of The Mohicans?

(redirect if necessary)

Missed that one. Should I give it a rental?
Title: Michael Mann
Post by: Ghostboy on January 21, 2005, 09:56:22 PM
Well, using my own taste as a barometer, the answer would be a resounding yes. It's still my favorite Michael Mann film (even if The Insider is better), and one of the very best historical action films I've ever seen.
Title: Michael Mann
Post by: Gold Trumpet on January 21, 2005, 10:00:27 PM
Quote from: GhostboyWell, using my own taste as a barometer, the answer would be a resounding yes. It's still my favorite Michael Mann film (even if The Insider is better), and one of the very best historical action films I've ever seen.

I'll rent it next then. Your taste isn't a bad barometer for me at all. Your initial rave about Spring, Summer, Fall, Winter...Spring got me to blind buy because I couldn't find it for rental.
Title: Michael Mann
Post by: Myxo on January 21, 2005, 11:49:45 PM
Oh and did I mention Heat has quite possibly the best shootout scene in any action film?

We used to use the DVD to test our sound systems at the electronics store I worked at. If we were trying to sell a package big screen and sound system it was always either,

A. Matrix lobby scene..
B. Heat gunfight in the streets..

:-D
Title: Michael Mann
Post by: cine on January 21, 2005, 11:53:38 PM
Heat is the best film of the 90's.
Title: Michael Mann
Post by: cowboykurtis on January 22, 2005, 02:13:42 AM
Quote from: cinephileHeat is the best film of the 90's.

give me a fucking break
Title: Michael Mann
Post by: ono on January 22, 2005, 02:18:53 AM
Quote from: cowboykurtis
Quote from: cinephileHeat is the best film of the 90's.

give me a fucking break
Sincerity is the best tool available for use on the Internet.
Title: Michael Mann
Post by: cowboykurtis on January 22, 2005, 02:27:27 AM
Quote from: wantautopia?
Quote from: cowboykurtis
Quote from: cinephileHeat is the best film of the 90's.

give me a fucking break
Sincerity is the best tool available for use on the Internet.
and how do i know hes not being sincere?
Title: Michael Mann
Post by: cine on January 22, 2005, 02:33:19 AM
Sorry, I was being insincere.

I meant the past half-century.
Title: Michael Mann
Post by: cowboykurtis on January 22, 2005, 02:34:24 AM
Quote from: cinephileSorry, I was being insincere.

I meant the past half-century.
you got me good
Title: Michael Mann
Post by: cine on January 22, 2005, 02:35:39 AM
Really though, best film of the 90's.
Title: Michael Mann
Post by: cowboykurtis on January 22, 2005, 02:41:37 AM
Quote from: cinephileReally though, best film of the 90's.
don't rub it in, you're the internet king - you GOT me
Title: Michael Mann
Post by: cron on January 22, 2005, 11:40:44 AM
Quote from: The Gold TrumpetOf bank robbery films, I'd say Rififi is the pinnacle.

And I'd say that out of the criterions i've watched, Rififi is the most conventional, The only thing I like about it is how the villain is literally always standing taller than every other character. Besides, Jules Dassin was a commie.
Title: Michael Mann
Post by: Gold Trumpet on January 22, 2005, 01:58:41 PM
Quote from: cronopio
Quote from: The Gold TrumpetOf bank robbery films, I'd say Rififi is the pinnacle.

And I'd say that out of the criterions i've watched, Rififi is the most conventional, The only thing I like about it is how the villain is literally always standing taller than every other character. Besides, Jules Dassin was a commie.

Rififi is hardly convential. Actually, its filmmaking is amazing, worthy of a great essay. In essence, what the film does is combine the ethics of old Hollywood filmmaking with the realism of films today. The films starts out using only on set locales, keeping the scenes pithy and unassuming. But, as the story digs deeper into the underworld and the character's crime, it begins using on site locales more and breaking more narrative codes. The way this films starts to make that transition speaks for the heightened tension in the film, but it also speaks for what he wanted to get out of the audience. Audiences back then must have seen this break more clearly, realizing they were finally getting a gritty view point of Paris and really seeing conventions be thrown out the window with a 26-minute, completely silent, bank robbery. Today, the transition is almost invisible. We take for granted Paris can be filmed and people may even interact on the streets also. The bank robbery does stand out, but most film comment today is just on that. There is hardly recognition on the genius of how slyly the film did erode artificiality completely in conjecture with the rythm and theme of the story. I'd even comment Rififi is one of the prime examples of film criticism within a film. It clearly shows two worlds of filmmaking and allows the audience to feel how one worked so much better to really move the audience.
Title: Michael Mann
Post by: Gold Trumpet on January 23, 2005, 03:45:08 AM
I just watched Last of the Mohicans. Ghostboy steered me well with this one. Not only will I agree with him its my favorite Michael Mann, but I also think it may be his best. The richness of the film is so good I feel I can't really say Insider is his best just because its a deeper drama on paper. Last of the Mohicans, just on paper, is really almost silly, but the production values brought to recreate this time period is really some of the best work I've ever seen in any film. As an action film, I could tell the Mann realized he was making a very old style film as the beginning dinner scene of everyone happy had that hallmark musical touch to it even. Its an action film truly. It never really went beyond that besides the usual expected cheesiness, but there was a touch of great filmmaking to really heighten the experience so I never became too bothered by really anything. I bought into the film.

I kept thinking through out this film why I bought into this film and not Collateral. Both really have the same IQ in their story. I'm starting to realize how much of a mistake it was for Mann to have used digital the way he did for that film. He should have used film. As much as digital will be a huge part of the future, its not really there yet in quality. I never felt like I was closer to the characters because it was filmed hand held and in digital. It didn't transform the experience for me at all. It seemed to make me even more aware of how staged film can be sometimes because digital loss a degree of authenticity for me. If people really want to look at filmmakers who have broken the barrier of intimacy on screen, look at any film by Jean-Pierre and Luc Dardenne. They still use film but realize its all in how you tell the story and then film it. Michael Mann may like genre rules too much for his aspirations sometimes.
Title: Michael Mann
Post by: Ghostboy on January 23, 2005, 11:34:01 AM
Quote from: The Gold TrumpetI just watched Last of the Mohicans. Ghostboy steered me well with this one. Not only will I agree with him its my favorite Michael Mann, but I also think it may be his best. The richness of the film is so good I feel I can't really say Insider is his best just because its a deeper drama on paper. Last of the Mohicans, just on paper, is really almost silly, but the production values brought to recreate this time period is really some of the best work I've ever seen in any film. As an action film, I could tell the Mann realized he was making a very old style film as the beginning dinner scene of everyone happy had that hallmark musical touch to it even. Its an action film truly. It never really went beyond that besides the usual expected cheesiness, but there was a touch of great filmmaking to really heighten the experience so I never became too bothered by really anything. I bought into the film.

Exactly. Plus, it has one of the best adventure/romance scores ever written.
Title: Michael Mann
Post by: soixante on January 23, 2005, 12:18:17 PM
I think the only thing that keeps Mann from being a great filmmaker, and joining the ranks of Scorsese and PTA, is that he is too beholden to mainstream Hollywood sensibilities.  Collateral is similar to other Hollywood films that start off in an interesting, unpredictable way, but then succumb to rote genre conventions.

I do think the digital video deployed in Collateral helped create a different sort of mood.  I think of Los Angeles is the third character in this movie, and Mann captures its nocturnal qualities in a cool way.  I was highly impressed by the obscure locations they were able to find.  Mann also made wonderful use of downtown L.A.'s sterile and abandoned skyscrapers.
Title: Michael Mann
Post by: Myxo on January 24, 2005, 02:41:40 AM
Quote from: soixanteI do think the digital video deployed in Collateral helped create a different sort of mood.  I think of Los Angeles is the third character in this movie, and Mann captures its nocturnal qualities in a cool way.  I was highly impressed by the obscure locations they were able to find.  Mann also made wonderful use of downtown L.A.'s sterile and abandoned skyscrapers.

Agree. :yabbse-thumbup:

The digital film work I think allowed Mann to give things a sort of unnatural look that I totally loved. There are lots of scenes with Foxx driving around where you can see bright city lights reflecting in the windshield. Also, alot of the out of focus work was beautiful as well.

The story does drag into convential action film territory but it's worst quality is a stupid ending. At least with Heat I felt some degree of completion had taken place between Deniro and Pacino. In this movie I felt like Cruise got a raw deal in such a quick death while the audience got less dialogue and more shooting.

The nightclub scene is really aweful. Whenever I think about Collateral, for some reason I always get that sequence in my head and that stupid evil look on Cruise's face that he can't sell. I never could completely believe that he was that cold.

It's worth a shot as a rental but I wouldn't pay full price for a copy.
Title: Michael Mann
Post by: Myxo on February 02, 2005, 02:43:27 AM
SPOILERS

Alright, so a friend and I had a great discussion at lunch today about Mann's films.

Last of the Mohicans, Heat and Collateral all place the "bad guy" in a position to die far too easily.

In the case of Mohicans, we've got Magua who gets killed on screen in like 10-15 seconds. Now, I don't have a problem with this, seeing as he just murded the elder's son right in front of his eyes. Magua deserved a quick and brutal death, but it was still pretty swift and without much of an epic struggle for such a foul antagonist.

Moving on to Heat, we have Robert Deniro dying after his position is given away at the airport. I'd say Pacino had a whole lot of fucking luck on his side to manage that one. Did he deserve as much? There is such a build up, and we really respect Deniro as much as we respect Pacino. It seems like a pretty lame way for Deniro to die given that Pacino himself was full of character flaws.

Finally we arrive at Collatral, a film where Tom Cruise's character is knocked off by another fluke. Jamie Foxx manages to kill his antagonist because the subway lights went out and he got a lucky shot off?

A pattern is emerging here..

I absolutely love Michael Mann's work, but I admit his endings bother me in the case of all three of the films mentioned here. Last of the Mohicans is the most believable and satisfying ending of the three, because Magua has been built up as such a demon that we are glad to see him go. However, in the case of Heat and Collateral, did the bad guys really need to go out like that? It by no means "ruins the movie" for me, but there is something lacking when I've built up a huge amount of respect for Deniro and even Cruise for the films to end so abruptly. The antagonists needed to die, but not like they did..

Thoughts?
Title: Michael Mann
Post by: Ghostboy on February 02, 2005, 02:50:57 AM
Isn't that a credit to Mann, though, that he allows death to be arbitrary, as it is in life? This is of course more attributable to Heat, which of the three films you mention has the most developed and therefore lifelike characters, but his thwarting of conventions overall seems rather refreshing.

I totally think Mike Wallace went out like a sucker in The Insider, though.
Title: Michael Mann
Post by: jasper_window on February 02, 2005, 08:46:17 AM
Quote from: GhostboyIsn't that a credit to Mann, though, that he allows death to be arbitrary, as it is in life? This is of course more attributable to Heat, which of the three films you mention has the most developed and therefore lifelike characters, but his thwarting of conventions overall seems rather refreshing.

I totally think Mike Wallace went out like a sucker in The Insider, though.

There it is right there.  

As for Last of the Mohicans, the way Maguai is killed is completely satisfactory to me, it's like a violent ballet.  The crushing blow to his torso, smashing his shoulder, and that spin move to finish him off.  It's quick and brutal.  Anytime I've gotten a new TV, receiver, speakers etc...the last 15 minutes of Mohicans is the first thing to go in.
Title: Michael Mann
Post by: life_boy on February 02, 2005, 11:21:28 AM
Quote from: GhostboyIsn't that a credit to Mann, though, that he allows death to be arbitrary, as it is in life? This is of course more attributable to Heat, which of the three films you mention has the most developed and therefore lifelike characters, but his thwarting of conventions overall seems rather refreshing.

This is usually how I see it also.  It is anticlimactic, perhaps because we always expect a huge climax with explosions and car crashes and the final word before the bullet goes in when we watch an action film (and perhaps we feel this need even more since we do know the characters more than in some other action films)...but I think this is part of Mann's point.  For all the other people in these films who die without fanfare or climax, why should the "bad guy" get the climactic death?  "He allows death to be arbitrary, as it is in life."  I wouldn't necessarily say death is arbitrary or that Mann sees it as arbitrary, but I would say that it feels arbitrary to those who are not particularly close to the one who passes, as in life.

Quote from: MyxomatosisHowever, in the case of Heat and Collateral, did the bad guys really need to go out like that? It by no means "ruins the movie" for me, but there is something lacking when I've built up a huge amount of respect for Deniro and even Cruise for the films to end so abruptly. The antagonists needed to die, but not like they did..

I do understand what you're saying, Myxomatosis, but I also think that it adds to Mann's overall existential worldview as shown in his films.  Honestly, I felt like the ending of Collateral could (or perhaps should) have been something more than it was (it was the only thing in the movie that really bothered me), but perhaps I'm not being fair to the director's vision by wishing it could end a little differently and I need to view the film again with eyes to understand why he ended it the way he did.  What is he trying to tell me?  This is something I'll be keeping in mind when I revisit Collateral in the next week or so.
Title: Michael Mann
Post by: MacGuffin on February 14, 2005, 05:04:10 PM
Foxx, Farrell Take on 'Miami Vice' Duty

LOS ANGELES - Add Jamie Foxx and Colin Farrell to the roster of stars resurrecting TV shows for the big screen. Foxx and Farrell will star in a movie version of the cop series "Miami Vice," which will be written and directed by Michael Mann, an executive producer on the show that ran on NBC from 1984-89.

Shooting is scheduled to begin this spring, with the movie tentatively due in theaters July 28, 2006.

Foxx, who co-starred with Tom Cruise in Mann's hitman thriller "Collateral" last summer, will play Detective Ricardo Tubbs, a role originated for TV by Philip Michael Thomas. Farrell is playing Detective Sonny Crockett, the part created by Don Johnson.
Title: Michael Mann
Post by: Two Lane Blacktop on February 14, 2005, 09:44:46 PM
Oh, PLEASE!  Why would anyone even attempt a remake of that show now?  Anything they do is going to pale in comparison to...
(https://xixax.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.gouranga.com%2Fimages%2Fgtavice%2Fvc-212.jpg&hash=501b041df47356ba81815d1fc29dafeea6363b78)

2LB
Title: Michael Mann
Post by: SHAFTR on March 17, 2005, 04:07:07 AM
Quote from: MacGuffinFoxx, Farrell Take on 'Miami Vice' Duty

LOS ANGELES - Add Jamie Foxx and Colin Farrell to the roster of stars resurrecting TV shows for the big screen. Foxx and Farrell will star in a movie version of the cop series "Miami Vice," which will be written and directed by Michael Mann, an executive producer on the show that ran on NBC from 1984-89.

Shooting is scheduled to begin this spring, with the movie tentatively due in theaters July 28, 2006.

Foxx, who co-starred with Tom Cruise in Mann's hitman thriller "Collateral" last summer, will play Detective Ricardo Tubbs, a role originated for TV by Philip Michael Thomas. Farrell is playing Detective Sonny Crockett, the part created by Don Johnson.

I hope there is a scene with them in the car driving to "In the Air Tonight"
Title: Michael Mann
Post by: Weak2ndAct on March 17, 2005, 04:34:50 AM
Quote from: SHAFTRI hope there is a scene with them in the car driving to "In the Air Tonight"
I bought the season 1 dvd when it came out, and I lost my shit when that scene came on.  Great moment.  I hope you're not being facetious.
Title: Michael Mann
Post by: SHAFTR on March 17, 2005, 11:15:15 AM
Quote from: Weak2ndAct
Quote from: SHAFTRI hope there is a scene with them in the car driving to "In the Air Tonight"
I bought the season 1 dvd when it came out, and I lost my shit when that scene came on.  Great moment.  I hope you're not being facetious.

I'm not.  I'm currently going through Season 1 and that moment (albeit cheesy) works.
Title: Michael Mann
Post by: MacGuffin on March 30, 2005, 01:04:51 AM
'Miami Vice' Squad Books Gong Li as Love Interest

Chinese-born actress Gong Li has joined the cast of Michael Mann's big-screen update on the 1980s TV crime drama "Miami Vice" for Universal Pictures.

Colin Farrell and Jamie Foxx star, respectively, as Detectives Sonny Crockett and Ricardo Tubbs in the film being adapted from the hit NBC series. Mann, who executive-produced the TV show, is writing, directing and producing the feature.

The actress will play Isabella, the Chinese-Cuban wife of the leader of a transnational crime syndicate and Crockett's love interest.

"Vice" is set for a July 28, 2006, release.

Li, whose credits include "Raise the Red Lantern" and "Farewell My Concubine," appears in the upcoming films "2046," "Eros" and "Memoirs of a Geisha."
Title: Michael Mann
Post by: MacGuffin on April 06, 2005, 02:51:26 PM
Who Shot Miami Vice?
Crew revealed for film version.
 
The Hollywood Reporter reveals that Dion Beebe will serve as the director of photography on the big-screen version of Miami Vice. Beebe previously teamed with Vice director Michael Mann on Collateral, for which Beebe and Paul Cameron received the top cinematography prize at the British Academy Film Awards.

Beebe is reportedly "testing the Panavision Genesis, the Thomson Viper and the Sony HDCAM for shooting Vice night sequences. Asked whether he is considering using a combination of digital cameras again, Beebe said: 'I don't think so. We'd like to keep it to just one digital camera this time.'"

THR also says William Goldenberg (Domino) and Paul Rubell (The Island) will be the editors of Miami Vice, with Victor Kempster (Any Given Sunday) onboard as production designer.

Miami Vice begins filming soon for a summer '06 bow.
Title: Michael Mann
Post by: MacGuffin on April 15, 2005, 01:33:13 PM
Mann Talks Vice
"There is a sexual beat to Miami."
 
According to the Miami Herald, director Michael Mann and Oscar-winner Jamie Foxx attended a Lenny Kravitz after-concert party Wednesday night at billionaire developer Thomas Kramer's mansion on Star Island where Mann spoke to the Herald about his Miami Vice movie.

"There is a sexual beat to Miami that no city in the world has, and the film will capture it the way the TV show was never allowed to," Mann said.

Mann believes Vice might, as the TV series did, set some fashion trends. Miami's penchant for revealing night-life attire will be showcased in the movie.

"I am not trying to do a film version of GQ, not intentionally anyway," the director humorously added.

Miami Vice begins filming next month for a 2006 bow.
Title: Michael Mann
Post by: SiliasRuby on April 16, 2005, 11:49:09 AM
I just watched The Insider last night, (after watching Broadcast news) and it is the one movie that has blown away any second thoughts of wanting to smoke. Great film.
Title: Michael Mann
Post by: SHAFTR on April 16, 2005, 12:02:34 PM
Quote from: MacGuffin

Miami Vice begins filming next month for a 2006 bow.

...and I'm so excited.
Title: Michael Mann
Post by: Kal on April 16, 2005, 12:11:52 PM
They are shooting some scenes just some meters away from my place. Same spots were they shot parts of The Specialist and Transporter 2.

Transporter was very fun to watch, and take pictures. They crashed cars and made explotions and everything.
Title: Michael Mann
Post by: SHAFTR on May 30, 2005, 01:26:39 AM
Quote from: life_boy
Quote from: GhostboyIsn't that a credit to Mann, though, that he allows death to be arbitrary, as it is in life? This is of course more attributable to Heat, which of the three films you mention has the most developed and therefore lifelike characters, but his thwarting of conventions overall seems rather refreshing.

This is usually how I see it also.  It is anticlimactic, perhaps because we always expect a huge climax with explosions and car crashes and the final word before the bullet goes in when we watch an action film (and perhaps we feel this need even more since we do know the characters more than in some other action films)...but I think this is part of Mann's point.  For all the other people in these films who die without fanfare or climax, why should the "bad guy" get the climactic death?  "He allows death to be arbitrary, as it is in life."  I wouldn't necessarily say death is arbitrary or that Mann sees it as arbitrary, but I would say that it feels arbitrary to those who are not particularly close to the one who passes, as in life.

.

In a lot of ways, i think these final deaths allow the film to get better on repeat viewings.  Heat, Collateral and Last of the Mohicans each get better and better with each viewing for me.  To me, they are in that group of films where you want to restart the movie after it's finished.

I've only seen The Insider (loved it), Theif (good) and Manhunter (ok>good) once.  Ali is the only film that I saw and didn't like at all.  I saw it in theatres and perhaps I need to rewatch it.  Is the Directors Cut better than the original?
Title: Michael Mann
Post by: SiliasRuby on May 30, 2005, 09:53:45 PM
Quote from: SHAFTRIs the Directors Cut better than the original?
I'd like to know this too, Mac? Anyone?
Title: Re: Michael Mann
Post by: MacGuffin on May 10, 2006, 12:11:18 PM
Pacino, De Niro bring "Heat" to videogame

The stars and director the 1995 heist thriller "Heat" are in talks to contribute to a videogame spin-off, according to the project's developers.

The film starred Al Pacino and Robert De Niro as characters on the opposite side of the law, and included the first scene in which the two actors ever appeared together. Val Kilmer also starred in the film, which was directed by Michael Mann.

The videogame is expected to be confirmed Wednesday at the Electronic Entertainment Expo underway in Los Angeles.

Offering single-player and multiplayer first-person shooter action set in the film's world, it is being targeted for next-generation consoles by late 2007. "Heat" producer Regency Entertainment, Titan Prods. and video game developer Gearbox Software are developing the project.

The game will either be a prequel or a sequel to the film, said Brad Foxhoven, president and co-founder of Titan. If it is a sequel, De Niro will appear in flashback since his bank robber character was killed in the film.

Should Pacino come aboard, his character will hunt down a new heist crew. If he doesn't, a new character will step into the role and track down the new crew.

Foxhoven said De Niro would potentially be used in the game through flashbacks and training levels. Kilmer's character would be able to interact with the crew directly because he survived the shootout at the film's end.

Gearbox president Randy Pitchford said the challenge is to avoid merely retreading the space the film already covered, but to let players choose their own paths and make their own decisions that the characters in the film didn't have to make or perhaps wouldn't have made if they got into the situations the game is going to create.

"There is something about this concept that I call 'hard core heist' that has never really been done well in a video game, yet everyone on the planet has thought about robbing a bank or something at one time or another," Pitchford said. "'Heat' pretty much defined what hard core heist means and it gives us a narrative mechanism to consider both sides."
Title: Re: Michael Mann
Post by: Pubrick on May 10, 2006, 02:32:28 PM
if videogames really are the future, i'm tapping out right now. consider this to be where the kids and i part ways. kubrick would never do video games.

oh, this is just to make money! thank god for inferior quality products. frailty, thy name is franchise.
Title: Re: Michael Mann
Post by: godardian on May 10, 2006, 03:21:32 PM
Quote from: Pubrick on May 10, 2006, 02:32:28 PM
if videogames really are the future, i'm tapping out right now. consider this to be where the kids and i part ways. kubrick would never do video games.

oh, this is just to make money! thank god for inferior quality products. frailty, thy name is franchise.

I am completely with you on this one. I don't like movies that look like video games, and I don't like video games passing themselves off as somehow cinematic. Cinema should be kept separate from video games; the two things are not like peanut butter and chocolate.
Title: Re: Michael Mann
Post by: Split Infinitive on May 10, 2006, 09:39:13 PM
Quote from: godardian on May 10, 2006, 03:21:32 PMI am completely with you on this one. I don't like movies that look like video games, and I don't like video games passing themselves off as somehow cinematic. Cinema should be kept separate from video games; the two things are not like peanut butter and chocolate.
I'm curious about your justification for the latter part -- why can't games aspire to be more cinematic?  I think history has shown the devestating pitfalls of game-to-film adaptations (though some visionary genius might shuck the trend; I highly doubt it), but a lot of the most popular games of the last several years have made great use of the cinematic aspects.  I recently had the opportunity to play a game called Shadow of the Colossus, an incredibly cinematic game, and found that the cinematic technique greatly enhanced my emotional attachment to the game.
Title: Re: Michael Mann
Post by: ©brad on May 10, 2006, 10:29:43 PM
i kinda agree w/ split.

i don't like movies that look like video games either, but what's wrong w/ video games that are adapting cinematic qualities? that's a good thing. 
Title: Re: Michael Mann
Post by: pete on May 10, 2006, 10:44:35 PM
having cinematic qualities is different from an interactive movie though.  I'm not a video game buff by any means, but I see games right now that are very innovative in the freedom they give to the player and game play, but then I see games that are adapted from movies, that are pretty big-budgeted and shallow and are essentially high-concept projects between a few producers who do not even know how to make Mario shoot fireballs. 
Title: Re: Michael Mann
Post by: Gold Trumpet on May 11, 2006, 04:49:28 PM
The video game revolution should have positive results for film. Like television in the 1950s, video games are trying to justify themselves by being more encompassing entertainment for everyone (the model, of course, is movies). And like television in the 1950s, it is attracting more people and better sales than movies. If movies start to look and feel like other forms of entertainment, a changing of the guard will happen again like in the 1960s. The examples are clear. In the late 1950s, there were 58 television westerns on TV. Television popularized that movie genre to such an extreme it became suffocated and subsuquently died out in 15 years as a popular genre. Before it did, though, the very best and most innovative Westerns ever made were made in 'The Wild Bunch', 'The Hired Hand' and 'Mccabe and Mrs Miller' and others. If people feel they are getting bad imitations of movies with video games like in television with the westerns, popular film will have to evolve again.
Title: Re: Michael Mann
Post by: MacGuffin on July 27, 2006, 02:37:04 PM
Foxx, Mann reunite — again
Source: MTV

Don't look now, but Jamie Foxx and Michael Mann are developing an Alfred Hitchcock/ Jimmy Stewart-like dependency. They've worked together in 2001's "Ali," 2004's "Collateral" and the big-screen adaptation of "Miami Vice" and are planning to reunite again for "Damage Control," a drama about the perils of the sports-agency business. Now, after promoting "Vice," they'll return to the set of a Middle East military drama called "The Kingdom," directed by Peter Berg and co-starring Jennifer Garner, Jason Bateman and Chris Cooper. "It's a serious film, produced by Michael Mann," Foxx said. The flick tells the story of no-nonsense government officials sent to examine a bombing in the war-torn region. "They're shooting it now; they closed down for a few weeks so Jamie could do [interviews for 'Vice']," Mann said. The drama is expected in theaters next year.
Title: Re: Michael Mann
Post by: I Love a Magician on August 05, 2006, 04:23:25 PM
What if Michael Mann directed a Batman movie. Hm.
Title: Re: Michael Mann
Post by: pete on August 05, 2006, 10:11:25 PM
they'd spend 30 minutes to explain how certain technologies are possible, and gotham will take place in compton.
Title: Re: Michael Mann
Post by: edison on August 05, 2006, 10:15:33 PM
and Foxx would play Batman
Title: Re: Michael Mann
Post by: cron on August 06, 2006, 07:14:24 PM
Quote from: Pubrick on May 10, 2006, 02:32:28 PM
kubrick would never do video games.

i am not sure of this. while i think he would've never allowed his films to become mediocre videogame adaptations, he was a nerd, and he was also a businessman, and he might have ended up producing ideas for a unique device or a game thing, kind of like what shigeru miyamoto and hideo kojima do. he might've created what homer dreamed of in homer vs patty and selma.
Title: Re: Michael Mann
Post by: Gold Trumpet on August 06, 2006, 07:30:02 PM
Quote from: cronopio on August 06, 2006, 07:14:24 PM
Quote from: Pubrick on May 10, 2006, 02:32:28 PM
kubrick would never do video games.

i am not sure of this. while i think he would've never allowed his films to become mediocre videogame adaptations, but he was a nerd, and he was also a businessman, and he might have ended up producing ideas for a unique device or a game thing, kind of like what shigeru miyamoto and hideo kojima do.

Highly doubtful. Kubrick was a supreme believer in his films standing up for themselves. He refused to give commentaries. In the 1960s he refused to do seminars at Yale because he didn't want to organize his thoughts on filmmaking for others. He even had difficulty lending original prints to film festivals that wanted to salute an actor who was in one of his films. His contracts with studios stipulated all films would be under his ownership after so many years to ensue that his films would never be exploited. In so many ways he was a filmmaker who kept his thoughts and his films to himself. Umberto Eco once said the first duty of an author after they wrote a book was to die. The rationality is that it would stop the author from helping his audience interpret his book. I think Kubrick believed in a similar philosophy.
Title: Re: Michael Mann
Post by: cron on August 06, 2006, 10:17:13 PM
all i was saying is that kubrick's imagination was so inmense that , had he lived more, he might have shown interest for the development of new technologies in a medium different to filmmaking, and a videogame could've been that medium. i see what nintendo's doing with its new console and i think you need the same sort of creativity kubrick had, to even imagine a thing like that and then make it work.  it's cheesy but whenever i see a cool and useful gadget i think  that kubrick would be proud of it.
Title: Re: Michael Mann
Post by: Gold Trumpet on August 06, 2006, 10:30:35 PM
Quote from: cronopio on August 06, 2006, 10:17:13 PM
it's cheesy but whenever i see a cool and useful gadget i think  that kubrick would be proud of it.

Alright, I'll give you that. Kubrick forged ahead with electronica music in A Clockwork Orange and was on the cusp of the newest special effects when developing A.I. I think he could have found interest in video games, but I don't think he would have ever created one or allowed for any of his films to have developed into one.

Note: Does anyone else notice that a lot more people these days are trying to legitimize video games? It goes back to earlier conversations in this thread and others, but with the fanaticism of video games, serious filmmaking may take another step back in youth appreciation. It did so at the end of the 60s with the popularization of rock n roll and every new fad seems to dismantle more excitement for great films.

Segway: http://xixax.com/index.php?topic=9116.msg230431#msg230431
Title: Re: Michael Mann
Post by: MacGuffin on January 13, 2007, 12:37:00 AM
Columbia, Mann get into spy game
Studio picks up Litvinenko tome 'Dissident'
Source: Variety

Call it spy vs. spy.

Columbia Pictures and Michael Mann have entered the race against Warner Bros. and Johnny Depp to mount a film about Alexander "Sasha" Litvinenko, the ex-KGB agent who was fatally poisoned.

Based on a proposal and a sample chapter, Columbia paid $500,000 against $1.5 million early Friday for the screen rights to "Death of a Dissident," a book that is being co-written by Alex Goldfarb and the subject's widow, Marina Litvinenko. The book will be published in late May by the Simon & Schuster subsidiary Free Press.

Red Wagon partners Doug Wick and Lucy Fisher, who brought the project to the studio, will produce. Mann is in negotiations to direct. If that happens, his Forward Pass will produce as well.

Among the bidders for "Death of a Dissident" was WB, Depp and Graham King's Initial Entertainment, which had already made an option deal to base a Litvinenko film on with "Sasha's Story: The Life and Death of a Russian Spy". That book is being written by New York Times London bureau chief Alan Cowell.

According to sources, WB offered to match Col's winning bid, but came away empty-handed. Col topper Amy Pascal, Mann and Wick and Fisher were particularly aggressive and won the auction, which was conducted by CAA and London-based publishing agent Ed Victor.

This will be an espionage thriller, exploring the collision between deep rooted Russian power structure enforced by the KGB and its successor, the FSB, and the new wave of wild west capitalism that came on the heels of Glasnost. And the way in which Litvinenko got caught between those two colossal forces. From his deathbed, Litvinenko blamed Russian president Vladimir Putin and his regime for the poisoning, ruled to be from polonium-210.

Columbia will also seek to fast track a project that comes not only with "Death of A Dissident," but also the life rights of Litvinenko's widow, Marina.

According to the proposal viewed by Daily Variety, the book will contain first-hand information from the widow, and Goldfarb. A four-page proposal laid out the book's intention to describe Litvinenko's career as went from insider to outcast in the political epicenter of post-communist Russia. Goldfarb's close relationship with the ex-KGB agent is made clear in a 22-page sample first chapter that was part of the auction.

There are other books on the subject being shopped as well. Steve LeVine, the Wall Street Journal correspondent who was Daniel Pearl's reporting partner in Pakistan, has a Random House deal to write a Litvinenko/KGB book that is tentatively titled "Polonium." That book is being shopped by agents Jody Hotchkiss and Tom Wallace.

And Litvinenko's own 2002 memoir, "Blowing Up Russia: The Secret Plan to Bring Back KGB Terror," is about to be reissued in the U.K. Rights for that are held by Braun Media, a U.K.-based producer.
Title: Re: Michael Mann
Post by: MacGuffin on May 02, 2007, 06:10:08 PM
Mann, DiCaprio team for drama
Film takes place on MGM lot in '30s
Source: Variety

Michael Mann has delivered to studio execs what he hopes will be his next directing effort, a star vehicle for Leonardo DiCaprio.

Scripted by John Logan, the project is an untitled noir drama that takes place on the old MGM lot in the 1930s. DiCaprio is poised to play the kind of private detective studios once relied on to clean up the scandals created by its stars. He's hired to investigate whether a starlet murdered her husband.

The script was delivered by CAA to studios late last week, and sources said that a deal was expected to happen quickly. New Line made a bid of around $100 million, said sources, which falls below a projected pricetag of around $120 million.

Sources said the script is strong and the film has a period feel reminiscent of "L.A. Confidential." Studios were weighing that and DiCaprio's heat against the large budget, but other bids were expected before a deal is closed.

Aside from a budget, the film has a February start date. It will shoot mostly on soundstages, and it works in classic figures like Judy Garland and Bugsy Siegel. The latter is the centerpiece of a shootout scene that unfolds in the Trocadero nightclub on Sunset Boulevard.

Mann, who'll produce under his Forward Pass banner, has been quietly developing the script with Logan since September. DiCaprio has also been in the mix for several months. The trio last worked together on "The Aviator." Mann produced that film, but originally developed it with Logan and DiCaprio with the expectation he would direct.

Not eager to direct another biopic after "The Insider" and "Ali," Mann handed the script to Martin Scorsese so that the picture could go into production before several rival Hughes films that were being mobilized.

If a deal closes, DiCaprio would finally find himself before Mann's camera lens, after years of attempts. Aside from "The Aviator," they tried to team on a James Dean biopic and the fact-based drama "The Inside Man."
Title: Re: Michael Mann
Post by: MacGuffin on May 30, 2007, 07:37:26 PM
Depp, Mann Teaming Up?
And no one wants to buy Mann's film noir with Leo.

It was reported in January that there were two rival film projects about slain Russian dissident Alexander Litvinenko in the works, one from director Michael Mann and another from producer-star Johnny Depp. Mann's film will be based on Death of a Dissident, a book co-written by the poisoned ex-spy's widow Marina. Depp's project is Sasha's Story: The Life and Death of a Russian Spy, based on the book by Alan Cowell. Now a report claims that Mann and Depp will team for Mann's version. Is it true?

According to The Guardian, Marina Litvinenko was at the Cannes film festival promoting Rebellion: the Litvinenko Affair, a documentary about her late husband, when she spoke about the dueling Hollywood movies. The paper's report, however, says that Depp will star in the Warners-based Dissident, which suggests that he has shelved his Sony-based version in favor of Mann's movie. (Dissident has a huge advantage over Sasha's Story in that it has the screen rights to Marina's life.)

IGN contacted Depp's production company, Infinitum Nihil, which advised us that the Guardian report is inaccurate. We were told that Depp will not star in the Mann version and, although he is not attached to star in anything yet, if he were to make a Litvinenko movie then it would be Sasha's Story. So that settles that.

In other Michael Mann news, the Los Angeles Times reports that the John Logan-scripted film noir that Mann will direct with Leonardo DiCaprio set to star can't find a studio to finance it. The project has been shopped around for several weeks now to no avail. The story is a period thriller set in the Golden Age of Hollywood. DiCaprio would reportedly play "a tough-guy studio fixer named Harry Slidell."

According to the Times, "At $120 million, even with DiCaprio, the deal was too rich, especially when people can get their Hollywood fix today via Entourage or Extras. The only studio with real enthusiasm is New Line, which has a history of buying material nobody else wanted." Also coming against Mann, the paper claims, is the fact that his last film, Miami Vice, was an expensive underperformer. His reputation for going over-budget and for being a testy perfectionist is also said to be hurting him.
Title: Re: Michael Mann
Post by: Pubrick on May 30, 2007, 07:45:16 PM
Quote from: MacGuffin on May 30, 2007, 07:37:26 PM
His reputation for going over-budget and for being a testy perfectionist is also said to be hurting him.

what's hurting me is articles that could be summarized in one word..

Quote from: MacGuffin on May 30, 2007, 07:37:26 PM
Depp, Mann Teaming Up?

Nope.

Title: Re: Michael Mann
Post by: MacGuffin on September 10, 2007, 08:42:03 PM
When I first saw this commercial, I immediately recognized the score from Last Of The Mohicans. No wonder, it's directed by Michael Mann:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=55BZ2gSsSmY
Title: Re: Michael Mann
Post by: MacGuffin on October 10, 2007, 10:25:40 PM
Will Smith to rule Columbia's 'Empire'
Michael Mann directing John Logan drama
Source: Variety

In a seven-figure pitch deal, Columbia Pictures has acquired "Empire," a drama that John Logan will write for Michael Mann to direct and Will Smith to topline.

Neither the studio nor the principals would elaborate on the plot, but sources said that Smith will play a contemporary global media mogul.

Smith and James Lassiter's Overbrook Entertainment will produce with Mann's Forward Pass.

"Empire" puts the director back in the ring with Smith for the first time since "Ali." Mann has been working as producer with Smith, Lassiter and Akiva Goldsman on "Hancock" (formerly "Tonight, He Comes"), the Peter Berg-directed Columbia Pictures drama that stars Smith as a disaffected superhero.

Mann, who just produced "The Kingdom" with Scott Stuber for Universal, is in the process of locking down a film he'll direct early next year.

"Empire" reteams Mann's with "Gladiator" scribe Logan. They developed "The Aviator" together when Mann planned to direct that picture before handing it to Martin Scorsese to helm and producing the drama.

Smith next stars in the Warner Bros. drama "I Am Legend," which opens Dec. 14, and is in pre-production on "Seven Pounds," a co-production of Overbrook and Escape Artists for Columbia that reteams Smith with "Pursuit of Happyness" director Gabriele Muccino.
Title: Re: Michael Mann
Post by: MacGuffin on October 25, 2007, 02:59:39 PM
US director Mann to direct Litvinenko film

US filmmaker Michael Mann, known for movies including "Collateral" and "Heat", will direct a film about Russian former spy Alexander Litvinenko, a foundation set up after his murder confirmed Thursday.

Mann's version will be based on a book co-written by Litvinenko's widow Marina, said the Litvinenko Justice Foundation, which campaigns for the truth over his agonizing death by radioactive poisoning last year.

US actor Johnny Depp is reportedly producing a separate account of his life and death.

The confirmation came on the day Marina Litvinenko's book "Death Of A Dissident: The Poisoning Of Alexander Litvinenko And The Return Of The KGB" is released in Portugal.

"A film version of the book is being developed by Columbia Pictures and will be directed (by) Michael Mann," said the foundation, which like Litvinenko is based in London.

Litvinenko, an outspoken critic of Russian President Vladimir Putin, died in a London hospital last November from radiation poisoning after apparently accusing Putin of involvement, a charge the Kremlin denies.

British prosecutors want to charge another former spy, Andrei Lugovoi, over the murder but Russia has refused to extradite him, prompting a series of tit-for-tat diplomatic expulsions.

Marina Litvinenko was in Lisbon on Thursday to press the European Union to raise the issue at an EU-Russian summit there on Friday.

The Litvinenko Justice Foundation aims to keep pressure on the British and Russian governments to bring his killer to justice.

Its founders include Russian businessman Boris Berezovsky, who is exiled in London and donated 500,000 pounds (717,000 euros, one million dollars) to the foundation.
Title: Re: Michael Mann
Post by: MacGuffin on December 04, 2007, 10:17:51 AM
The Vine: Depp casing Mann's 'Public' heist
Source: Hollywood Reporter

Johnny Depp doesn't shy away from blood in the upcoming "Sweeney Todd," for which he's being touted as a major Oscar contender, and he might again find himself awash in blood if he opts to join up with producer-director Michael Mann for a film about the Depression-era crime wave.

Mann has long been interested in mounting a screen adaptation of Brian Burrough's nonfiction book "Public Enemies: America's Greatest Crime Wave and the Birth of the FBI, 1933-34" for Universal; at one point, Leonardo DiCaprio was attached to the project, but DiCaprio is headed into Martin Scorsese's "Shutter Island."

But Mann -- who has considered taking the helm of Columbia's spy thriller "Edwin A. Salt" but has not committed to that project because he believes it needs a rewrite -- has an open slot.

As for Depp, he was to have starred in Warner/Initial Entertainment's "Shantaram" followed by Warner Independent's "The Rum Diaries," but both of those projects were postponed last month, leaving the star with an opening in his schedule.

So Depp and Mann are sitting down this week to discuss the possibility of joining forces; Depp is said to be eyeing the role of bank robber John Dillinger. Along with Mann, Kevin Misher is on board as producer; Robert De Niro and his partner Jane Rosenthal, who originally optioned the book, have been involved as exec producers; and the studio is looking at a March start in Chicago if all the elements come together.
Title: Re: Michael Mann
Post by: MacGuffin on January 10, 2008, 10:41:24 PM
Christian Bale takes down Depp
Actors to face off in Mann's 'Public Enemies'
Source: Variety

Christian Bale is in negotiations to join Johnny Depp in Michael Mann's upcoming "Public Enemies."

According to a person familiar with the situation, Bale will play Melvin Purvis, the legendary FBI agent who led the manhunt for John Dillinger. Depp is starring as Dillinger in the pic, which is set up at Universal and is slated to begin production in March.

Mann is producing via his Forward Pass banner, with Kevin Misher and his Misher Films. Jane Rosenthal of Tribeca is exec producing.
Title: Re: Michael Mann
Post by: MacGuffin on January 28, 2008, 12:54:45 AM
Michael Mann rounds up 'Enemies'
Cotillard joins Depp, Bale in crime drama
Source: Variety

Director Michael Mann has set Marion Cotillard to join Johnny Depp and Christian Bale in "Public Enemies."

The Depression-era crime drama gets under way in Chicago on March 10 for Universal Pictures.

Channing Tatum, Giovanni Ribisi, Stephen Dorff and Jason Clarke are also joining the cast.

The Oscar-nominated "La Vie en rose" star Cotillard will play Billie Frechette, the lover of the country's most notorious gangster, John Dillinger (Depp).

Tatum will play outlaw Pretty Boy Floyd, Ribisi will play Alvin Karpis, Dorff is near a deal to play Homer Van Meter, and Clarke will play John "Red" Hamilton. That quartet repped a Dillinger gang that knocked off banks all over the Midwest during the Depression.

Bale plays Melvin Purvis, who was tapped by FBI chief J. Edgar Hoover to lead a manhunt that established the FBI as the country's first federal police force after the G-Men killed Dillinger outside the Biograph Theater in 1934.

The shooting script was written by Ronan Bennett, Ann Biderman and Mann. Mann will produce with Kevin Misher. Jane Rosenthal is exec producer.

U, Mann and Misher spent several years developing the film, which came together quickly after the postponement of Depp's expected spring slot, the Warner Bros. drama "Shantaram."

Cotillard is available because the Weinstein Co. postponed "Nine," the Rob Marshall-directed musical she is still expected to star in with Javier Bardem, Penelope Cruz and Sophia Loren. Moving that project forward was a key reason TWC signed an interim deal with the Writer's Guild of America.

Tatum was available after United Artists halted the Oliver Stone-directed "Pinkville." Ribisi has been shooting the James Cameron-directed "Avatar," and Clarke most recently wrapped the Jada Pinkett Smith-directed "The Human Contract" as well as the Paul W.S. Anderson-directed "Death Race."
Title: Re: Michael Mann
Post by: MacGuffin on April 03, 2008, 01:23:03 AM
Crudup to play Hoover in 'Public'
Mann taps Lang as leader of Texas Rangers
Source: Variety

Billy Crudup has been set to play FBI director J. Edgar Hoover in "Public Enemies," the Michael Mann-directed crime drama for Universal that stars Johnny Depp as John Dillinger.

Mann has also set Stephen Lang to play Winstead, the leader of the Texas Rangers who joins the manhunt for John Dillinger and his gang. Christian Bale and Marion Cotillard also star.

Crudup most recently starred in the romantic comedy "Dedication." Lang, a regular on Mann's "Crime Story" series, also worked with the director on "Manhunter" and "Band of the Hand."
Title: Re: Michael Mann
Post by: MacGuffin on July 19, 2008, 03:32:11 PM
Depp as Dillinger: Mann kills on 'Public Enemies'
Source: Los Angeles Times

When I saw producer Kevin Misher painfully limping into Chaya Brasserie for lunch this week, having just returned from spending months in Chicago producing "Public Enemies," the upcoming Michael Mann 1930s gangster movie, I have to admit that my first thought was: "Oh no, Mann must've been using live ammunition again." Anybody who's ever worked on a Michael Mann film has stories to tell that sound like tall tales, at least until you spend some time on his sets and see for yourself that pretty much anything can happen when Mann has a full head of steam.

Outside of James Cameron and perhaps David Fincher, no one is as much of a hard-headed perfectionist as Mann, who has a special zeal for authenticity. When I spent time on his "Ali" set in Miami, he insisted on shooting a scene where Ali first sees Malcolm X at the exact mosque where Malcolm was preaching. He also shot a scene set in the backyard of Ali's Miami home at Ali's real house, even though the backyard was right in the flight pattern of Miami International Airport, meaning a plane flew overhead every 90 seconds, repeatedly drowning out the dialogue. One of the production guys shook his head, grumbling "We didn't have this problem when we shot near LAX with 'Heat.' " Why was that, I asked? "Michael got the flight controllers to reroute LAX traffic to a different runway for a few hours."

Frankly, when I scheduled my lunch with Misher back in May, I thought for sure the producer would end up canceling. "Public Enemies," which stars Johnny Depp as John Dillinger and Christian Bale as Melvin Purvis, was slated to finish shooting June 30 to beat the SAG strike deadline. But having seen what happened on Mann's last movie, "Miami Vice," which went endless months over schedule, I figured the odds of Mann being done on time were about as slim as the Dodgers finishing the season with a winning record. And yet, here was Misher, bloodied (he actually hurt his leg in a hiking fall) but unbowed. So how did Misher and Universal Pictures manage to keep Mann on schedule?

Misher says Mann was incredibly focused about finishing on time, no doubt because the filmmaker saw the strike deadline on the horizon, knowing it would wreak havoc if he had to shut down before shooting was completed. That doesn't mean that Mann has lost any of his thirst for authenticity.

"Whenever we could we shot exactly where the events happened--if we could find where Dillinger walked, we shot where he walked," said Misher. "We shot at the Biograph Theater on the very street where Dillinger was killed, so that scene was exactly where the real events happened. All we did was change the facades of the buildings and reverted them back to period. We also shot at the Little Bohemia lodge up in northern Wisconsin, which is the scene of a famous gunfight between the FBI and Dillinger and Baby Face Nelson." Mann even dug up vintage tommy guns that were made in the '30s to be used by the gangsters. When I asked for details, Misher threw up his hands. "You gotta ask Michael," he said. "The guns are his department. He knows all there is to know."

The truly amazing thing, frankly, is that Universal Pictures, having lost tons of moola on "Miami Vice," had the stomach to get back into the ring with Mann a second time around. But like Martin Scorsese, Mann is a great filmmaker who's a magnet for movie stars, so the studio couldn't resist the idea of an action-packed period thriller with Johnny Depp at the top of the bill. As Misher put it: "If you're looking for action, I don't think you'll be disappointed. We've got three bank robberies, two prison breaks and who knows how many shootouts."

Slated for July 1, 2009, "Public Enemies" gives Universal a big summer tentpole movie. But instead of the dumbed-down dreck that decorates most studio summer slates, "Public Enemies" has the opportunity to be a critical success as well. It also boasts a romantic storyline--"La Vie en Rose's" Marion Cotillard has a hefty role in the film as Depp's love interest--that could draw female moviegoers too.

Universal Chairman Marc Shmuger says the studio got revved up when it first read the script, which was written by Ronan Bennett, with a rewrite by Mann and Ann Biderman. "It really felt like the most exciting thing Michael's done in years," said Shmuger. "It's a seminal gangster saga, but it's also a classic doomed lovers story. They meet on the run and you know that they know that the relationship can't last, which makes the film really heart-wrenching. With that combination, well, let's face it, there's just not that many filmmakers in the world besides Michael could do that."

Shmuger admits that it was a tough shoot, but that comes with the territory in Mann Land. "When Sam Fuller said that 'Film is a battleground, love, hate, violence, action, death--in a word, emotion,' he must've been thinking about Michael Mann," Shmuger says. "With every movie, he goes into battle. I'm sure you've heard all the legendary stories about the fallout and casualties. But that's the only way Michael knows how to make movies. And we're willing to take the bet that out of that commitment and passion will come a great movie."
Title: Re: Michael Mann
Post by: theyarelegion on November 12, 2008, 05:16:36 AM
I have a 11/4/07 dated draft of the script for Public Enemies. PM me if you want it.
Title: Re: Michael Mann
Post by: MacGuffin on April 08, 2009, 12:55:24 AM
Jamie Foxx Says Michael Mann's 'Damage Control' Is On Its Way
Source: MTV

It's been nearly three years since Jamie Foxx and Michael Mann last collaborated on "Miami Vice" and just as long since the pair announced plans for a fourth team-up. Now Foxx has confirmed with MTV News that their "Damage Control" is still on the way.

The film is planned as a sports drama, focusing on Foxx as a professional publicist/spin doctor who represents troubled players. With steroid abuse a major part of today's headlines, Foxx believes that there's no better time to get "Damage Control" to the big screen.

Though he admitted that the film had been gestating for some time, Foxx implied that it was still very much on the radar. He's taking off acting for a little while to go on tour with his music, but "Damage Control" could theoretically be Mann's next project after this summer's upcoming "Public Enemies".

There had been word that Mann was developing "Frankie Machine" about a retired mob hitman as a Robert DeNiro project (formerly helmed by Martin Scorsese) but news on that front has been scarce since the initial announcement back in 2007.

Foxx, who plays schizophrenic musician Nathaniel Ayers in April 24th's "The Soloist," seems pretty confident that, even without a firm date revealed, "Damage Control" is definitely not a forgotten project. Mann will no doubt have an update on the matter this summer when "Public Enemies" hits theaters.
Title: Re: Michael Mann
Post by: MacGuffin on October 04, 2009, 11:50:24 PM
Col, Mann Tackle Capa Pic
By: Mike Fleming; Variety

Columbia Pictures and director Michael Mann will team to tell the story of renowned war photographer Robert Capa, using the snapshot of a torrid two-year romance with Gerda Taro during the Spanish Civil War.

The studio has acquired "Waiting for Robert Capa," a Spanish language novel by Susana Fortes, and set Jez Butterworth to adapt it.

Mann will produce through his Forward Pass banner. He will also direct.

The story begins in Paris in 1935, where Capa, a refugee from Fascist Hungary, met Taro, a refugee from Nazi Germany, met with the intention to become photographers. The outbreak of the Spanish Civil War one year later began Capa's emergence as the most renowned war photographer ever, and established Taro as the first frontline female battle photographer. She was killed in the battle of Brunete in 1937.

Mann, who last directed "Ali" and produced "Hancock" for Columbia, had long wanted to find a way to make a film about Capa and found his way in through the Fortes novel. Capa was shattered by Taro's death, and though he'd later romance the likes of Ingrid Bergman, Capa never married. When he was blown up by a land mine during the French Indochina War, the only photo found in Capa's wallet. 

Some 4300 photos taken mostly by Capa and Taro during the Spanish Civil War were recently discovered, and the images will be the subject of a show to be held at the Institute of Contemporary Photography next year.

Mann, who last directed the Johnny Depp-starrer "Public Enemies" for Universal Pictures, intends to make a gritty, low budget film. He chose Butterworth based on his play "Jerusalem," and for a James Brown biopic that Butterworth wrote with brother John-Henry Butterworth. The writers also teamed on the script for "Fair Game," the Doug Liman-directed adaptation of Valerie Plame memoir which stars Naomi Watts and Sean Penn.
Title: Re: Michael Mann
Post by: MacGuffin on January 06, 2010, 09:40:50 AM
Mann, Milch Saddle Up for "Luck"
Source: Variety

Michael Mann is in talks to direct "Luck," an hour-long HBO series pilot about horse racing culture created by David Milch.

Milch, who wrote the pilot script, last brought "John From Cincinnati" and "Deadwood" to HBO.

Milch will be executive producer along with Carolyn Strauss and Mann. The plan is to shoot in April, most likely at Santa Anita Race Track. Getting to the start gate is a major achievement for Milch, who has seen horse racing from every angle, including owning close to 100 horses and winning several Breeder's Cup races.

"The pilot is about a bunch of intersecting lives in the world of the horse racing track," Milch told Daily Variety. "It's a subject which has engaged and some might say has compelled me for 50 years. I've joked that if I just can make $25 million on this show, I'll be even on research expenses. I find it as complicated and engaging a special world as any I've ever encountered, not only in what happens in the clubhouse and the grandstand, but also on the back side of the track, where the training is done and where they house the horses."

The lead role, not yet cast, is Ace Bernstein, whom Milch described as "a guy versed in all the permutations of finance, elicit and otherwise. When he is released from jail for securities violations, he resumes his place at the race track, where he is a figure of long-standing repute."

Mann, who is close to a deal to direct, sparked to the Milch script, and also the feedback he got from Martin Scorsese and the experience he had directing the "Boardwalk Empire" pilot for HBO. Mann's last directing foray on the small screen was 1987's "L.A. Takedown," a precursor for Mann's crime film classic "Heat." He and Milch have a long friendship which goes back to the days when Milch was running "Hill Street Blues" and Mann was doing the same with "Miami Vice."

Bonnie Timmerman, who often collaborates with Mann, will cast the series.

"I am feeling very lucky to have Michael direct this and am champing at the bit, to borrow a few horse racing phrases," Milch said.
Title: Re: Michael Mann
Post by: MacGuffin on March 01, 2010, 09:40:42 PM
Dustin Hoffman to star in HBO pilot 'Luck'
Horse-racing drama marks actor's first major TV series role
Source: Hollywood Reporter

Dustin Hoffman is going to television.

In his first major TV series gig, the Oscar winner has signed on to topline HBO's horse-racing drama pilot "Luck," from Michael Mann and David Milch.

The project is described as a provocative look at the worlds of horse-racing and gambling told through a diverse group of characters surrounding a racetrack.

It centers on  an intelligent, intuitive and tough man (Hoffman) who has always been involved with gambling, from bookmaking and money laundering through casino operations.

Recently released after four years in prison, he teams with Gus Economou (Dennis Farina), his longtime chauffeur and muscle, to craft a complex plan involving the track. They recruit Turo Escalante (John Ortiz), a successful trainer with sordid reputation.

Milch wrote the pilot, which Mann is directing. Both are executive producing with Carolyn Strauss and "The Sopranos" alum Henry Bronchtein.

The pilot is eyeing an early spring production start in Los Angeles.

Landing Hoffman is a major coup for HBO as the "Tootsie" actor has not done TV in more than 40 years.

WME-repped Hoffman, an Oscar winner for "Rain Man" and "Kramer vs. Kramer," next stars opposite Paul Giamatti in "Barney's Version."
Title: Re: Michael Mann
Post by: MacGuffin on October 26, 2010, 02:18:13 AM
Michael Mann Adds Gangster Pic 'Big Tuna' & Medieval 'Agincourt' As Potential Next Films
Source: The Playlist

Things have a been little bit quiet on the Michael Mann front since his lukewarm and somewhat middling "Public Enemies" last year. He's currently hard at work on the David Milch-scribed horse-racing world drama HBO series "Lucky" starring Dustin Hoffman. But in a recent interview with the Financial Times, Mann spilled details on the new HBO series and couple more feature film projects he has up his sleeve.

But first, to clear things up, if you think Mann is doing somekind of director's penance on HBO, guess again. Asked why he gravitated towards "Lucky," Mann says, "It's one of the best pieces of writing anyone has ever passed to me." Add to that the very director-friendly environment and Mann being another advocate for the cable channel, saying that it "isn't really like any place else. It's not really analogous to television, which is why they've attracted the people they've attracted in the last couple of years to do this work. It's why Marty [Scorsese] would do 'Boardwalk Empire,' why Tom Hanks and Steven Spielberg have worked there. You have a total free hand."

But Mann's definitely eyeing a return to the big screen and has added two more projects to his growing slate of potential gigs. First up is "Big Tuna" (no, not about Jim from the "The Office"), which will tell the story of Chicago mobster Tony Accardo (who went by the titular nickname) and his successor Sam Giancana. So what has attracted Mann to yet another crime tale? "Here's an older man who was the undisputed boss at a time when the Chicago outfit was the most powerful crime element in America. It becomes a classic tragedy of megalomania and hubris," Mann said.

Also in the works is a bit of a gear change for Mann, the medieval tale "Agincourt." Based on the novel by Bernard Cromwell, the film will focus "on a young man with a death sentence on his head who is saved when his skills with the bow catch the attention of English king Henry V. The archer develops into a warrior and falls in love with a young woman whose virtue he saved from a lecherous priest, and he becomes the portal to the bloody Battle of Agincourt." The project is being written by Michael Hirst ("The Tudors," the Cate Blanchett 'Elizabeth' films) who has been developing the script with Mann for over a year now.

Interestingly, Mann admits to the Financial Times that he wishes he had more films under his belt, but says "It's taken me time in the past to find that thing I want to do." These are just two more projects on Mann's plate that currently include a biopic/romance of war photographer Robert Capa that last we heard, had Eva Green attached and the long gestating adaptation of Ernest Hemingway's "For Whom The Bell Tolls" that is set up at Warner Bros. Which one will go next, remains to be seen.
Title: Re: Michael Mann
Post by: MacGuffin on April 12, 2011, 09:31:01 PM
Michael Mann Eyes 'Gold' Hunt As Next Film
BY MIKE FLEMING | Deadline

Michael Mann, who last directed Public Enemies, is closing in on his next picture. He's getting serious about Gold, a contemporary Treasure of the Sierra Madre-type treasure hunt about prospectors and speculators involved in the chase for gold. The project is just taking shape. It had been developed by Paul Haggis, who showed it to Mann as a writing sample for scribes Patrick Masset and John Zinman. Mann liked it so much that he became the director. He's producing through his Forward Pass banner, with Haggis and his Highway 61 partner Michael Nozik. The hope is to begin production late in the year. Mann, who has several potential directing projects that include a film about famed war photographer Robert Capa, an adaptation of the 15th century novel Agincourt based on the Bernard Cornwell novel, and Luck. Mann is exec producing that HBO horse racing series and directed the David Milch-penned pilot. The series stars Dustin Hoffman, Nick Nolte, Dennis Farina and Joan Allen.
Title: Re: Michael Mann
Post by: polkablues on April 12, 2011, 11:51:54 PM
Michael Mann, over the course of a decade, went from making some of the most visually lavish Hollywood movies around to making movies that look like they were shot on a Flip-cam.  It's hard to get excited about going to the theater when it looks like you're watching a YouTube video blown up to cinema-size.

Michael Mann is not so good at digital filmmaking, is what I'm getting at.
Title: Re: Michael Mann
Post by: socketlevel on April 13, 2011, 12:11:19 AM
Quote from: polkablues on April 12, 2011, 11:51:54 PM
Michael Mann, over the course of a decade, went from making some of the most visually lavish Hollywood movies around to making movies that look like they were shot on a Flip-cam.  It's hard to get excited about going to the theater when it looks like you're watching a YouTube video blown up to cinema-size.

Michael Mann is not so good at digital filmmaking, is what I'm getting at.

I totally agree. He was one of the first to do digital as well, which makes it far more interesting. It's like when everyone started using the genesis and red Mann decided he wanted to keep with the first gen cameras.  I think he likes the aesthetic of the bleached out video look, the only other director i know who liked this look was RR; which isn't the best company to keep.  while i dig that he considers it a unique look, it just isn't up my alley.
Title: Re: Michael Mann
Post by: JG on April 13, 2011, 08:09:58 AM
You didn't like how Collateral looked, at the time at least?
Title: Re: Michael Mann
Post by: socketlevel on April 13, 2011, 10:03:46 AM
Quote from: JG on April 13, 2011, 08:09:58 AM
You didn't like how Collateral looked, at the time at least?

nope, i didn't like how once upon a time in mexico looked either. I think both movies did a lot to get us to the point of the Red One. However, my main gripe is not understanding why Mann would use that same dated camera for Public Enemies. bleached video look isn't something I'm into.
Title: Re: Michael Mann
Post by: Reel on April 13, 2011, 10:10:00 AM
Collateral had its charm going for awhile. It made L.A at night look pretty great, but then towards the end I couldn't get over the feeling that I was watching a cheap showtime movie with good actors in it. Polka is absolutely right, there's something about
HD that makes everything too fluid, and the shit's are so light you don't think twice about picking 'em up and moving 'em around when you have to. As much as ppl like Mann and Rodriguez think it "frees them up" in their creative decisions I think the opposite is true- It's working through the limitations that makes stuff turn out really great in the end. I can understand his decisions to do Collateral and Miami Vice as sort of one off things but when you're doing a period piece about John Dillinger and company on video, I mean, c'mon. Wtf are you thinking? No one's gonna believe that shit.
Title: Re: Michael Mann
Post by: socketlevel on April 13, 2011, 10:20:33 AM
It's kind of an old argument however, social network was shot on Mysterium-X chipset in a Red and it looks warm in the moments it needs to, only a couple shots could i tell it was HD. Winter's bone was also shot with an older chipset yet they managed to make the cinematography like a dirty 80s movie.

It's just that michael mann refuses to use HD that looks more like film...
Title: Re: Michael Mann
Post by: JG on April 13, 2011, 10:35:48 AM
Quote from: Reelist on April 13, 2011, 10:10:00 AM
when you're doing a period piece about John Dillinger and company on video, I mean, c'mon. Wtf are you thinking? No one's gonna believe that shit.

But what is that grounded in? Why can't you? It all seems very vague to me, rooted in these weird preconceptions about what digital can and can't do...

Quote from: socketlevel on April 13, 2011, 10:20:33 AM
It's just that michael mann refuses to use HD that looks more like film...

Why does he have to make it look like film? Is the sole purpose of digital to simulate the effect of film?
Title: Re: Michael Mann
Post by: Gold Trumpet on April 13, 2011, 10:48:17 AM
Quote from: JG on April 13, 2011, 10:35:48 AM
Quote from: Reelist on April 13, 2011, 10:10:00 AM
when you're doing a period piece about John Dillinger and company on video, I mean, c'mon. Wtf are you thinking? No one's gonna believe that shit.

But what is that grounded in? Why can't you? It all seems very vague to me, rooted in these weird preconceptions about what digital can and can't do...



I agree with your point that digital should not have a preconception against it to tell a historical story. It reminds me of Francois Truffaut saying the story of Christ should always be filmed in black and white because that's the kind of film technology they would have used back then. It doesn't make sense.

However, digital just needs to jump some belief quarters about its ability to tell a story as well as film can. As other people here have highlighted, The Social Network did an excellent job, but there were some amendments to how it did its version of digital and what technology it was using. Michael Mann is a genre filmmaker and I think he's trying to popularize digital for everyday stories. So far, it hasn't paid off for me and lots of other people. I have no idea if he's not getting specifics right yet about what kind of digital film to use. All I know is that these questions and conversations don't highlight use of film the way it does for digital. As much as the last 10 years has seen amazing advancements, digital is still not enshrined with the viewing public and fully accepted. Michael Mann made one of the prettiest movies in recent memory with Last of the Mohicans and now he's trying to inhabit a new medium for his talents. Just hasn't happened yet. I doubt it will in his lifetime.
Title: Re: Michael Mann
Post by: socketlevel on April 13, 2011, 11:14:44 AM
Quote from: JG on April 13, 2011, 10:35:48 AM
Quote from: Reelist on April 13, 2011, 10:10:00 AM
when you're doing a period piece about John Dillinger and company on video, I mean, c'mon. Wtf are you thinking? No one's gonna believe that shit.

But what is that grounded in? Why can't you? It all seems very vague to me, rooted in these weird preconceptions about what digital can and can't do...

Quote from: socketlevel on April 13, 2011, 10:20:33 AM
It's just that michael mann refuses to use HD that looks more like film...

Why does he have to make it look like film? Is the sole purpose of digital to simulate the effect of film?


yes that is the goal. at least that's the goal of every development in digital photography. HD has less range, especially the type he chooses to use. i will concede that his version of HD would be the equivalent of shooting on super 8 (which i feel has a great look to it) in the HD medium. I just don't like the bleached out look, it feels lazy. The more analog the image looks, the more i like it. That's why i don't mind a degraded film aesthetic, yet dislike the digital counterpart.

i get it's ultimately subjective. however his brand of HD only separates the audience from the emotional impact of the scenes; which could also be his intent. I personally feel that type of image creates a middle man to the story that is undesirable. he should be allowed to do whatever he wants, but i just don't like it.  It's the same feeling i get when i read a book that has been laser printed on over bleached processed paper. I prefer the printing press on a pulp base, as it feels more intimate.
Title: Re: Michael Mann
Post by: Reel on April 13, 2011, 01:37:37 PM
Quote from: JG on April 13, 2011, 10:35:48 AM
Quote from: Reelist on April 13, 2011, 10:10:00 AM
when you're doing a period piece about John Dillinger and company on video, I mean, c'mon. Wtf are you thinking? No one's gonna believe that shit.

But what is that grounded in? Why can't you? It all seems very vague to me, rooted in these weird preconceptions about what digital can and can't do...


because it looks more like a re-enactment on the fucking History channel than an actual movie..
Title: Re: Michael Mann
Post by: socketlevel on April 13, 2011, 02:49:53 PM
Quote from: Reelist on April 13, 2011, 01:37:37 PM
Quote from: JG on April 13, 2011, 10:35:48 AM
Quote from: Reelist on April 13, 2011, 10:10:00 AM
when you're doing a period piece about John Dillinger and company on video, I mean, c'mon. Wtf are you thinking? No one's gonna believe that shit.

But what is that grounded in? Why can't you? It all seems very vague to me, rooted in these weird preconceptions about what digital can and can't do...


because it looks more like a re-enactment on the fucking History channel than an actual movie..

:yabbse-thumbup:

exactly, it just looks budget.
Title: Re: Michael Mann
Post by: wilder on April 13, 2011, 07:06:20 PM
I can definitely see how his recent output is really, really divisive. I hated both Miami Vice and Public Enemies when I first saw them...and only in rewatching them with totally revised (re: blank slate) expectations did I start to see them differently. I think Michael Mann of the 90s basically commit suicide and was reborn - his early 2000s output, Ali and Collateral, were an experimental bridge towards his most recent style, fully forming with Miami Vice and Public Enemies. While these last two features may still take place within the world of crime and echo themes from his early work, the angle he's coming at the material from is entirely new and I would argue practically through the eyes of a different filmmaker. They are deceptive in that their loglines and marketing trick you into thinking they follow the well-known Michael Mann lineage, but I don't think Miami Vice and Public Enemies use remotely the same kind of film language his earlier movies do.

This is a review from Mubi user Jack Lehtonen that I think really captures at least what I personally see in his last two movies, being more about states of mind than the dually internal/external narratives he executed before.

Quote from: Mubi user Jack Lehtonen
Perhaps more than those of any other filmmakers, the current films of Michael Mann and Claire Denis, particularly their respective masterpieces Miami Vice and L'intrus, speak more clearly and succinctly to the post-9 11 frame of mind, the nightmare shadowland of shifting perspectives that is the 21st century. Revolutionary in their cinematic methods, Mann and Denis are rapidly evolving beyond the abilities of their contemporaries, creating a cinema that is both primal and wholly new. Miami Vice and L'intrus focus on the transient, the abstract, the unnameable. Their shimmering surfaces offer us glances into a fractured state of being, a world struggling to find a sense of identity.

Both Miami Vice and L'intrus can be placed among the sensualist films of contemporaries such as Terrence Malick and Wong Kar-Wai. But Denis and Mann pushthe boundaries more aggressively than their fellow sensualists. The melancholy brought on by Miami Vice and L'intrus is far too pervasive and penetrating to allow them simply to be deemed sensualist films.

Both films understand and process the post-9 11 mindset far more accurately and hauntingly than any ham-fisted Oliver Stone or Michael Moore piece. Both pictures are fragmentary, gliding across uncertain surfaces, struggling to identify themselves. No films capture the flux and isolation of a fractal, paranoid world shaken and divided, constantly in a shift of identity, better than Miami Vice and L'intrus.

The crime plot of Vice is rendered both nearly-unintelligable and obsolete by Mann's abstraction. It is a maelstrom of chaos, an extremey adept and cunning stand in for the 21st century globe. The characters are drowning in a sea of technology and constant information, all blending into a dehumanizing storm of stimuli, rendering our midnight warriors lost amidst a landscape of blurred lights and florescent skies. The characters strive for emotional contact and consolation, a primal peace hidden amongst the digital world, most clearly represented by Colin Farrell's mournful and longing gaze into the deep blue of the ocean, an escape impossible for him on his quest. It is the smallest of moments, the soundtrack of voices fading away as Farrell's eyes gaze through the window into the horizon of the sea. But it's already over, he is pulled back into the plot, and the inherently meaningless cop babble continues.

Farrell's relationship with Gong Li's character is an attempt, beautifully tender but ultimately futile, to gain a hold on real human emotion. They abscond to Cuba in his sleek speed boat, literally zooming into the escape he so desperately longed for, the chasm of the ocean's horizon line. This Cuba segment is the most crystalline portion of the film. Love blossoms under the tropical sun, and the film finds a moment of quiet peace, the world suddenly intelligable and perceivable. But a deep well of melancholy underscores the proceedings, built on a foundation of lies and hopelessness. Farrell's identity is hidden to Li, he is a cop to her criminal, but the moral distinctions between them have been erased. They are both lost souls wandering through the night, desperately seeking contact. But their love is doomed, because she is the woman of the film's central drug dealer, and he is a partner and, unbeknownst to her, a cop. His sense of identity is compromised by his love for a criminal, his prey, and ultimately, rather than solidifying him as he would hope, his passion only furthers his separation from a concrete self. He is destined to roam Miami's luminous landscapes of light a lonely, weary soul. His partner, Jamie Foxx, is more stable in his identity and relationships, but his world is supported by fragile foundations. His sense of identity does not make him invulnerable to the chaos.

Michel Subor's central, enigmatic protagonist of Claire Denis' L'intrus is a step beyond Colin Farrell's character in Vice. An old man, he has been separated from his identity and emotional connections for a longer duration of time, living amongst nature in solitude, escaping the mysterious truths of his place in the world at large. His past is obscured, with no clear explanations of what actions defined him for others. Subor, threatened with death via heart ailment, must leave his solitude and reenter a world wary of him. Encountering his son for the first time in years, Subor is met with bitterness, revealing a resentment. In what is perceivably a dream, he is dragged through the snow by two people on horseback. He explains that he had already payed, but a mysterious blonde woman, present throughout several sequences, informs him that he shall never stop paying. There is a hidden and unrevealed guilt in this man's past responsible for the perceptions others hold of him.

Subor is utterly alone in the world, moving like the faintest wisp of a soul from locations as varied as France and South Korea. He possesses no definite center, no true self, and on his voyage he attempts to recapture an indentity, a new heart, but his body rejects it and he is left as vacuous as before. He, like the souls of Vice, is desperate for contact, but is ultimately incapable of giving it. His lover towards the beginning of the film, after sex, is abandoned in bed as he wanders his home at night, stoically killing an intruder on his property. His attempt to touch the dog keeper played by Beatrice Dalle are spurned, again hinting at an unknown past of transgression, her calling him crazy. In a beautiful sequence, a sense of genuine emotion, more transient even than Farrell and Li's affair, occurs in a South Korean bar well into the night. Subor and a Korean bond over drinks and the Elvis song "Are You Lonesome Tonight?", a brief respite from loneliness, Subor even cracking a genuine smile and laughing with real warmth. It's just a glance, a moment, of true human contact. Subor remains an abstraction, but his humanity, however obscure, briefly surfaces as he bonds over alcohol and Elvis. But the moment is over, and he presses on into the unclear once more.

Farrell and Subor's quests for identities and contacts both end in failure, not for lack of trying, and both are left wanderers of some form or another. They are twenty-first century individuals in the truest sense, lost in the flux of the world, grasping at vivid glimpses of something more, but remaining isolated and unidentifiable. Both are tragic figures, unable to find themselves, and facing futures as abstract as their own sense of being. Their crises of identity and stability are potent representations of the modern world. Denis and Mann achieve this without setting out to achieve it, without politics or grand statements. These films are simultaneously insular and expansive, containing no on-the-nose symbolism to drive across ham-fisted and hollow points. Rather, they occupy the world of the individual, and say things without saying them, represent things without representing them. They are obscure and clear, fleeting visions of the fractured conscience of a world lost.


Long story short, the audience who gets amped on the trailers for Miami Vice and Public Enemies is ultimately not the audience they're intended for, and the audience they are intended for probably won't go to see them in the first place. To me both of these movies are edgier, in terms of blowing accepted conventions of filmmaking completely out of the water and pushing for a whole redefinition of filmmaking styles, than most of the indie output of the past five years. Maybe I'm giving him too much credit here, but aside from low-light capabilities and logistical ease arguments, I think he chooses to shoot on video the way he does now in order to divorce the viewer of preconceived notions about the kind of stories he tells so that they might be more accepting or conscious of his new radically different filmmaking style and attempt to compare his recent work to what he was trying to do in the 90s less, since I don't think the goals of his most recent films are anywhere near comparable.
Title: Re: Michael Mann
Post by: Reel on April 13, 2011, 10:25:59 PM
you know what I think? His 'films' look like shit now and he needs to learn how to use a tripod.
Title: Re: Michael Mann
Post by: wilder on April 13, 2011, 11:42:47 PM
Great.
Title: Re: Michael Mann
Post by: Gold Trumpet on April 14, 2011, 04:46:09 AM
It's an interesting idea, wilderesque, but the reason it isn't convincing to me is because while Michael Mann is completely rebooting his style, the stories are no less generic, in the genre sense, than any of his previous films. In fact, the style attachment of digital filmmaking to each of his films, feel like easy style attachments done by filmmakers like Nicholas Ray. For fans of genre style, my comparison to Ray is high compliment, but it bears reminder that what Ray did then and Mann does now does is done with a high sense of artificiality. The article you shared tries to make a case there is an extra level of internalization with what Mann is doing. Sure, in a layer of style, it may be, but I never found any of the stories less generic. All the films the article compares to what Mann is doing has no little of genre conventionality so the writer is only reading one level of Mann's attempt to internalize his stories.
Title: Re: Michael Mann
Post by: wilder on April 14, 2011, 05:46:28 AM
I see it a bit differently. In Thief and Heat, Mann's protagonists live by a strict code of honor that they break for love. Their work is all-consuming and so treacherous that intimacy becomes a threat to their very survival, but intimacy is the need. Ultimately these protagonists break their own codes and end up paying for it, usually with their lives. There are existential moments of reflection, but the plot elements take center stage.

In Miami Vice and Public Enemies, identity is what's at stake, and while the protagonist's objects of affection are still threats to their survival and compromise their work, the need for stasis, not necessarily love, is the theme at large - a genuine human relationship is the thing that's going to suck them down from the ether and put them back on earth.

I feel a bit shady doing this, but I'm going to copy and paste some thoughts I posted elsewhere:

Quote from: wilderesque
"No past no future." Miami Vice and Public Enemies are as much about identity and the impossibility of a narrative line defining the characters as they are about their external plots and doomed love stories. The whole idea of the myth of John Dillinger, in the sense of his identity being something that almost belongs to other people, or is only understood in the context of its reflection back to him through the media and other people's eyes (exemplified most literally in the final scene in the movie theater where Dillinger is watching MANHATTAN MELODRAMA, in which Clark Gable is playing a character influenced by Dillinger) is especially interesting I think. The character is working tirelessly to maintain self-ownership and self-preservation while otherworldly forces work equally as tirelessly to rob these fundamental things from him.

The men in these movies are all lone wolves without support systems who must find the will to live and move forward within themselves once they have lost the narratives that fulfilled them before. Their positions isolate them and set them so far outside the societies they're born into that they might as well be floating in outer space. In one of the 'Sight & Sound' polls Mann cited THE PASSION OF JOAN OF ARC (1928) as one of his favorite films, and while his own movies may not be as blatantly emotional as PASSION, I can definitely see similarities in the underlying spiritual ideas he's trying to communicate with the audience.

Dillinger becomes irrelevent because the world he knew and came from is becoming irrelevent - technology and the intelligence-gathering procedures of law-enforcement are evolving faster than he knows how to keep up, and so his place in the world as he knew it is compromised and put in jeopardy.

Also applicable is this passage from Joan Didion's essay 'The White Album', in which she writes this:

Quote from: Joan Didion
We live entirely...by the imposition of a narrative line upon disparate images, by the "ideas" with which we have learned to freeze the shifting phantasmagoria which is our actual experience.

Or at least we do for a while. I am talking here about a time when I began to doubt the premises of all the stories I had ever told myself, a common condition but one I found troubling.
[...]
This was an adequate enough performance as far as improvisations go. The only problem was that my entire education, everything I had ever been told or had told myself, insisted that the production was never meant to improvised: I was supposed to have a script, and had mislaid it. I was supposed to hear cues, and no longer did. I was meant to know the plot, but all I knew was what I saw: flash pictures in variable sequence, images with no "meaning" beyond their temporary arrangement, not a movie but a cutting-room experience. In what would probably be the middle of my life I still wanted to believe in the narrative and in the narrative's intelligibility, but to know that one could change the sense with every cut was to begin to perceive the experience as rather more electrical than ethical.

I would argue that that very mindset is what Michael Mann is going for, and that the conventional narratives still present in these movies are necessary because they are supposed to fulfill the character's function, and no longer do. They have to be present as a backdrop for the characters to be separate from, or separating from, for us to understand this as a viewer.
Title: Re: Michael Mann
Post by: wilder on April 18, 2011, 06:47:32 AM
First look at 'Luck'

http://youtu.be/p8yOQJ288GQ (http://youtu.be/p8yOQJ288GQ)
Title: Re: Michael Mann
Post by: wilder on May 16, 2011, 12:37:45 PM
Michael Mann Confirmed To Direct Historical Epic 'Agincourt'
via The Playlist

Since 2009's underwhelming "Public Enemies," a fascinating example in style that simply doesn't work as a movie, Michael Mann has been beavering away on "Luck," a HBO collaboration with "Deadwood" writer David Milch, with a cast including Dustin Hoffman, Michael Gambon, Ian Hart, John Ortiz, Dennis Farina and many more. But he's remained undecided as to his next big-screen project, with a number of possible films percolating.

There's the Hemingway adaptation "For Whom The Bell Tolls," the wartime photographer biopic "Capa," possibly with Andrew Garfield and Gemma Arterton, another period gangster tale, "Big Tuna," from "Up in the Air" writer Sheldon Turner, and, most recently, the contemporary prospecting adventure "Gold," from writer Paul Haggis, but none has yet come to the front of the pack. One of the more intriguing, out-of-the-box possibilities has been "Agincourt," an adaptation of the Bernard Cornwell novel that retells the famous battle between Henry V's English army, and the French, which Mann was developing with "Elizabeth" and "The Tudors" writer Michael Hirst. And it looks like that project just got something of a boost.

Screen Daily reports that Independent, the production company run by Luc Roeg, the son of filmmaking great Nic Roeg, is in Cannes unveiling its new slate, fresh off the success of Lynne Ramsay's "We Need To Talk About Kevin," and the announcement was headed up with confirmation that Mann will indeed direct "Agincourt" for the company. "RKO 281" director Benjamin Ross is currently re-writing the script, with Roeg saying the project now has momentum, although the company are waiting for the film to be fully developed before they go out to studios for full financing—no start date is yet planned, but the shoot will likely take place in France and the United Kingdom.
Title: Re: Michael Mann
Post by: Mr. Merrill Lehrl on May 26, 2011, 06:32:45 PM
Fox, Mann rev up 'Go Like Hell'
http://www.variety.com/article/VR1118037661

EXCLUSIVE: Michael Mann is nearing a deal with 20th Century Fox to direct "Go Like Hell," the true story of the furious competition between Ford and Ferrari in 1966, when an American car won the Le Mans for the first time.

Based on the tome by A.J. Baime, script was penned by Jason Keller with Alex Young and Lucas Foster producing through Foster's Warp Film shingle.

Story follows Henry Ford II -- with the help of young automotive whiz Lee Iacocca and racing maven Carroll Shelby -- as the future gearhead giants set about reinventing the Ford Motor Co. by entering the high-stakes world of European car racing. In a handful of years they developed the Ford GT40, one of the most celebrated cars in automotive history, which became the first American car to win the 24 Hours of Le Mans (and went on to win four years running).

Brad Pitt was considered for the lead, but no casting decisions have yet been made.

Mann, whose career has been mostly comprised of crime dramas, has stayed busy of late, lining up several directing projects including "Waiting for Robert Capa" and "Big Tuna" as well as exec producing and directing the pilot for the HBO horse-racing series "Luck." It's uncertain at which film project would be his next.

Mann is repped by CAA. Keller is repped by Management 360.
Title: Re: Michael Mann
Post by: wilder on June 15, 2011, 02:59:44 AM
I was scanning Niles Schwartz's blog, which Picolas linked to in The Tree of Life thread, and happened upon an entry he made on Michael Mann -- there's some overlap here with some posts I made earlier, but his writing is much more in-depth...

Quote from: Niles Schwartz
Unlike Heat, where almost every actor in the crowded story is given a juicy scene that clearly establishes an identity (as an ensemble film, it ranks with Altman's best work – and thus as a crime genre ensemble, it stands alone), time in Mann's more recent work is moving ahead so fast that there's no room (no time, no space) for an individual to establish Identity, where even the protagonist is struggling to hang on under the weight of this immense gravity that pulls the Self into a black void. Howard Hughes (Leonardo DiCaprio) in The Aviator (whom Johnny Depp's John Dillinger resembles) wants to go faster, fly higher, and create bigger cinematic worlds than ever witnessed, his context for reality transformed into a space in front of a projected desert on a screen that lays its geography on his own naked body. His technological innovations and assimilations with those technologies of "The Future" – "the way of the Future" – eventually swallow him in a darkness of complete isolation. Similarly, Sonny Crockett (Colin Farrell) in Miami Vice is disallowed any development in the context of the motion picture, save for a duplicitous sexual and emotional relationship with Isabella (Gong Li), a criminal just as duplicitous as he is. Dreaming of the ocean and a haven of peace, he is pulled back into the flux of action, of his work, of socially-imposed fabricated identity, into the hyperreal world where personal history populated with photographs and ornaments of history are non-existent.

[...]

...it is the Movies, after all, that generate our own personal myths and validate our preconceived identities, making sense out of human experience - our relationships, our loves, our deaths – much as Mann's Dillinger experiences cinema (Manhattan Melodrama) moments before his last stand. Indeed, the cinematic construction of the Self for Dillinger is circularly reinforced, being that his image of identification (Clark Gable) is in part a film studio's construction based on the man Dillinger himself has created with the assistance of the media. The "Real Self" is possibly non-existent, ghostly, and perhaps the only place John Dillinger can be captured and killed is under the blinking lights of a movie theatre, the Biograph (a name suggesting a "Life"), because he's more Real there than in his corporeal body. Public Enemies is focused on the Real Self within History and how that Self dissipates within that History's systematic unveiling. The State becomes realized as an Idea of absolute Control and Reason, and people within that Right Hegelian System personified by J. Edgar Hoover (Billy Crudup), such as the tragically alienated Melvin Purvis (Christian Bale), are doomed to become nothing but despair-ridden suits, dying slowly and then forgotten.

[...]

Dillinger the Myth bespeaks a strange kind of heroic Freedom Fighter with no political or ideological goal, but simply his own freedom to do what he will with endless stretches of frontier space. This land is our land, and no body should own it, and a phenomenological experience of it brings one back to an incendiary "Ground Concept" of this Land that is more powerful than the rational "Hegelian" systems developing with the unveiling of History that aims to control that space. To some, John Dillinger was the Great Depression's Jesus Christ (he had more charisma as a leading man than the similarly "martyred" Floyd), and even at his trial in 1934 his lawyer, Louis Piquett, invoked this idea by stating that "Christ had a fairer trial!" Representing a "Spirit" that is so different and at odds with the cold "Machine" emerging in a country becoming increasingly industrial with political leaders being inextricably tied to Big Business and capital interests (which came to complete unfortunate bloom with Warren G. Harding's involvement with oil companies during the Dome Teapot Scandal of the early 1920s), Dillinger was this beautiful force that could not be contained by the system, performing escapes that could be interpreted as miracles. Imprisoned, he would free himself like a wild element in Nature that could not be tamed by the world of civilized men, by the System that guaranteed Service and Protection, but really only served and protected the interests of the System - not the Individual.

Off the Map: Freedom vs. Control in Michael Mann's Public Enemies (http://nilesfilmfiles.blogspot.com/2011/07/off-map-aura-between-freedom-and.html)
Title: Re: Michael Mann
Post by: Mr. Merrill Lehrl on June 15, 2011, 08:31:40 PM
The third paragraph especially both seems related to what you were saying and is impressively well-written.  I didn't realize how big of a Mann fan you are when you brought him up in the Refn thread, which is funny because I posted in this thread and you'll all over it.

So now I'm pumped on Mann and want to revisit some of his films.  Right now I can't decide between Collateral and Miami Vice.
Title: Re: Michael Mann
Post by: wilder on August 24, 2011, 05:10:44 PM
"Robbery Homicide Division" (2002)

(https://xixax.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fimg807.imageshack.us%2Fimg807%2F6532%2Frhdu.jpg&hash=bfdfb837212ce12a2ffc326760128d347669eea8)

I've been wanting to see this short-lived series forever, and just came upon a link with all of the episodes for download. The series is shot with hd cameras and reminds me a bit of the style of the Miami Vice movie, maybe works better here because it's doing its own thing instead of following in the footsteps of a well-established brand.

Download - http://tinyurl.com/3oe6bx9 (http://tinyurl.com/3oe6bx9)
IMDB - http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0315686 (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0315686)
Real dated TV promo - http://youtu.be/lhNvRWFo-HI (http://youtu.be/lhNvRWFo-HI)

whatevs
Title: Re: Michael Mann
Post by: polkablues on August 24, 2011, 07:42:08 PM
It was an okay show.  Not great, just all right.

I'll be around if you need any more of my awesome opinions on things.
Title: Re: Michael Mann
Post by: john on August 25, 2011, 01:30:44 PM
Quote from: polkablues on August 24, 2011, 07:42:08 PM
It was an okay show.  Not great, just all right.

That's a pretty succinct evaluation of Mann's entire filmography. A lot of it is pretty to look at, some of it is commendably restrained.... most of it is fucking boooorrrrrrriiiiiiiinnnnngggggg.
Title: Re: Michael Mann
Post by: Pubrick on August 25, 2011, 08:49:17 PM
^ Haha, yes!

Finally someone said it perfectly.

I would've attempted myself, but his films don't inspire me to write even two sentences.
Title: Re: Michael Mann
Post by: wilder on September 26, 2011, 01:43:03 PM
"Luck" Trailer (http://tinyurl.com/3t7pjh3)
Title: Re: Michael Mann
Post by: wilder on November 02, 2011, 01:19:04 AM
The first episode of "Luck" will air on December 11, 2011 at 10pm ET/PT, over a month ahead of the subsequent episodes:

Quote from: HBO via TwitterNote that #LUCK makes its official series debut Sunday, Jan 29 with the remainder of the 9-episode season debuting on subsequent Sundays.
Title: Re: Michael Mann
Post by: wilder on November 17, 2011, 10:50:39 AM
New trailer (http://youtu.be/2M67XCzfr7o?hd=1) for "Luck" (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1578887/)
Title: Re: Michael Mann
Post by: ElPandaRoyal on November 17, 2011, 03:58:00 PM
Looks like something I can get hooked on... damn!
Title: Re: Michael Mann
Post by: wilder on January 10, 2012, 12:53:23 AM
The Study of Mann

Thieves, assassins, mad men, whistle-blowers, and gamblers have all populated the extreme adventures of Michael Mann's films. For more than 30 years, with style and precision, he has examined the richness of human experience.

By F.X. Feeney
Photographed by Scott Council

(https://xixax.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fimg848.imageshack.us%2Fimg848%2F2729%2Finterviewmann01ashx.jpg&hash=c9d0882ed703584312c85f799a8e8781ea440678)

Chicago born and raised, Michael Mann was majoring in English literature at the University of Wisconsin when a screening of G.W. Pabst's The Joyless Street moved him to want to become a director. Discovering Stanley Kubrick's Dr. Strangelove at a local theater later that same year closed the deal. He entered the London Film School in 1965, then crossed to Paris as a film correspondent for NBC television to cover the May 1968 student uprisings. He returned to the U.S. in 1971 and made his first mark in television, writing for Starsky and Hutch and directing Police Woman and a number of movies for television, culminating in The Jericho Mile (1979), which won a DGA Award and was released to critical acclaim as a theatrical feature in Europe.

While learning the ropes, Mann was saving his money and building his own production company.
His successful TV work in the 1980s—Miami Vice and Crime Story—afforded him the autonomy
to choose only those projects that most excited him. Asked recently how he was able to maintain creative control over his first theatrical feature, Thief (1981), he replied: "Easy. I cut the checks."
In all, he has directed 10 features, creating a body of work that is abundantly energetic in its precision and variety, from the psychologically layered crime film Heat (1995), to the historical epics The Last of the Mohicans (1992) and Public Enemies (2009), to an all-American study of corruption, The Insider (1999).

Most recently, Mann directed the pilot and is the executive producer of the new HBO horse racing series Luck. We caught up with him at his Santa Monica-based production company, in his office filled with skyscrapers of books and art and artifacts from the many eras he's visited in his movies.




F.X. FEENEY: A lot of directors know from an early age that this is what they want to do. Did you have a life plan that you wanted to make films?

MICHAEL MANN: I wasn't really interested in cinema until I saw Dr. Strangelove, alongside a set of films by F.W. Murnau and G.W. Pabst for a college course. These were a revelation. I'd already seen some of the French New Wave and some Russian films, but the idea of directing, of shooting a film myself? Never. Prior to Strangelove, it simply had not seemed possible that you could work in the mainstream film industry and make very ambitious films for a big mainstream audience. The whole film is a third act. The mad general played by Sterling Hayden is totally submerged in his character the moment we first encounter him. There's no prelude, no context. We're just with him, we know who the guy is, and we catch up along the way. Even as a young man I found that intensity very exciting—how immediate it was.

So how did you organize yourself as a director? What did you have to pull together to make it happen?

One of the most instructive events was when, right out of the London Film School, I got a job working for Bill Kaplan in the British office of 20th Century Fox in Soho Square. Bill was production supervisor for a lot of films that were being made at that time in England, owing to the budgetary rebates then in force under The Eady Plan. Working in physical production, helping organize scheduling, budgeting, and production logistics became for me a model of how to think, of how to organize the totality of a movie. I apply the lessons I learned there to this day, not just in terms of budgeting—but in terms of the content of a movie. There's a critical planning that is very three dimensional at this early stage. That has become really important in everything I've done since. 

Your earliest films were documentaries. Is that what formed your commitment to authenticity?

My ambition was always to make dramatic films. I had a strong sense of the value of drama growing up in Chicago, which has long had a thriving theater scene. I'd also found, working a lot of odd jobs as a kid—as a short-order cook, on construction, or as a cab driver—that there was tremendous richness in real-life experience, and contact with people and circumstances that were sometimes extreme. I was drawn to this instinctively. You find out things when you're with a real-life thief, things you could never make up just sitting in a room. The converse is also true: Just because you discover something interesting, you don't have to use it; there's no obligation. Yet life itself is the proper resource. I've never really changed that habit of wanting to bring preparation into the real world of the picture, with a character that actors are going to portray.

Is that why you develop biographies for every character, not just for your use but for your actors as well?

I like to know everything about a character. Major characters, minor characters, even if a picture's got nothing to do with what their childhood is, I want to know what their childhood was like. What were their parents like? Where did they grow up? What do they like, what do they not like? What kinds of women are attracted to them? Why are these women attracted to them? If the character is a woman, who is she? How is she relating to the situation of her life?

In a period piece such as The Last of the Mohicans, it must have been difficult to get the kind of authenticity you're after.

Making The Last of the Mohicans was particularly challenging. We were trying to re-create the conditions, the tones, the value systems of 1757, particularly for somebody raised in an Algonquian-speaking tribal group, such as the Mohicans. How does Hawkeye come on to a woman? How does he say, 'Hey: I like you. Let's go out?' Behind that is an anthropological perspective I always want to have. I want the actor to have that same deep clarity about his or her character. Mind you, this inquiry includes not wasting time on stuff that is immaterial. On The Insider Russell Crowe met the real Jeffrey Wigand three times, and then we both said, 'That's enough.' He got everything he needed, and there was that fine point in which he was still on a frontier—needing to project and extrapolate what Jeffrey would do. The trap both Russell and I wanted to avoid was falling into a Xerox of the actual guy. I didn't want anything imitative. What results therefore is Russell's evocation of Wigand, the essential, authentic Wigand that's based on his origins and what he's confronting.

What was your connection to Wigand as a character in this drama?

The beauty of Wigand is his awkwardness. He was definitely a hero, warts and all. He's a scientist who went to work for a tobacco company—for the money. That's what makes his obstinacy so heroic. His personal failings by contrast are what make him so much like us. If there had been bonding and pal-ship between him and Lowell Bergman [the producer from 60 Minutes goading him to take action played by Al Pacino], I might not have had the idea to make the film. It was precisely because Lowell didn't exactly care for the guy, and yet put everything on the line to defend him, that I could access him, access the pair of them, and hopefully persuade the audience to access him.

Are you conscious of choosing actors who share your intensity?

It's usually a good idea. [Laughs] I've made one or two mistakes, but most of the people I've worked with are really down for the cause.

Do you like to rehearse your actors before and during shooting?

Yes, but never for too long. There's an art to rehearsal. Never rehearse to the point where you wish you'd shot it. I always want to stop just before the moment becomes so actual that I wish I had a camera. I don't want that to happen until take 3 or 4 of the day we're shooting it. You always want to back off, you always want to leave potential. There's a tremendous thrill for me in finding the spontaneous moment. Sometimes that happens when you're smart enough not to rehearse too much—when you know where to stop, because otherwise you'll get too programmed. Other times, that spontaneity comes with a liberation you get at the end of tremendous preparation—where everybody is confident and the players know exactly what they're going to do.

How did you apply that to the famous coffee shop scene between Al Pacino and Robert De Niro in Heat (1995) when the two adversaries meet head-to-head for the first and only time?

We did two things: We discussed the scene. Then we did some rehearsals, but I was wary because the entire movie is a dialectic that works backward from its last moment, which is the death of the thief Neil McCauley [De Niro], while the detective Vincent Hanna [Pacino], who's just taken McCauley's life, stands with him as he passes. The 'marriage' of the two of them in this contrapuntal story is the coffee shop scene.

Now Pacino and De Niro are two of the greatest actors on the planet, so I knew they would be completely alive to each other—each one reacting off the other's slightest gesture, the slightest shift of weight. If De Niro's right foot sitting in that chair slid backward by so much as an inch, or his right shoulder dropped by just a little bit, I knew Al would be reading that. They'd be scanning each other, like an MRI. Both men recognize that their next encounter will mean certain death for one of them. Gaining an edge is why they've chosen to meet. So we read the scene a number of times before shooting—not a lot—just looking at it on the page. I didn't want it memorized. My goal was to get them past the unfamiliarity of it. But of course these two already knew it impeccably.

You made an interesting choice directorially in the finished film. The whole scene takes place in over-the-shoulder close-ups—each man's point of view on the other.


We shot that scene with three cameras, two over-the-shoulders and one profile shot, but I found when editing that every time we cut to the profile, the scene lost its one-on-one intensity. I'll often work with multiple cameras, if they're needed. In this case, I knew ahead of time that Pacino and De Niro were so highly attuned to each other that each take would have its own organic unity. Whatever one said, and the specific way he'd say it, would spark a specific reaction in the other. I needed to shoot in such a way that I could use the same take from both angles. What's in the finished film is almost all of take 11—because that has an entirely different integrity and tonality from takes 10, or 9, or 8. All of this begins and ends with scene analysis. It doesn't matter if it's two people in a room or two opposing forces taking over a street. Action comes from drama, and drama is conflict: What's the conflict?

At the opposite end of the scale from that intimate two-man scene in the coffee shop is the huge street-battle in Heat. How did you prepare a sequence that massive?

That scene arose out of choreography, and was absolutely no different than staging a dance. We rehearsed in detail by taking over three target ranges belonging to the L.A. County Sheriff's Department. We built a true-scale mock-up of the actual location we were using along 5th Street in downtown L.A., with flats and barriers standing in for where every parked car was going to be, every mailbox, every spot where De Niro, Tom Sizemore, and Val Kilmer were going to seek cover as they moved from station to station. Every player was trained with weapons the way somebody in the military would be brought up, across many days, with very rigid rules of safety, to the point where the safe and prodigious handling of those weapons became reflexive. Then, as a culmination, we blocked out the action with the actors shooting live rounds at fixed targets as they moved along in these rehearsals. The confidence that grew out of such intensive preparations—all proceeding from a very basic dramatic point—meant that when we were finally filming on 5th Street, firing blanks, each man was as fully and as exactly skilled as the character he represented.

What was the 'conflict' your choreography was proceeding from?

McCauley's unit wants to get out, while the police want something else, and are sending in their assets. Judged strictly in terms of scene analysis and character motivation, the police are used to entering a situation with overwhelming power on their side. When they're assaulted by people who know what they're doing, they don't do well. McCauley's guys are simply more motivated, and have skills that easily overwhelm the police. Choreography has to tell a story; there's no such thing as a stand-alone shootout. Who your characters are as characters determines your outcome.

Collateral (2004) is largely a two-character drama, which must have created its own demands. How did you prep your players for that film?

Prepping Jamie Foxx for his role in Collateral was a matter of getting him to understand the neighborhood this man came from, and the death-by-repetition involved in being a cab driver. Having been a cab driver myself, I knew what a grind that is. For Tom Cruise, who plays a hit man, the preparation involved all kinds of crazy stuff in preproduction—acquiring the skill sets he would need to be this man. We had him stalking various members of the crew for weeks, in secret, learning their habits, and then picking the moment. This person would be coming out of a gym at 7 a.m. and feel somebody slap something on his back—and it would be Tom, who had just put a Post-it on their back. In our virtual world, that was a confirmed kill.

Each of your films seems to set out in a different direction from the one that preceded it. What attracts you to a project?

Usually I think I know what I'm going to look for next, and usually that turns out to be wrong. How I chose to do Collateral is a prime example. I had just come off of doing Ali (2001), a picture about a huge real-life figure. I had developed The Aviator, about Howard Hughes. But as brilliant as John Logan's screenplay was, and as much as I wanted to work with Leonardo [DiCaprio], I felt I would be doing a rerun of what I'd just done. What attracted me to Collateral was the opportunity to do the exact opposite: a microcosm; 12 hours; one night; no wardrobe changes; two people; small lives; inside a cab; a small time frame viewed large. I very much admired the hard, gem-like construction of Stuart Beattie's screenplay. There were a lot of modifications as we prepared to shoot, but the structure was there from the start—and it was tremendously appealing. That made my decision. I asked Marty [Scorsese] if he wanted to do The Aviator.

The idea for The Last of the Mohicans came to me because I'd seen the film written by Philip Dunne when I was 3. I realized 40 years later that it had been rattling around in my brain ever since, that it was a part of me, a very important part. I just hadn't been consciously aware of it up to that point. I also thought: There hasn't really been an exciting epic, period film in a long, long time. Joe Roth and Roger Birnbaum were running 20th Century Fox at the time. They got the excitement of it immediately.

Even though you're always trying to do something new, there seems to be continuity in your work.

As far as the continuities you're noticing in my work, those are arrived at film by film, and are not planned as such. The film directors I admire most don't consciously have a form that is their form. Marty Scorsese doesn't say to himself: 'I will make a certain decision this way because it either does or doesn't conform to my form.' No, what he chooses to do flows from him organically. I think that's the case for every filmmaker. The more diverse one film is from the other, the more exciting it is. What you want is to find yourself on a frontier. For the working director, there is no conscious form from film to film. We all know what our ambitions are, but in a very healthy way we are all unconscious of 'signature.'

In Public Enemies you shaped your portrait of John Dillinger to dramatize the fact that a series of revolutions in technology—the speed of cars, telecommunications, even the power of movies—had made his career possible.

Our digital age is older for us than was Dillinger's access to high-speed travel. He could pull off major robberies in a single 10-day period, starting in Minnesota, jumping to Indiana, then speeding to Tucson to take a break. His ability to do that was less than five years old. One irony that attracted me was, here was a guy who did formal planning, who had a deeply methodical approach to every single score, yet was on a ride to nowhere specific. He had no outcome goal. There was no plan for his life in the sense that Butch and Sundance had said, 'Once we accumulate X amount of capital, or the risk gets too extreme, let's head for South America.' I don't think the film succeeds in conveying this. That point eluded me. If I were making the film all over again, maybe a whole different screenplay would be written.

Yet this is an abiding theme. Neil McCauley in Heat is in a similar position—ready to walk away from any life situation on a moment's notice.

I'm attracted to characters who are conscious of trying to figure out what they're doing here, and what's the best way to do it. Maybe that's because I'm engaged in the same thing and I either have, or I haven't!

Music is an important element in all your work. Do you use it to pre-imagine your films, or are your choices discoveries you make in postproduction?

As research, music enters early for me. If you can find that piece of music which evokes the central emotion of one of your characters, some pivotal crisis where he or she must rouse themselves from despair and manifest something very aggressive within his or her own mind—this becomes the piece of music for that moment. If I want to quantify how a character is feeling and thinking, in a way that is replicable, so I can re-evoke that emotion many, many times, finding the right piece of music is positively essential. Not only as I prepare the scene—but as I shoot the scene, as I direct the actors, and finally, as I edit the scene. One specific example comes to mind in Collateral, when the coyotes cross in front of the cab. For me, that was a watershed in the story's progression. Each of the two principle characters is submerging into his own perspective of what life is: a retrospective moment; a prelude to a violent confrontation. The song "Shadow on the Sun" by Audioslave nailed that moment for me. It became an indelible part of planning, sustaining, and executing that scene.

You once told me that for Thief, in your mind you saw the city as a 'three-dimensional machine.' Was that behind your choice of the electronic Tangerine Dream score, over the earthy blues you originally considered?

One of my great weaknesses is that I'm still hung up on the choice I made over that score. Thirty years later I'm still debating this. By string theory, in some alternate reality, there's a version of Thief with wall-to-wall blues.

Parallel universes aside, you've certainly revisited and re-edited your films on DVD.

Highly recommended! I'm all for that.

Sometimes you'll match an image entirely to music, but you also use sound effects melodically and integrate audio textures.

You have no idea, it can actually get quite nuts. In Thief there's a fire extinguisher going off in F minor. We actually found a way, in Tangerine Dream's studio, of processing actual sound effects and rendering them into a key. This was long before digital computers. The layering can be extraordinarily intricate. During the safe-cracking sequence in Thief, the chaotic sound of the burning bar suddenly stops, and in the silence—corresponding to the bright points of light on the diamonds when the first tray is pulled out—you start hearing a high-pitched note in the key of E, and every once in awhile there's a blast in F minor of the fire extinguisher putting out the embers. This moment happens to work for me, now, in a way that I can still look at and not cringe. It's withstood the test of time. Other things in the film are nonsensical: ocean waves crashing in G minor—sounding big, but yielding nothing at all.

From what I've observed, you keep a very long workday, from the crack of dawn to late at night.

In terms of a shooting day? No. I like a 12-hour day, but I'd like to get that down to a 10-hour day. I'm at my best in those kinds of chunks. It all gets down to selection: 'This is really of value.' It's pivotal; if you don't get this particular moment right, you just blew the Act II ending. You go get that thing, and you don't let anything stand in your way. By the same token, there's another event that may show up and be part of the scene that's a visual, and it may be trivial; it really is not important. To be able to have that discretion allows you to direct your concentration and logistical assets to what's really important. The more you can have that discretion of accurately reading: 'This is really pivotal, this really is not,' that is absolutely the key to doing this stuff well.

Does this discretion grow out of the preparatory work?

It grows out of the preparatory work, it grows out of experience, and out of necessity. We shot The Jericho Mile under horrendous conditions. We were working in Folsom Prison, and it turned into 19 seven-hour days. Every two hours the guards had to count the population of convicts I had. The IQ of the guards wasn't tremendously high, so if I had 28 convicts out there and three guards are doing a head count, inevitably each one would come up with a different number. 'I got 27.' 'I got 26.' 'I got 29.' [Laughs] Meanwhile we're dying! We were dying in every minute of shooting time.

Over time, you've come to work with the same people again and again. How do you assemble your team?

You have to work backward from how great it is when you're in the trenches and who you're there with. If people are as ambitious as you are, you keep them close to you. If a person gets excited by the things I am excited by—say, transforming a run-down arena in the middle of Mozambique that hasn't had electricity or plumbing since 1974, as we had to do for Ali—if a challenge like that gets your blood running, you would be a person I gravitate toward. We would wind up working together on a lot of pictures. My 1st AD Michael Waxman, who is now directing television successfully, has been working with me since 1986. Cinematographer Dante Spinotti and I have done five movies together. There are a number of folks on my crew who've been working with me since Mohicans back in 1991. We're all working now on Luck.

As executive producer of Luck, you're in the position of directing other directors.

And I want them all to be as expressive as they can possibly be. I directed the pilot. Fidelity to the narrative—the brilliant rotating story tracks devised by David Milch—informs the shooting style, and the disjunctive editing that is so crucial. What most attracted me to David's pilot script is that it doesn't have a beginning, middle, or end. We're suddenly immersed in his characters full form. We encounter each of them in an in instant, without context; then we move to the next character. This is an exciting challenge for any director. Can you bespeak some cloud or challenge in a character's past, purely by conveying their particular attitude to the world around them? Our common ambition became to locate you within these characters as much as possible. That there would be a consistency, a narrative style arising out of these imperatives was a foregone conclusion. All of the directors—among them Phillip Noyce, Mimi Leder, Allen Coulter, Terry George, and Brian Kirk—are bringing their best game. In healthy competitive ways, each wants to do their best work within the series. I do everything I can to encourage that.

Luck has a varied cast with many different kinds of actors. How do you work with someone such as Dustin Hoffman who is a legendary perfectionist?

The cast is splendid, I couldn't be happier. But you're wrong to characterize Dustin as a perfectionist. A perfectionist to me is someone who can't tell the difference between detail that's important, and detail that's irrelevant. Dustin concentrates, with great thoroughness, on what's relevant. Something that's not important simply does not arrest his attention. He is so very specific, so grounded in his character that he is never lost. Every look, every action, expresses a determined intention on the part of Ace, the character he's playing.

In terms of creating an aesthetic through the pilot, how do you shoot a horse race?

Not by observing, but by conveying the experience of a jockey. I wanted the audience to be, as much as possible, on the horse. There's a lot of lyrical work one can do with long lenses, but I prefer the intimate perspective. As elegant as distance can be, I wanted to take us inside the moment.

So did you mount cameras on the horses as they were racing?

No, you can't do that. We tried; it doesn't work. We devised systems for working with small cameras—the Canon 5D or the Canon 1D Mark IV. Then we found various different devices to get us right up next to the horse and drop the camera right in. We built a tracking vehicle. Nothing too advanced: a pickup truck, stripped to suit our purposes, with a hand-operated arm, a lightweight pole a sound man uses, over the shoulder, to lower in these cameras, because they're small enough to do that with. Since then we've made further modifications through practice, failure, and frustration that have enabled us in every episode after the pilot to give us an improved sense of being in among these horses.

There's a whole other aspect of this: getting the horses used to our presence; the question of how many horses we were allowed at a given moment; how frequently we could run them, because of the limitations which we very strictly adhere to for their protection. If we film a race, we can only run them for a third of a mile. Then they get a rest period. We could do that two, maybe three times in a day and that was it. They have a very short day, then they're retired and we use a duplicate set. Sometimes to film a single race we would use three separate sets of horses to get us nine passes.

How many setups do you like to shoot in a day?

That depends on the film—but I'd say 30 to 40, on average. Less ever since Collateral, because that was when we began shooting digitally, and did 15-minute takes. But I use two or three cameras quite often. That considerably increases the number of setups. I love working fast. What makes me crazy is waiting; any obstacle to a smooth flow will get me agitated. What you want to be is on a roll. This is what I particularly love about working with Al [Pacino]; we always get into a steady groove. Takes 5, 6, or 7 are generally his golden takes. You get into a tempo with all good actors, a rhythm, and it's wonderful. There's not even verbal communication after awhile. You don't have to talk about it—eyes connect.

What's a Michael Mann set like?

Protecting concentration is a big thing for me. I like a quiet set. The actors have the most extraordinarily difficult task: being somebody else, and projecting themselves authentically into a given moment. I'm extremely zealous about guarding their concentration—and mine—from any needless distraction that might interfere.

You've been active in the Guild and a board member for a long time. How has that served you as a director?

Directors don't see other directors a lot. When we're making films, there's only one director on that set. It's not like actors, working with other actors, or writers, who are working at home and can get together after work over coffee. If you're working in Rome and I'm in Mozambique, we can't just hang out. So what the Guild provides, apart from the many superb bedrock forms of support whose virtues are well known by its membership—creative rights, the pension plan, etc.—what I personally hold close is the society it offers of spending time with fellow directors. Whenever we get a chance to get together and talk, it is both rare and tremendously enjoyable. If Alejandro González Iñárritu wants to ask me about a certain cameraman, actor or actress, there are things I can reveal to him, regardless of the political sensitivities, which I wouldn't say to anybody else. I can always tell the unvarnished truth to another director. And I've enjoyed the same benefit coming the other way. There's a wonderful solidarity and truth-telling that goes on among directors.

For years you were talking about doing For Whom the Bell Tolls, but more recently you've shifted your attention to a chapter in the life of photographer Robert Capa, set during the same time period. Is that an evolution of the same interest?

I'll be attracted to an arena or milieu for a long time, and I've long been interested in the Spanish Civil War. On For Whom the Bell Tolls, I was forced to realize that every aspect of the story has been so ripped off over the years and there's nothing left. There was no way for me to make it fresh, even though Hemingway's book is as brilliant as ever. I'm still interested in the period, and I'd long been interested in Capa, but his life story is so vast that there never seemed to be any way to do it until a few years back, when new information came to light about his love affair in Spain, in 1936, with fellow photographer Gerda Taro. It was a defining moment for him—the defining moment. His entire life changes from that point on and is never the same. That presented a way to tell the story. What next? There's a medieval movie I'm developing, that I really want to make, called Agincourt. There's a science fiction project I'd love to do. And some other things I can't discuss. Ask me in a week.

Source (http://www.dga.org/Craft/DGAQ/All-Articles/1201-Winter-2012/DGA-Interview-Michael-Mann.aspx)

Title: Re: Michael Mann
Post by: MacGuffin on February 13, 2012, 08:05:04 PM
Michael Mann Entering 'The Big Stone Grid'
BY MIKE FLEMING | Deadline

EXCLUSIVE: Michael Mann is in talks to develop to direct The Big Stone Grid, a cop thriller that Sony Pictures bought as a spec script last year by S. Craig Zahler. Michael De Luca, who's on the Oscar circuit for Moneyball, is producing ths one. The script is a hard-edged thriller in the vein of Seven and Marathon Man, about two decorated detectives who uncover a terrifying extortion ring that operates within the secret underbelly of New York City. The plan is for Mann to do a pass with the scribe, but don't be surprised if he relocates the action to L.A., where he made such crime sagas as Heat and Collateral. Mann is likely to next direct Go Like Hell, the duel between Ford vs. Ferrari for sports car supremacy in the 60s that he is developing at Fox. He's also exec producing the HBO series Luck with David Milch. That series, which was renewed for a second season, is building into quite an interesting look at the world of horse racing at Santa Anita. Mann is repped by CAA.
Title: Re: Michael Mann
Post by: wilder on February 17, 2012, 06:48:17 AM
20 minute interview with Mann for "Luck" (http://blogs.indiewire.com/theplaylist/michael-mann-eyeing-south-china-sea-picture-the-tam?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed) embedded at the bottom of this page announcing his new South China Sea project in development, 'The Tam'.
Title: Re: Michael Mann
Post by: wilder on February 29, 2012, 01:04:25 PM
HBO, Michael Mann Set War Photographers Docuseries
"Witness" will team the "Luck" executive producer with documentary director David Frankham for the four-episode project.
via The Hollywood Reporter

HBO is doubling down on Michael Mann. The Luck executive producer/director is reteaming with the premium cable network for a limited documentary series chronicling war photographers, HBO announced Tuesday. Titled Witness, the four-episode docuseries will follow a new generation of young combat photographers capturing the conflict in Mexico, Brazil, Uganda and Libya. Mann will partner with documentary director David Frankham for the four-episode project, with the first episode filmed in Juarez, Mexico.

"David Frankham and I share an admiration for combat photography that captures the universal -- and sometimes the indescribable -- in a single frame in the midst of chaos and danger," Mann said in a statement announcing the news.

Added Frankham: "Witness will not provide a historical context. The direction Michael and I took in creating Witness was to immerse the audience via intimacy with the photographer into the intensity of a situation as it's developing, as they risk their lives to capture one piece of the truth."

Mann directed the pilot and is executive producing HBO's David Milch horse racing drama, which has already been renewed for a second season. A premiere date has not yet been determined.

Title: Re: Michael Mann
Post by: MacGuffin on March 14, 2012, 09:19:39 PM
HBO's 'Luck' To Shut Down For Good Following Latest Horse Death
BY NELLIE ANDREEVA | Deadline

Luck will be no more on HBO. The pay cable network, along with Luck executive producers David Milch and Michael Mann, just announced that they're shutting production on the series for good following yesterday's horse death, the third on the set of the horse racing drama starring Dustin Hoffman. Luck had been in the middle of production on the second episode of Season 2. The already completed first episode won't air. Meanwhile, the remaining two episodes of Luck's first season will air as scheduled, with the season finale serving also as a series finale. In the immediate aftermath of yesterday's horse death, HBO initially said that production on Luck will continue only with scenes that don't involve horses. Now the stoppage will encompass the entire production. As of the time of HBO's announcement, filming on the series was still underway but was expected to shut down immediately.

After drawing a modest 1.1 million viewers for each of the pilot episode's two premiere airings, in December and then again in January, Luck has slipped in the ratings, drawing 686,000 viewers for its most recent first-run episode. Luck is a behind-the-track look at the world of horse racing and gambling's denizens – owners, trainers, jockeys and gamblers. Dustin Hoffman and Nick Nolte led the cast, which also included Dennis Farina, John Ortiz, Richard Kind, Kevin Dunn, Ian Hart, Ritchie Coster, Jason Gedrick, Kerry Condon, Gary Stevens, Tom Payne, and Jill Hennessy. Milch and Mann executive produced with Carolyn Strauss. Here is the statement announcing the end of the series:

It is with heartbreak that executive producers David Milch and Michael Mann together with HBO have decided to cease all future production on the series Luck.

Safety is always of paramount concern.  We maintained the highest safety standards throughout production, higher in fact than any protocols existing in horseracing anywhere with many fewer incidents than occur in racing or than befall horses normally in barns at night or pastures.  While we maintained the highest safety standards possible, accidents unfortunately happen and it is impossible to guarantee they won't in the future.  Accordingly, we have reached this difficult decision.

We are immensely proud of this series, the writing, the acting, the filmmaking, the celebration of the culture of horses, and everyone involved in its creation.
Quote from Michael Mann and David Milch:  "The two of us loved this series, loved the cast, crew and writers.  This has been a tremendous collaboration and one that we plan to continue in the future."
Title: Re: Michael Mann
Post by: malkovich on March 15, 2012, 12:30:02 AM
R.I.P Horses
Title: Re: Michael Mann
Post by: Pubrick on March 15, 2012, 01:39:05 AM
Quote from: MacGuffin on March 14, 2012, 09:19:39 PM
Quote from Michael Mann and David Milch:  "The two of us loved this series, loved the cast, crew and writers.  This has been a tremendous collaboration and one that we plan to continue in the future."

I wonder if they both said that at the same time, while looking into each other's eyes.
Title: Re: Michael Mann
Post by: Just Withnail on March 15, 2012, 02:57:54 AM
Quote from: Pubrick on March 15, 2012, 01:39:05 AM
Quote from: MacGuffin on March 14, 2012, 09:19:39 PM
Quote from Michael Mann and David Milch:  "The two of us loved this series, loved the cast, crew and writers.  This has been a tremendous collaboration and one that we plan to continue in the future."

I wonder if they both said that at the same time, while looking into each other's eyes.

While sitting on a dead horse.
Title: Re: Michael Mann
Post by: Jeremy Blackman on March 15, 2012, 11:39:32 AM
David Milch is certainly not lucky. I wonder what he'll do next, after two canceled shows...
Title: Re: Michael Mann
Post by: Jeremy Blackman on March 15, 2012, 11:45:09 AM
Angry David Milch brought baseball bat to edit bay?

http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/showtracker/2012/03/luck-angry-david-milch-brought-baseball-bat-to-edit-bay.html

The racetrack show "Luck" has been put down, but even before that the show's off-screen creative struggles may have been more interesting than the spare drama that reached the HBO show's meager viewing audience.

How intense was the tug-of-war between show writer David Milch and director Michael Mann, two of Hollywood's fiercest perfectionist mavericks? "Luck" costar Nick Nolte said there was one afternoon when Milch cracked under deadline pressure and reached for a Louisville Slugger.

"There was a day that David was going to kill Michael," Nolte said during a recent interview. "I guess I shouldn't talk about this, but I've heard it going around so I guess it's not a secret. It's absolutely true. Michael hadn't turned the film in [for an episode] and David was livid. He said to John [Ortiz], who plays the other trainer on the show, 'I'm going to go down to the editing room and I'm going to kill Michael Mann.'"

Nolte continued: "The look on Milch's face was intense, and John was pretty upset and he says, 'David, you really don't want to do that. You don't have a gun, do you?' And Milch tells him, 'No, I don't have a gun but I have a baseball bat and I'm going to kill him. If I'm not back in a few hours, get my lawyers on the phone.' John was beside himself."

What happened next?

"An hour and a half later, Milch comes back and John asks him what happened," Nolte said. "Milch says something like, 'I went down there and kicked in the door and Mann was there hunched over the Avid [editing console] and he looked back at me and then he just kept working.' Milch stood there for something like 15 minutes and Mann kept looking back every minute or two but he also kept working. And finally I guess Milch realized that Mann was working as fast as he could."

The actor said he later confirmed the incident with Milch and Mann and others on the "Luck" team. Nolte, who is no stranger to bare-knuckle, raw-behavior moments, shrugged it all off as just a bad day on "Luck" — and, he added, everyone was fortunate it wasn't worse.

"If Michael had been sitting there eating a sandwich when Milch kicked in the door, well, it could have been bad," Nolte said with a raspy laugh.
Title: Re: Michael Mann
Post by: polkablues on March 15, 2012, 04:24:31 PM
We can't completely dismiss the possibility that this was just a peyote hallucination Nick Nolte was having.
Title: Re: Michael Mann
Post by: Jeremy Blackman on March 15, 2012, 04:33:15 PM
Yeah I kind of realized that after I posted. I just love the image.
Title: Re: Michael Mann
Post by: wilder on April 21, 2012, 12:48:01 PM
Michael Mann's America through movies montage from the 79th Academy Awards


Title: Re: Michael Mann
Post by: ElPandaRoyal on May 10, 2012, 04:27:39 AM
When I first watched Collateral and Miami Vice, I felt like something was kind of out of place, that the movies didn't work completely, but there was something there that made me want to watch them again. Well... years later, I've watched both at least 3 times each and they keep getting better. And Public Enemies was, of course, one of the best movies of its year. He gives these types of characters an extra dimension, something we don't get to see a lot in action movies, plus he shoots everything with great style and his actions sequences are loud, intense, and breathtaking.
Title: Re: Michael Mann
Post by: BB on May 10, 2012, 01:40:31 PM
Miami Vice is enormously underrated. Mann atoning for the sins of his younger days.
Title: Re: Michael Mann
Post by: wilder on August 09, 2012, 01:01:39 PM
November 27, 2012

(https://xixax.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fi.imgur.com%2Feto42.jpg&hash=77f0c5e906a0100226d76815c7c98714285341b4)

and

HBO Orders Up Pilot From 'Bullhead' Director Michael Roskam, Co-Produced By Michael Mann
via The Playlist

(https://xixax.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fi.imgur.com%2Fe3RZy.jpg&hash=47978169cd757db64352e20fb8c999432b8af196)

An Oscar nomination will open up some doors, and for Michael Roskam and Matthias Schoenaerts, director and star of Best Foreign Film contender "Bullhead," that's starting to happen. Schoenaerts has lined up an intriguing slate of films including another great performance in Jacques Audiard's upcoming "Rust And Bone," along with roles in Guillaume Canet's English language debut "Blood Ties," the thriller "In Treatment" and uh, "Loft." And now, Roskam is looking to add a bit of shine to his resume.

Following the path of so many filmmakers these days, the director is now headed to HBO where he'll write and direct the pilot for "Buda Bridge." The show will be set in the near feature in Brussells, and is a crime drama that will kick off when a woman is found dead on the titular landmark, leading to crime, mayhem and a bit of sci-fi, apparently. All intriguing stuff, but there's a bit more: Michael Mann will be co-producing alongside Roskam and Michael Johnson, and he's certainly become a familiar face at HBO. Mann was behind the ill-fated and since canceled "Luck," and this fall throws his producing powers behind the documentary series "Witness," about war photographers.

So, hell yeah, the mix of folks here is certainly one that puts this firmly on our radar. Roskam doesn't seem to have been in any big rush to sign on to his next project, but this looks like a sound decision, and it certainly gives the rising filmmaker a lot more tools to play with. Let's hope this project keeps some solid forward momentum.
Title: Re: Michael Mann
Post by: wilder on November 03, 2012, 07:18:12 PM
Mann's documentary Witness: Libya (http://www.hbo.com/#/documentaries/witness-libya) premieres November 12 at 9pm on HBO.

Title: Re: Michael Mann
Post by: wilder on November 06, 2012, 12:58:33 AM
Michael Mann & David Frankham Talk HBO's 'Witness,' The Influence Of '60 Minutes,' Filming War Zones & More
via The Playlist

Everyday, from the around the world, we receive images in our newspapers, magazines, inboxes and online articles dispatched from some of the most dangerous places on Earth. Usually accompanied by an article or text giving an overview of the situation from whatever far flung place the pictures are coming from, we're usually on to the rest of our day before that image has a chance to linger. And given that the media tends to work in cycles, while situations in places that made headlines months ago may still be evolving, reporters in general are on to the next thing. But that's where "Witness" comes in.

The four-part series starting this week on HBO is executive produced by Michael Mann and David Frankham, and it takes viewers right on the ground with three seasoned photojournalists: Eros Hoagland ("Juarez" and "Rio"), Michael Christopher Brown ("Libya") and Veronique de Viguerie ("South Sudan"). Immersive and powerful, these brief journeys go right to the frontlines of the conflicts and issues in their respective countries, revealing narratives that are far more complex than the soundbites that are generally given to them.

We caught up recently with Mann and Frankham (who also directed "Rio," "Juarez" and "South Sudan") recently to talk about "Witness," what prompted the series and how they managed to shoot in locations that were both volatile and perilous. But from the start, both Mann and Frankham approached the series as a way to the kind of in depth reporting that isn't done very often anymore.

"Basically I had an idea for the series and I was very, I was a bit frustrated, or very frustrated with the way the news kind of tries to create this summation of all of these events in the world...and I'm talking about TV news in particular. So it was that and I was quite fascinated with war photographers and friends with war photographers, conflict photographers and the way they get into stories," Frankham explained. "So because of that, I went off and created with Eros and [cinematographer] Jared [Moossy] the 'Juarez' episode or film. From that it was really a way to kind of explain the entire series. Explain how we could like use the photographers as characters that help us get inside these conflicts and get closer on a human level to the conflicts and what was going on."

Once that first episode was finished, it was brought to the attention of Mann, who was already fascinated by the subject and quickly came on board and helped develop the series. "I have a long-standing interest in war photographers and photojournalism since way, way back. I thought that what [Frankham] had captured...by just moving through the conflict zone with photo journalists in a very intimate and subjective way, [was] that you were experiencing a fraction of the bigger reality but expressing it in such an intimate and human way that it became a fractal and contained all the issues of the larger conflict."

But their common curiosity about those who embed themselves in these troubled spots around the world wasn't the only link between the pair, as Mann expressed his own desire for creating a portrait with depth and impact.   

"My interest in this kind of material probably began in '64 when I was in a civil rights march in Chicago and Cicero, shooting with a 16 millimeter camera...and a lot of friends of mine went to work for [British investigative program] 'World In Action' which made '60 Minutes' look like ding dong school," Mann shared. "In '70 I did a documentary on returning to the United States ['17 Days Down The Line'] and wound up out in Albuquerque, there were a lot of Vietnam veterans against the war. So I mean the subject has had a lot of appeal to me for a long time...But when I saw David's 'Juarez' piece I was knocked out. He brought that intimacy...there's nothing wrong with historical summary with the news, with analysis, I love it, I read and watch a lot of it. As a dramatist what's truly impactful for me was what these guys were able to achieve, what 'Witness' shows."

However, "Witness" is not claiming to be a definitive statement on any of the places it visits. The recurring emphasis in speaking to both Mann and Frankham is less on presenting an authoritative package, than an experience which translates the intensity, uncertainty and responsibility of being in these locations and using the images to share a story or many stories, that make up the complex web of everything from the ongoing drug war in Mexico to the unstable, post-revolution Libya.

"It wasn't looking for a balance, it was looking for how that individual photographer relates to it and each person relates to it differently," Mann explained, adding: "They're there to record something that becomes a fraction but somehow encoded in the image that they make, encoded in that image is the power to move us. And that's why these images sustain."

But getting those images was no easy feat. Working with a very small crew of five people max, the production team was light and fast, aided by Canon 5D digital cameras that allowed them to remain mobile.

"We go as five and that includes our subject, lead photographer and then Jared, who would be like our DP and then the segment producer, the director and a digital tech who is just making sure that we're not losing any data, backing everything up and taking care of the cameras and all of that. So every day we kind of hit the ground because as four of us sometimes we'd split up into two and two but we all have cameras, we're all filming," Frankham detailed, adding: "These photos don't happen in front of you. Veronique I think sums it up quite well: part of it is getting to these places [and] putting yourself in these situations and we can't do that with a crew and you can't do that with a big crew and you can't do that with a TV camera on your shoulder, I think that immediately effects the situation. So we tried to be as small and as invisible as we could be. And I think it was quite effective. As I go back we went back through the edits and go back through it now, with the screenings, I feel so many moments that it feels like the camera's invisible and that we're capturing this experience."

And watching "Witness," it's certainly a unique piece of storytelling, both visceral and haunting, giving viewers a generous look into the heart of places where history is being made almost on a daily basis. And for Frankham, he hopes the show can recall an old school era of reportage that could enact action.

"...when this idea was first coming and developing I kind of thought of it as the new '60 Minutes.' When I was a kid, on Sunday you would see something on '60 Minutes' that you had never heard of before and on Monday everybody was talking about it. And it was so effective and so you know it created change and I think that this is a way of like going back out to those," he shared. "I remember the kids in Brazil sniffing glue out of the little jars, you know? '60 Minutes' told that story that stuck in my head from I don't know, thirty years ago. And that [report] changed that you know? The companies who were responsible for the glue like it ends over night because of the power of that. So there's this naive side to me that believes that we could keep telling these stories, going into conflicts and trying to engage people."

As Mann, he hopes to continue to share these remarkable stories. "I'd love to do some more, we'd like to do another set," he said.

"Witness" airs on HBO, Monday nights at 9 PM starting tonight.



Title: Re: Michael Mann
Post by: wilder on February 05, 2013, 08:57:55 PM
Against the Flow of Time: Michael Mann and Edward Hopper (http://www.latrobe.edu.au/screeningthepast/23/michael-mann-edward-hopper.html)
Title: Re: Michael Mann
Post by: wilder on February 14, 2013, 05:00:15 PM
Michael Mann To Direct Cyber Thriller Starring Chris Hemsworth
via The Playlist

After circling/developing a number of projects including a South China Sea set film called "The Tam," the cop thriller "The Big Stone Grid," the racing flick "Go Like Hell," the historical epic "Agincourt," the "Treasure Of The Sierrra Madre"-esque "Gold" and the forever brewing biopic "Capa," Mann will now take helm of an untitled movie "set in the world of cyber threats and attacks."

We'll have to rely on Morgan Davis Foehl (currently penning the videogame adaptation "Mass Effect") to deliver the goods, as he's written the script. The project is set up at Legendary (hope of stuff like "The Dark Knight Rises," "Man Of Steel" and "Pacific Rim") so we presume this has blockbuster potential.

Production is aiming to star this summer now that Hemsworth's calendar is clear.
Title: Re: Michael Mann
Post by: wilder on February 21, 2013, 04:15:07 PM
Some screenshots from the upcoming blu-ray of The Insider:

(https://xixax.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fi.imgur.com%2FHvxfmWN.jpg&hash=ab7d15b05ca14fed89595dadde129042bd65f532)

(https://xixax.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fi.imgur.com%2FIt1lH5F.jpg&hash=6966ed16e5468b2ffa2938832042e718f6966575)

(https://xixax.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fi.imgur.com%2F4TK5aqO.jpg&hash=c09abd40bdfe4e8141b5e5903a6648aeb24e05d6)

(https://xixax.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fi.imgur.com%2FoTz0LnC.jpg&hash=0be32053a6f2fe99babe0a595af1780035b489d6)

(https://xixax.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fi.imgur.com%2FBcwAOH2.jpg&hash=33ce7c674855ab9d52fafc68e29e5ba4ac56a7eb)

(https://xixax.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fi.imgur.com%2FcTa9Ob8.jpg&hash=45b81969390407c38811da4747a63d9b60ff03bf)

(https://xixax.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fi.imgur.com%2FxVu5TUN.jpg&hash=992537de638c3bdb02d3a4c066fe48d1680ebe2a)


WHY THE FUCK DID YOU HAVE TO START SHOOTING DIGITAL? WHY.
Title: Re: Michael Mann
Post by: wilder on March 15, 2013, 06:15:49 PM
Les Réalisateurs - Michael Mann

Title: Re: Michael Mann
Post by: wilder on April 09, 2013, 04:32:40 PM
Story Details Revealed About Michael Mann's Cyber Theft Thriller Starring Chris Hemsworth
via The Playlist

We're now at four years since Michael Mann's last film, the cops 'n gangsters tale "Public Enemies," but the director seems to be getting close to making his next movie. Back in February it was revealed he was teaming with Chris Hemsworth for an untitled thriller "set in the world of cyber threats and attacks." Not many other details were shared other than Mann was co-writing the script as well, with Morgan Davis Foehl, who is currently penning the videogame adaptation "Mass Effect." But a few more bits and pieces have been revealed.

Reports out of Asian media have revealed that Mann is currently scouting locations in Hong Kong, and has been meeting with notable talent for roles including Tang Wei ("Lust, Caution"), Nick Cheung Ka-fai ("Election") and Shawn Yue Man-lok ("Infernal Affairs," "I Come With The Rain"). And while specifics are still being kept under wraps, we have learned the story will involve a Balkan hacker operating out of a South Asian country, with an American and Chinese task force in pursuit.

Things seem to be coming to together, and the plan is to try and get production on the movie rolling this summer, and hopefully we'll know more soon.
Title: Re: Michael Mann
Post by: wilder on April 22, 2013, 04:54:12 PM
Viola Davis Goes Cyber With Michael Mann & Chris Hemsworth
via The Playlist

Michael Mann has never been the most prolific filmmaker, but it's rare during the course of his career that he's taken any more than three years between films. We assume that it is largely down to the ill-fated HBO show "Luck" that Mann hasn't had a film in cinemas since "Public Enemies" in 2009, but it looks like we won't be waiting too much longer with his currently untitled cyber theft thriller set to go in front of cameras in China next month.

Chris Hemsworth is already on board to star in the film that Mann co-wrote with Morgan Davis Foehl. Not much is known about the specifics of the movie, but talk was that the film will follow a Balkan hacker operating out of South Asia who has an American and Chinese task force on his tail. Well, we haven't learned much more about the plot or Hemsworth's character, even though production is fast approaching, but what we do know is that Viola Davis is likely to appear as an FBI agent in the film.

Davis, a Tony-winner and twice Oscar nominee (for "Doubt" and "The Help") was last seen on the big screen in "Beautiful Creatures" and will show up in another potential young adult franchise next, "Ender's Game." She's also got "The Disappearance of Eleanor Rigby: His," "The Disappearance of Eleanor Rigby: Hers" and "Prisoners" due later this year, and working with Michael Mann isn't a bad way to follow those up. Last we heard, Mann was looking at a lot of Chinese actors to join the film, which makes sense given the setting, so we'd expect to get confirmation on some of those roles as the film moves closer to production.
Title: Re: Michael Mann
Post by: wilder on May 02, 2013, 04:09:50 PM
Michael Mann's 'Agincourt' Still Alive, Gets A New Writer
via The Playlist

hough he's set to shoot his first film in three years this month, the untitled cyber theft thriller starring Chris Hemsworth, Michael Mann is still keeping an eye on what comes next.
Originally floated as his next potential film in 2010, Mann started developing "Agincourt" with a script by "Elizabeth" and "The Tudors" writer Michael Hirst before bringing on "RKO 281" director Benjamin Ross for a rewrite. Now Deadline reports that a new writer has been brought on in the form of Stuart Hazeldine (the writer behind Alex Proyas' scuttled take on "Paradise Lost" and co-writer of Moses movie "Gods and Kings").

Adapted from the Bernard Cornwell novel, the film retells the famous battle between Henry V's English Army and the French Army, and focuses on "a young man with a death sentence who is saved when his skills with the bow catch the attention of the king. The archer develops into a warrior and falls in love with a young woman whose virtue he saved from a lecherous priest." Seeing as we're big fans of Mann's last historical epic, "Last of the Mohicans," we can't help but get a little excited. Since Mann still has his next film to shoot and the already long development process "Agincourt" has had (not to mention all the other projects he's been linked to in the past), we're assuming it's going to be a while before anything happens.
Title: Re: Michael Mann
Post by: wilder on May 17, 2013, 01:43:30 PM
Michael Mann Out, Spike Lee In For Paul Haggis-Produced Adventure 'Gold'
via The Playlist

Though it's been four years since Michael Mann last directed a feature film, it wasn't for lack of trying. In addition to the currently-shooting -- and still-untitled -- international-cyber-crime thriller, Mann has the historical epic "Agincourt" and the long-gestating Robert Capa biopic, among countless others. Now The Wrap is reporting that the "Heat" director's workload just got a little lighter.

All the way back in 2011, Mann attached himself to the "Treasure Of The Sierra Madre"-esque Paul Haggis-developed project "Gold." With his recent flurry of activity Mann decided to bow out of the project, leaving the director's chair open for none other than Spike Lee.
Title: Re: Michael Mann
Post by: mogwai on September 15, 2013, 06:23:59 AM
So I haven't seen "Manhunter" but I saw "Red Dragon" yesterday. And it is what is, an average movie with a shitty director. And I've read that mostly everyone (yes, the entire globe) thinks that "Manhunter" is better. And I'd just like to know which version is the best? The theatrical or the directors cut? Thanks.
Title: Re: Michael Mann
Post by: Alexandro on September 15, 2013, 10:59:29 AM
I don't know which version of manhunter is better, but i would wait to see it if you just saw red dragon. you will know what will happen at every turn...
Title: Re: Michael Mann
Post by: Reel on September 15, 2013, 12:12:43 PM
Quote from: Christian on September 15, 2013, 06:23:59 AM
So I haven't seen "Manhunter" but I saw "Red Dragon" yesterday. And it is what is, an average movie with a shitty director. And I've read that mostly everyone (yes, the entire globe) thinks that "Manhunter" is better. And I'd just like to know which version is the best? The theatrical or the directors cut? Thanks.

I just bought 'The Silence Of The Lambs' recently and this is the time of the year that my horror movie watching really ramps up with the seasons changing and all. So I've been wanting to watch a great one, but I feel so familiar with this movie that I can never get in the mood. Like Alexandro said, "I know what happens at every turn." With Manhunter I don't, though. I'm another one of those poor schmucks who was first introduced to the story through Fat boy. Only seen Manhunter in chunks but the atmosphere and cinematography alone make it ten times better than 'Dragon'. So thanks for the reminder, Chris! I also believe this movie is streaming on Netflix.
Title: Re: Michael Mann
Post by: wilder on September 15, 2013, 02:18:02 PM
I've only ever seen Manhunter's theatrical cut, but the director's cut is only a three minute difference. This review (http://www.dvdtalk.com/reviews/6878/manhunter-restored-directors-cut-divimax-edition/) has a brief rundown of the specific differences, and calls them "largely inconsequential", and this page (http://www.movie-censorship.com/report.php?ID=1299) goes into insane detail about the differences with screencaps and shot descriptions. Only the theatrical version is on blu-ray, though, so if you can watch it that way that'd probably be your best bet.
Title: Re: Michael Mann
Post by: MacGuffin on September 15, 2013, 04:11:13 PM
Quote from: Christian on September 15, 2013, 06:23:59 AMAnd I'd just like to know which version is the best? The theatrical or the directors cut? Thanks.

The theatrical cut. It includes scenes that work best for pace and story. Director's Cut has scenes that were best left out.
Title: Re: Michael Mann
Post by: mogwai on September 17, 2013, 10:47:29 AM
Quote from: wilderesque on September 15, 2013, 02:18:02 PM
I've only ever seen Manhunter's theatrical cut, but the director's cut is only a three minute difference. This review (http://www.dvdtalk.com/reviews/6878/manhunter-restored-directors-cut-divimax-edition/) has a brief rundown of the specific differences, and calls them "largely inconsequential", and this page (http://www.movie-censorship.com/report.php?ID=1299) goes into insane detail about the differences with screencaps and shot descriptions. Only the theatrical version is on blu-ray, though, so if you can watch it that way that'd probably be your best bet.

I believe the british region 2 has the directors cut available at amazon.co.uk. Thanks for the help y'all!  :yabbse-thumbup:
Title: Re: Michael Mann
Post by: wilder on September 24, 2014, 07:06:57 PM
Title: Re: Michael Mann
Post by: wilder on October 02, 2014, 09:30:21 PM
Full transcript (http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/legendary-newsman-mike-wallace-detested-734792) of Michael Mann's 90 minute Hollywood Masters interview
Title: Re: Michael Mann
Post by: wilder on April 15, 2015, 10:42:48 AM
Michael Mann To Direct Enzo Ferrari Biopic
via The Playlist

Michael Mann devotees will likely remember that quite a few years ago, the filmmaker was lining up a movie based on the book "Go Like Hell: Ford, Ferrari, and Their Battle for Speed and Glory at Le Mans" by A.J. Baime, about the Le Mans battle between Ford and Ferrari in 1966. The project never got off the ground, but it seems Mann hasn't lost his need for speed because he has another car movie he's getting behind the wheel on.

Variety reports that Mann will direct a biopic on Enzo Ferrari. The movie will be based on Brock Yates' book "Enzo Ferrari: The Man, the Cars, the Races." This project has been brewing for a while, with Sydney Pollack once attached to direct with Al Pacino in the lead, over a decade ago. This version will have a script put together from two different drafts by Troy Kennedy Martin ("The Italian Job") and David Rayfield ("Out of Africa"), telling the story of the larger than life personality behind one of the world's most famous automobile companies.

Financing is being put together and this won't shoot until 2016, so this one is still a bit of a way off. But we're also just glad to see Mann get moving on something after his cyber-thriller "Blackhat" tanked hard earlier this year. And oh, this is not to be confused with another brewing Ferrari movie, that reportedly has Robert De Niro slated to star.
Title: Re: Michael Mann
Post by: OpO1832 on May 13, 2015, 09:45:29 PM
Mann need to make his next movie ON FILM. He abandoned film and every since his movies look like shit. He is a master of film but its so sad to see each movie he makes look like such crap. I don't know whats a bigger disappointment his terrible rebook of famed property Miami Vice or the awful looking Public Enemies.I  will give Blackhat a try but its looks so fucking stupid! A hacker wielding a gun, being played by Thor. Hackers look like Kevin Mitnick and Snowden..and they don't need wield automatic pistols and work for the man.
Title: Re: Michael Mann
Post by: wilder on June 07, 2015, 11:14:11 PM
"Witness" (2012) (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt2475150/?ref_=tt_ov_inf) is available to watch on youtube

Drug trafficking, poverty, gang violence, corruption and ethnic warfare have created some of the most dangerous hot spots on Earth. Witness follows our current generation of photojournalists into these conflict zones in Mexico, Libya, Brazil and South Sudan. In the four-part series, war photographers carry us into the heart of the human drama of the people in the action on the ground. We see what compels the photojournalist and experience why, when everyone else seeks cover, the photojournalist stands and moves closer.

S01E01 Juarez:




and Rio (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bEpWuVQDzjY), Libya (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E_h8Bd77Zw8), and South Sudan (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1NIs0ehSuJ0)
Title: Re: Michael Mann
Post by: wilder on August 21, 2015, 01:33:19 PM
Christian Bale And Michael Mann Reteam For 'Ferrari'
via The Playlist

Christian Bale is reteaming with his "Public Enemies" director for the project. Based on Brock Yates' book "Enzo Ferrari: The Man, the Cars, the Races" with a script by Troy Kennedy Martin ("The Italian Job") and David Rayfield ("Out of Africa"), the film tells story of the founder of one of the most famous car company's in the world. The '50s-set story will also have a romantic angle as part of the plot, and a female lead is being sought.

This won't shoot until next summer ("The Promise" co-starring Oscar Isaac is next for Bale — it starts lensing in September), but now it's pre-sales season, so the filmmakers are trying to hustle up the budget.
Title: Re: Michael Mann
Post by: wilder on September 19, 2015, 05:57:48 PM
Michael Mann On The Long Odysseys of 'Heat' And 'Ferrari' – Toronto Q&A
9/16/15
via Deadline

EXCLUSIVE: "So you write a story about a movie I'm not doing, and you make the first time Al Pacino and Robert De Niro share the screen together an afterthought?" That's my recollection of the first words that Michael Mann ever said to me, after I wrote a Weekly Variety column about how he and Leonardo DiCaprio were scrapping their James Dean movie, and oh yeah, Mann would instead direct this crime drama called Heat. Boy, was Mann right. Last night in Toronto, he and cast members Pacino, De Niro, Val Kilmer and Ashley Judd celebrated the 20th anniversary of his seminal Los Angeles crime thriller, one that took about 20 years to go from script to screen. To honor the occasion, he took a trip down memory lane with Deadline, and filled us in on his next film, the one in which Christian Bale will play Italian automobile magnate Enzo Ferrari. That project is similar to Heat, each an epic-sized drama that took forever to solve the creative challenges. Re-watching Heat to get ready for the TIFF event, Mann sounded more than pleased by how it holds up, two decades later. "It's been awhile since I saw it on film, and you know, it doubles the world, makes it so much more real," he said. "It's convincing me that maybe I need to shoot Ferrari on film."

Mann allowed Deadline to see the actual marked up shooting script that he, Pacino and De Niro worked off during the classic mano a mano scene between Pacino's Hanna and De Niro. It might seem unusual to spend so much time with a 1995 film, but I think its fans will find it worth the ride:

DEADLINE: Just like the Ferrari project you'll do with Christian Bale, the Heat script took about 20 years. Does it sit in a drawer, waiting for inspiration?


MANN: It's a bit more dramatic than that. It's that there was something missing, something wrong. The heart of the story was always there, in Heat. Two men who are in opposition to each other and the activities of their life, are perfect counterpoints and contain components that are identical. They're both self aware, and they don't fool themselves. They see their own self and the world they live in without any filters or blinders. So they're very similar and yet there's one or two components in which they're exactly opposite. Preserving life is imperative for Hanna, and clearly it is not for McCauley. That basic dialectic, and its formal presentation in the coffee shop scene, is where the movie started with in its origin.

DEADLINE: Why wasn't that enough?


MANN: There was always something wrong, and it was in the ending. So I worked the screenplay and worked the screenplay and as soon as I discovered what it was and fixed it, getting it made was rather instantaneous. It was really within weeks of figuring out what was wrong, rewriting it, and then, let's go. Terry Semel, Bob Daly and Bruce Berman at Warners said, let's do it. It was that rapid. Ferrari is the same thing. There's something really golden that Troy Kennedy Martin captured. The difference is that I wrote Heat as an original, but not Ferrari. Troy captured something golden and spectacular in terms of the warmth, heart, and the real fabric of people's lives in 1957 in tumultuous times in Modena, Italy. But there was something wrong in the storytelling that stopped [Ferrari]. When I finally discovered what it was, early this year, the whole thing clicked. All I achieved in the revisions I did was to liberate the gold that Troy put there originally, and made it all work. It's a structural thing about how the movie really should end, and a decision about what is the critical relationship, which is between Ferrari, his wife Laura and Piero, who is his second son. His first son, Dino, had died a-year-and-a-half earlier. He's married to Laura, he had a son Dino who had muscular dystrophy and died in 1955.

DEADLINE: What does the Ferrari story have that sustained your passion for so long?

MANN: The simple answer, which is useless, is everything. It's one year in his life, 1957. That's the year that, fortuitously, the parts of his life that I most care about in making a human story, all collide. It's an opera, it's a family drama, a tragedy, filled with wry humor. It's a racing film, but it's not a movie about car racing. It's a movie about this guy's life and his passion. He started as a race car driver and then became a racing team manager for Alfa Romeo. His passion was to make the racing team win, so he's kind of an impresario, conductor or film director, of a race team. He's an instigator of men, many of whom tragically die young. He's very close to death and death is very close to him. His father died young, his brother died young. In the year of 1957, of the seven Ferrari drivers, only two were left alive at the end. He is passionate, plenty of libido. There's part of him that's like a metronome. As an engineer, he's precise, like a master draftsman. At the same time, he has passion. There are other women in his life. Sex, food, death. There is a contradiction between chaos on one hand and the precision with which you determine the diameter of an exhaust valve, on the other. Someone in London who really knew the heart of this, who's Italian, said it sounds like what you're doing is making something so intensely local that it's universal. And that's it. The film is about life, danger, passion, racing with volcanic temperament throughout.

DEADLINE: You worked with Christian Bale in Public Enemies, when his Melvin Purvis character chased Johnny Depp's bank robber character John Dillinger. What makes Bale right for this?


MANN: His courage, his humor, the way Christian makes himself into a character. You think of him in American Hustle and then as Purvis in Public Enemies; the range is extraordinary. He understands who this man Ferrari is, his irrepressible force and how he's always on the attack. There's nothing generically Italian about this, it's a local story.  Modena had two opera companies, two football teams and two race car companies. The people who ran all these went to the same barber shop to get a shave every single morning. The Orsi brothers are sitting there with Ferrari, who's sitting there reading the newspaper and says to one of the guys who runs the football team, "If your team doesn't win Saturday, I'm thinking of moving my car company to Bologna because my drivers are being demoralized by this constant series of losses." And the guy who runs the opera company says something, and then someone asks him, "When are you going to get a decent tenor?" That's the nature of it. Troy Kennedy Martin captured something golden in the heart of this that hooked myself and Sydney Pollack in 1997. It's such a great story that it has sustained itself in my ambitions ever since and did so for Sydney, until he tragically passed away. There was something unresolved about it that made it not complete. Sydney felt the same. When I figured out what it was, I did a rewrite, which did nothing but deliver in full power what Troy Kennedy Martin had put there in the first place. Suddenly, the whole thing clicked in. That's why I'm doing it now and why the screenplay really works now and has gotten the reaction it has.

DEADLINE: Can you distill what Pollack brought to this?

MANN: Great sophistication about men and women, and emotions that are authentic and more interesting because they are atypical. Life is asymmetrical, it doesn't fall into convenient binaries we normally impose on fiction. Sydney has an insatiable appetite for passion, emotion in real people and the way it really works. That includes tragic loss, and there's nothing as tragic as the loss of a child. That's something Ferrari experienced, one year before this happened. His son Dino died in 1955 of muscular dystrophy. Ferrari was certain, as the great engineer he was, that he could save his son. He could monitor the output and input of this human body and given all the skill sets he had, he could organize the best medical care and he would save his son. He told that to his wife and it didn't happen. As he said, I misled myself, I deluded myself. That's part of what's going on in the script, which occurs a year and a half after Dino died.

DEADLINE: Heat sounds similar in the way you solved the problems. Did you just need it to rattle around your head?

MANN: No, it's very specific. It came down to how the relationship should end and the breakthrough was that Neil McCauley would be fortunate enough to live the last moments of his life very close with the guy who was the most similar to him as any other man on the planet, while at the same time, also the person who killed him. The two are separate and there's no contradiction there. They're both true. Once I grasped this is how it ought to end, that he's literally holding hands with the guy who just killed him, and that that's the man he's been closest to. As soon as that became clear, then the whole idea worked. To tell a story in which there's these two protagonists and you are empathetic to each when you're with his story. At the same time, they're both in opposition to each other and trying to kill the other. The structure, if you could pull it off, had wonderful complexity. But it had to drive to where one does kill the other and then they're instantly together and McCauley's last moments are with Hanna. Once I had that, I could then reverse engineer that into a number of scenes so that it all built to that ending.

DEADLINE: It was one of those movies that introduced an array of characters buzzing around Hanna and McCauley, and what's remarkable is how quickly we knew who each of them was and what they needed. Does that come from the endless rewriting and gestation period, that you gave everyone his own mythology, including the tragic getaway driver played by Dennis Haysbert? With so many ensemble movies, it is difficult to remember names or who people are. How much of the 20 year gestation was about allowing you to connect all these characters in a fast, seamless manner?

MANN: What you ask is very insightful. For me, the experience was to compose and orchestrate the collision of all these people's lives. That's one. Two, is that crime and doing police work, that's only what they do. The narrative is driven by who they are, what they want. In the scene by scene construction of the story, the most important parts to me were these choruses where you take everybody home. After the first robbery goes down, we take Neil McCauley home to an alienating blue room over the ocean. We take Vincent Hanna home to a difficult marriage. We take Chris Shiherlis [Val Kilmer] home to the dissonant relationship with his wife [Ashley Judd], who wants him to take responsibility and grow up already. We see Neil McCauley again and he meets Eady [Amy Brenneman] and things begin to change. Then you go back to the plot drive of the crime story, the police story. And then you're back again. So the real engine is the people, the characters. It's not really a genre film. So then, when you start getting into who these people are, it's a very self-aware Vincent Hanna, who really is what Justine [Diane Venora] says, that "All you are is who you're going after." He knows he's going to fu*k up this third marriage, too. Then there's Breedan [Dennis Haysbert], who has acquiesced to exploitation to try and construct some kind of a life for he and Lilian and the discipline he has to have is to not give into his impulse to rebel against the exploitation of some shi*ty restaurant manager.

DEADLINE: So you have the equally competent cop and robber who think they are in control, but can't control the circumstances of people swirling around them...


MANN: There's Neil, living a catechism of non-attachment. That is the smart way to live your life when you're living outside the law and you come from circumstances of alienation and loneliness. You maintain your loneliness, you maintain your alienation, except for your bond to your partners, and you don't get attached. You don't have anything in your life you can't walk from in 30 seconds flat. Because you'll make one phone call, two years from now in Brazil, and they'll be tracking that call and if you have sentiment for that woman, they'll locate you. So you don't get attached. You leave that for after you've scored and take off. Then he described his life to Eady as a needle starting at zero and going the other way, a double blank and then you come along. So he abandons it and there's an initial rush of living an emotional life spontaneously, which he's not supposed to do. In making that happen, he's abandoning navigation. So then he's susceptible to being seduced with vengeance to go get Waingro, which is his undoing. So if you go back to the macro, another kind of guiding principle in the operating system of how the story tells itself is, what happens in these people's lives is a function of the way they think life happens.

For Neil, there's rigid cause and effect in his life. If he deviates, there's going to be a cost. It is nonnegotiable. Chris Shiherlis is postmodern and has no guiding principles to anything. He is impulsively driven and so he should be turned out by Charlene in the interest of his kid and her life. He smiles and she gives him a pass, and he escapes. He lives in a world without rules. So those imperatives are what drives the events, but I'm predetermining the outcome. And that is the ultimate collision of Neil and Vincent, and reverse engineering that back into all of the scenes. So yeah, that took years.

DEADLINE: How far into the process did you fix on the idea of pairing Al Pacino and Robert De Niro?


MANN: That came when Art Linson and I were having breakfast at the Broadway Deli in Santa Monica...

DEADLINE: The same place where Neil meets Eady the first time...


MANN: Yet another great restaurant that's no longer there because a greedy landlord raised the rent. Just like Kate Mantilini, for the same reason...

DEADLINE: Where you staged the scene between Pacino and De Niro...


MANN: Yeah. So Art and I were at the Broadway Deli when I asked if he wanted to produce it with me and he said, "You're out of your mind. You've got to direct it." Then we came up with the idea of Bob and Al. Who were the best people we could imagine for these parts? It was Bob and Al.

DEADLINE: Both were in Godfather II but shared no scenes. Was that what got you excited about presenting them together the first time?


MANN: That's kind of superfluous. It actually became something of a crutch that I had to bear. I wasn't really that interested in the stunt, the fact that these guys had never been in a movie together. In the structure of the storytelling, there's one scene that is designed to be the prelude to that meeting. It's during the aborted burglary. They're eyeball to eyeball, face to face, except it's a video image from the surveillance truck. Hanna is looking at Neil, and it's Neil looking at something suspicious, a noise he heard from a certain truck parked across the street. We know that inside that truck is Hanna. They are, in a virtual way, face to face. That's the prelude to the inspiration he gets, off of a conflict with Justine. He says, "Fu*k it. I'm going to go meet this guy."

DEADLINE: Where did you get all these characters?


MANN: All of them are novelizations in a way of real people. My late friend, Charlie Adamson, killed the real Neil McCauley in 1963. Fundamentally, the whole idea for the movie...sometimes these things just occur to you in a flash. The idea to do this movie came when Charlie was telling me about sitting down with Neil McCauley and they had this conversation and how much rapport there was between them. That was because there was tremendous respect, which wouldn't interfere with Charlie blowing this guy out of his socks at the drop of a hat if he caught him coming out of a score. Charlie was a guy who would say, "Look how smart this guy is. Look how clever he is. This guy's a real pro." There was serious professional admiration for a guy who was a really good professional thief. That's what McCauley was.

DEADLINE: Do you recall when you heard that idea? Did it hit you like a thunder bolt?


MANN: When I heard the story and the exchange they had, that became the whole core idea of the movie, it was at the Belden Deli on Lincoln Avenue in Chicago. It was a special feeling. I don't know if it was a thunderbolt, but you feel the electricity of the idea. It's like, you know when you know, this is a genome of a movie. Another situation like that came when Lowell Bergman and I were developing a project on an arms merchant, and Lowell was living through the experiences of The Insider. We're having this couple of phone calls and one Sunday afternoon he says, "You'll never guess what happened to me today. I'm walking down the hall and Don Hewitt comes up and says this and that." And then he says, "I don't even like Wigand, but I know how much he is putting on the line." I said, wait a minute. Forget this other thing. What you are living through, that's the movie. I just knew right then and there I wanted to do that. So then I corralled Eric Roth into it and he and I did The Insider. You just know when you know on some of these things.

DEADLINE: A lot of what we see inHeat was done first in a backdoor pilot that didn't get picked up, called L.A. Takedown. It even had the iconic coffeehouse scene. To me, that qualifies as the dictionary definition of taking a mulligan. No disrespect to those TV actors, but I watched that scene and they are not Pacino and De Niro.


MANN: What happened is, Brandon Tartikoff is a guy I loved dearly, but we disagreed on who ought to be the lead [in L.A. Takedown]. I wasn't going to abandon the actor who was in the pilot. So I said I'd rather not do it. He'd have made the series if I had changed the lead, which I didn't want to do. I owned the material, I deficit financed the pilot myself because I didn't want to let this material go anywhere. I don't know how long it was after that, maybe four years after a pilot that still had many problems in the writing. I figured it out afterwards. As soon as I figured it out, we shot it in the summer of 95 and released in December.

DEADLINE: Do you sometimes breathe a sigh of relief for the way that unfolded? Had that gone to series we wouldn't be talking about this. You can see a difference in budget and the look. It's stark.


MANN: Yeah. I had a lot of financial support from Arnon Milchan, the financier, as well as the guys from Warner Brothers.

DEADLINE: The Pacino-De Niro coffee shop encounter is far from the only memorable scene. You shot this bank robbery scene and the resulting shootout without visual effects in long takes, with the natural sounds of the gunfire and all the chaos adding to the realism. What's that like to plan and execute?
MANN: It was a major undertaking. I imported some guys from the British SAS and all the training was done on the LA County Sherriff's combat shooting ranges up around Magic Mountain. We did everything for real, in the sense that I went on to my location and I blocked all the action way ahead of time. Measured everything. You stay here behind the car, then you're going to move to this post box for cover. Then you're going to go from there to the next. So all of those distances were recreated with flats, out on the range. Then we trained the actors to become proficient in close quarter combat, under unbelievably intense supervision and safety regulations. Even more so than they normally have on an official shooting range. They're very, very strict about it and the first day out there on the range I don't think they even fired a shot. It was all about safety and protocol and taking the gun apart and putting it back together again.

They got so good that the footage of Val Kilmer, firing in two directions and doing a reload without a cut, they used that at Fort Bragg for Special Forces training. Like, what percent of you is going to get as good as this actor? Just smooth. I wanted the actors to feel that they can do this for real, with live ammunition. Just like you would train if you were in the sheriffs or if you were in LAPD.

DEADLINE: Why?


MANN: Actors have this crazy rapid learning profile, particularly when it comes to eye-hand coordination. So their skills were acquired very, very rapidly and they became very, very good at this. Just like Will Smith becoming a boxer in Ali. He just became a boxer. So it was all laid out and then we shot on a sequence of weekends. Every Saturday and Sunday downtown, for six weeks. There's an elaborate sound effect worked up by Lon Bender, but as good as that was, it was theatrical and nothing that was equivalent to the way sound bounced off those buildings. It was frightening.

DEADLINE: I recall some claiming cops would not engage in a shootout like that with civilians all around, but then there was an actual bank robbery later that unfolded in eerily similar fashion.


MANN: I remember. They made one mistake though, assaulting the police instead of fleeing the police. The whole point is to shoot your way out. You're supposed to leave because police assets accrue rapidly, the longer you stay. You're assaulting the police to shoot your way out but the point is to get out. They just stood around.

DEADLINE: Back to that scene with Pacino and De Niro. You dreamed up this pairing, after Charlie Adamson first described it. You cast them, and then you keep these stars apart. Then you are sitting next to them when it happens, with the eleventh take being the one your used. Describe all that.


MANN: The three of us formed this little ensemble for that scene. We were all kind of smart enough to not do things like rehearse it. We talked about what the scene meant. We paraphrased some of the interactions. We all knew it was the heart of the whole movie. Everything leads up to it and everything is a result of it, afterwards. I wanted all of the magic that happens spontaneously to occur when I'm shooting the actual scene. So both actors were shot simultaneously. Because I expected...they're both so terrific and were so attuned within their characters, not as Bob and Al, but as McCauley and Hanna. They were both so attuned to this meeting of disparate people who were opposed to each other, who were actually sitting together, staring right across from each other. The slightest movement or body language or gesture by Al, a resettling of his weight in a chair, produced a reaction from McCauley, De Niro. McCauley's thinking, is Hanna's right hand moving three inches closer to where he suspects he has a gun holstered? Should he shift his weight so that he has access to his weapon so that he could be two or three milliseconds faster?

That kind of minute thinking is going on in one part of the brain. While in the other part, they are moving into such intimacy that only strangers can have. When you tell somebody what you dream and then McCauley says I have a woman. He's telling him things you couldn't tell anybody else. He knows that Hanna has already confessed that his life is not barbecues and baseball games and that it's pretty fu*ked up. He runs down that I've got a stepdaughter who's a mess. I'm on my third wife and that's not going anywhere, because I spend all my time chasing guys like you around the block. Then he starts to get almost Dear Abby advice from Neil McCauley on what he's doing wrong. Hanna takes in that advice and says, "What about you?" When McCauley says, "I have a woman," he asks, "What do you tell her?" "She thinks I'm a salesman." Then he asks, what are you going to do if you see me around the corner and he says, "I'm going to flee, and that's the discipline." You could tell that Hanna doesn't quite believe him.

Now, cut to when Hanna's convinced he's lost McCauley. McCauley is going for Waingro [who spoiled the bank robbery], and Hanna's heard it. He lands by helicopter and there's a crowd of people. He looks through the crowd and the masses of people and fire engines, and he sees a woman alone in a car. And he knows that's where McCauley is.

DEADLINE: So McCauley revealed too much...

MANN: That's why Hanna wanted the meeting and why McCauley wanted the meeting. So the question for the actors is, what's my action? Why do I want to meet this guy? What am I there for in the first place? It's because you may learn something. They both are so skilled that they know that their subconscious may pick something up later on because of something that they've registered or learned by being face to face. What they didn't expect by being face to face is that they're in many ways the same guy and they didn't expect there to be this rapport. Real respect and rapport for each other, and then regret. So of course Hanna is not going to hesitate for a moment to shoot this guy. He has total regret that he's just ended the life of Neil McCauley. That's not a contradiction. They're both true, and that's the way life is. It's only in fiction that these things become these neat, symmetrical contradictions. So the challenge of the whole movie was to try and make a drama that is really pulled from life, is about life, and is the way life is. For me personally, that was the challenge.

DEADLINE: That scene you mentioned with the fire trucks and chaos around that hotel where McCauley kills Waingro. McCauley's decision to leave Eady and escape doesn't take longer than the 30 seconds he talked about in that coffee shop. Was it that precise?
MANN: Hanna is running down Century Boulevard, headed to the airport. He doesn't know which way to look, as people are running past him. He turns over his shoulder and I ramped him to slow motion. You don't really perceive it but in fact he slows down ever so slightly and the sound starts to disappear. You're suddenly seeing what he's seeing. Then there's that long lens shot of this woman, alone in that Camaro. She looks anxious. He starts to walk and then he runs right for that car. This is the woman McCauley had mentioned. He knows by now McCauley went for the bait. And then McCauley sees him, and knows he's never going to see this woman again.

DEADLINE: Why set the climax in that barren place near the planes like you did?


MANN: That was the most transient place I could find. I wanted to find a landscape that was so transient that it started to achieve a surreal effect on you but still maintained the gritty reality of the movie. For me, it's always the couple hundred yards before the runway starts at airports. Most people don't go there, it's a place where transients populate. There are towers, those orange and white buildings. I'm just attracted to places like that. The edge of runways, with those blue lights in them for example, they're quite beautiful at dusk or at night. They're part of our urban landscape but they have an unusual quality. The same way that Vegas in the 70s was kind of a Twilight Zone because you had all of these empty lots and then a casino. That's all gone now.

DEADLINE: You've had memorable pairings that were critical to films all through your career. I always wonder how you know that two actors will be the right chemical match. How did you know De Niro and Pacino would mesh, when their styles are so different...


MANN: That's because the characters are so different and that's where it starts. Neil McCauley, his life is lived from the inside out and he's a very inward directed man. He is very thoughtful and has a lot of forethought and logic to what he's going to do. So he's somebody who takes his own counsel a lot. Hanna is the same, but there's a part of Hanna that engages in displays of street theater, all to an objective. When he is particularly frustrated and he's just being himself...I'm talking about Hanna now, not Pacino. When their surveillance of the burglary goes wrong because one of the uniform cops sits down and his rifle hits the wall in the truck and McCauley hears that and because of professional discipline, he just says we walk. I don't know what it is. There's a noise that doesn't belong here. There's some trucks that don't belong here. We're walking away, and they just walk.

Vincent gets in an argument with the uniformed superior who says, arrest them anyway for breaking and entering. Hanna's pissed off and is frustrated beyond belief and they're going to have to start over. That whole scene, the rage is completely contained. He's very, very quiet and it breaks into the rhythm of his words and it's a wonderful little scene that's totally contained. On the other hand, when he's working with one of his informants like Albert Torena and Richard Torena, played by Ricky Harris and Tone Loc, there's a hilarious scene in this chop shop that's behind a dog fighting kennel, an illegal abattoir we found in an unincorporated part of Wilmington. It was all real, we just moved the cameras in. When Torena says my brother's not here, and Hanna breaks into song and says, don't waste my motherfu*king time, that's all street theater. That's all to convince your informant that he cannot predict your behavior, and because you are not predictable, you are dangerous and he'd better come across. It is meant to disrupt and disorient the informant. It's all to a purpose. So it's Hanna, acting. I have such a high regard for both men as artists of stunning integrity and authenticity, that the idea of working with the two of them together in the same film was kind of a dream. Al Pacino is Vincent Hanna with that theatricality, and the tremendous intensity that De Niro is capable of that made me know it was going to make Neil McCauley work.

DEADLINE: A moment on some of the other pairings. Daniel Day-Lewis and Madeleine Stowe made such a romantic couple in Last of the Mohicans. I would not have imagined Daniel Day Lewis coming out My Left Foot could become a frontier hero, or that Stowe could emerge a frontier woman. How'd you know?


MANN: Well, she's not really a frontier woman. She's very extroverted, she has fantastic, flamboyant energy. She's half Colombian and half English. The idea was somebody playing opposite to that, meaning in a fictional character. I imagined her living in Grosvenor Square, an upper middle class neighborhood of the middle of the 18th century. I know the music she would have been listening to in 1755. She would have come from a society that had very strict codes and very strict mores and values. Not to say that there wasn't rebelliousness, but that I wanted a woman who was passionate and was restrained by the very hierarchical class system, and the morays and values of the society she came from in the Middle Georgian period. So I liked casting somebody as volatile as I knew Madeleine could be.

When I met Daniel, I just thought he could do anything. He was a great athlete, a long distance runner with no upper body development whatsoever. It's interesting who got it, when I said Daniel Day-Lewis. Roger Birnbaum and Joe Roth at Fox got it immediately. I didn't even have to explain it. What a great idea. Everybody else was like, the old crippled guy in a wheelchair from My Left Foot? Daniel is a great athlete and it came down to his sense of commitment to project himself into a culture totally alien to him. That is to say, make yourself Daniel Boone, which is culture and skill sets appropriated from Native Americans. Daniel Boone, Sam Houston, many other young males went to live with some of the native peoples. Now, you talk about Madeleine and Daniel, when he is coming on to her. Courtship among the Iroquois was forthright and candid. Sex was permitted, premarital sex was accepted, marriages were monogamous, and if you saw a woman you liked, the accepted approach, the norm, would have been a very forward invitation. That's why he has that look when they're in the infirmary. That's where it's coming from.

DEADLINE: How long did take for Daniel to become that character?

MANN: Daniel was on it for seven or eight months. He started running, carrying a musket, in England. How he didn't get arrested I have no idea, because they weigh a lot. Just to build himself up. He did a lot of work in England before he came here.

DEADLINE: His transformation was remarkable and so was Will Smith's for Ali. Which of your actors put the most rigorous prep into realizing the character on the page?


MANN: There's a number of them, but it's not rigorous prep. It's an adventure. Who wouldn't want to? If you have serious artistic ambition, and self-confidence, who would want to do it any other way? To go on the adventure, if you're an actor, to be able to become a character that you're invested in?

DEADLINE: How long did it take Will Smith to become a boxer skilled enough to handle himself in the ring? I interviewed him then and he looked like he could beat up anybody that I've ever met.


MANN: He did. When we were sparring in Africa, one of his sparring partners was either the No. 1 or No. 2 boxer in Zimbabwe. They got into it and Will probably won two of the three rounds that they fought. That took eight months. First of all, Will and I both had a real commitment to make that movie. Will wasn't getting any younger. At 33, if he was going to play Ali, that was the time, this was the screenplay. I am one year younger than Ali and he was my hero in growing up in the '60s. What infuriated Ali, whether it was the murder of Patrice Lumumba, or the atrocities in the South, the civil right struggle or the politics of Vietnam, infuriated me too. So we shared the same reactions to things that were occurring on the 6 o'clock news in 1964 to 1967. So Will and I were both very committed to do that movie and that's why we put into it what we did. I built a gym about four blocks from my office and Will was there every single morning five days a week for a half day of boxing with Angelo Dundee and we had Michael Olajide, great trainers, and then Ali, whenever he was around. Which was a lot.

DEADLINE: Tom Cruise? He really looked like he knew what he was doing in Collateral.


MANN: He did. I had him out stalking my various crew members for assassination, without them knowing it. They'd be coming from the gym early in the morning and they'd be putting their gym bag in the car and all of a sudden they'd feel a tap on their back and someone had planted a Post-It there. It was Tom, who'd been stalking them for four days and figuring out the kill. It's also Breeden, Waingro, it's William Fichtner becoming the money launderer Roger Van Zant. It's my responsibility, as well as the thrill of it all, to try and help an actor get to that point where when I say action, they are it, they are the guy. They're filled with confidence and they know exactly what they're doing. The slightest gesture is all coming from someplace of conviction. To me, that's the most exciting thing. You have to be working with terrific actors and actresses, whether it's Amy Brenneman or Ashley Judd, Diane Venora. And Jon Voight was incredible, in both Heat and Ali. His character in Heat as Nate is based on somebody we both knew.

DEADLINE: That was Eddie Bunker, right?


MANN: Eddie Bunker wrote a book that became the movie Straight Time. There's such calibration in the bolo tie, the scruffy hair, his slow movements. Compare that to his Howard Cosell, which took 4 1/2 hours of makeup every morning. When he was in that makeup he was in character, the whole time.

DEADLINE: Small world. Danny Trejo was a drug counselor who came to a movie set to help keep a guy straight, and ran into Bunker, who knew Danny when he was the boxing champ in the prison where both served time. Next thing, Trejo was training the star and fighting him in the movie, and he walked away with a SAG card and new career. I always wondered about that scene where the bank robbery is about to go down and Trejo calls McCauley from a pay phone to says he's out, because he can't shake police surveillance. Later, when it's clear he was double crossed, McCauley comes to kill him and finds Trejo battered and dying in a pool of blood, his wife massacred in the bedroom. It's ambiguous, but a deleted scene indicated Trejo was in on it with Waingro and Van Zant's thugs. What happened there?

MANN: The deal was that he and his wife had been grabbed by Waingro and the other thugs and he had been compelled to make the call and betray the robbery. Then he was double crossed and they killed him and his wife anyway. Their home had already been invaded and his wife was taken. The phone call came first and you couldn't give it away there, because I didn't want you to know when they were recruiting Breeden, that the robbery had already been ratted out to the police.

DEADLINE: The precision and attention to detail is something you don't see that much of anymore in crime procedurals. How much harder has it gotten for a filmmaker who tells stories that aren't reliant on four quadrant targets or massive visual effects? Studios look for billion dollar grosses and that means mass appeal. How much harder is it to ply your craft now than it was back when you made Heator The Mohicans or The Insider in the '90s?

MANN: I don't think it's any different. I'll tell you why. Those films have really good stories and very good writing. For me, I believe that a great story, something really terrific, that's well-written, absolutely transcends all of the perceived conventional wisdom of what's supposed to work and not supposed to work. Everybody, whether they're financiers, distributors, actors they respond the same way. What a great story. We kind of have some faith that audiences are going to respond that way as well and then when they do, all of a sudden there's a new trend. We're in a very exciting period. There's great writing in television. There are a lot of good movies.

DEADLINE: Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu lamented to Deadline the studio preoccupation on superhero movies. He felt they were not good for storytelling because there were not grounded dilemmas that human beings struggled through. Instead, they rely on an institutionalized higher power to save the day. Do you feel good about the way the studio business is going?

MANN: I don't agree with that analysis, at all. Whether it's a movie, or great literature like Henry James, or great religious art, quality makes for something resonant and lasting, that has compelling power where you look at it and it hooks you. It's like when you're walking into La Chapelle, which is around the corner from Notre Dame, for the tenth time. It catches you the same way, each time. It can happen when you're watching a movie. I disagree with what he said. Take The Avengers, the movie Joss Whedon directed. That movie works, because the story is good. It's wry, it has sarcastic humor. Those can be really powerful.

If there is a powerful story that really is resonant, it makes the movie transcends the conventional wisdom of whether this genre works or doesn't. You can think of these movies as general categories of genre, but that is a very quantitative way of doing it, and it gets trumped every time there is something completely different that breaks the pattern. That happens, all the time. For example, when Heat was released in December, 1995, I don't remember it being preceded by a recent epical drama on its scale. It did about $75 million, which means there were 25 million people who came to see it, when tickets were a few bucks. Today, when tickets are $10 or $12, the picture would have grossed what, domestically, $300 million? You knock them out, you knock them out. Period. I believe in the power of story, and nothing can save a movie if the story isn't there.
Title: Re: Michael Mann
Post by: Fuzzy Dunlop on September 21, 2015, 12:31:40 AM
Fantastic interview. Here's the marked-up script they mention:

https://pmcdeadline2.files.wordpress.com/2015/09/heat-pg-90-95-coffee-shop-watermark.pdf (https://pmcdeadline2.files.wordpress.com/2015/09/heat-pg-90-95-coffee-shop-watermark.pdf)
Title: Re: Michael Mann
Post by: Alexandro on September 21, 2015, 11:34:23 PM
this man is brilliant. what an interview! and he's so eloquent. I didn't enjoy blackhat but damn if I don't wish with all my soul to see another new movie by him each time. Heat is just masterful filmmaking. The 90's were really out there in terms of risk taking within the studios. Kind of off topic but last friday I watched JFK again and it left me humiliated. Like, I don't even have the ambition to conceive a film like that, let alone write it, film it, execute it and then decide I'm gonna fly with it in post. Really. What the fuck with that awesome Kevin Costner monologue in the last part, like Jimmy Stewart on steroids. And it works so well. It's unthinkable that film and others, like Heat, could be made today with such studio support.
Title: Re: Michael Mann
Post by: Gold Trumpet on September 22, 2015, 12:56:33 PM
Quote from: Alexandro on September 21, 2015, 11:34:23 PM
this man is brilliant. what an interview! and he's so eloquent. I didn't enjoy blackhat but damn if I don't wish with all my soul to see another new movie by him each time. Heat is just masterful filmmaking. The 90's were really out there in terms of risk taking within the studios. Kind of off topic but last friday I watched JFK again and it left me humiliated. Like, I don't even have the ambition to conceive a film like that, let alone write it, film it, execute it and then decide I'm gonna fly with it in post. Really. What the fuck with that awesome Kevin Costner monologue in the last part, like Jimmy Stewart on steroids. And it works so well. It's unthinkable that film and others, like Heat, could be made today with such studio support.

I do like Mann. I haven't liked him as much since he went digital. Still, Last of the Mohicans is one the funnest movies to watch.

Haha Brietbart News website once did a list of the top 25 liberal movies by their film critic and #1 was JFK and it was basically their film critic (admitting he was an unsuccessful filmmaker) saying he could not understand how anyone could make a film that detailed, well edited and that ambitious in a way that works. Stone had 3 editors working on the film and purposely kept them away from each other so they would not try mimic each other's flow with rhythm between scenes.
Title: Re: Michael Mann
Post by: wilder on January 15, 2016, 05:41:32 PM
Christian Bale Exits Michael Mann's 'Enzo Ferrari'
via The Playlist

With an $80 million price tag attached, Michael Mann's brewing "Enzo Ferrari" biopic needs a big name to make that return on investment. And he had one in Christian Bale, who signed on for the picture last year. However, with a summer start date looming, the actor has gotten cold feet about the project.

Deadline reports that Bale has exited the movie, citing health concerns over the weight gain he needed to achieve to play the role. The actor has both slimmed down ("The Machinist," "The Fighter"), bulked up ("The Dark Knight" movies), and pudged out ("American Hustle") for roles over the years, but I'd imagine you can only do that so many times before your body starts to revolt.

Based on Brock Yates's book "Enzo Ferrari: The Man, the Cars, the Races" with a script by Troy Kennedy Martin ("The Italian Job") and David Rayfield ("Out of Africa"), the film tells story of the founder of one of the world's most infamous car franchises. Last fall, Noomi Rapace signed on for the movie as well, but no word yet if she's stlil involved.

The aim is get the movie made on schedule, and the hunt is on for a new A-list actor to take the lead role. Paramount is set to distribute.
Title: Re: Michael Mann
Post by: cronopio2 on January 18, 2016, 07:57:02 AM
they added Heat to Netflix over here and i watched it last night. my god. it's definitely a top 3 film for me.




to whet your appetites, here's that Brian Eno-scored scene:  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QQNBg6I29gI
Title: Re: Michael Mann
Post by: wilder on February 02, 2016, 02:27:13 PM
Heat & Vice: The Films of Michael Mann (http://www.bam.org/film/2016/michael-mann) is running at BAM cinematek February 5 - 16, and features a screening of the new director's cut of Blackhat.
Title: Re: Michael Mann
Post by: wilder on February 11, 2016, 02:54:02 PM
Breaking Down Michael Mann's Sharper Director's Cut Of 'Blackhat' (http://blogs.indiewire.com/theplaylist/breaking-down-michael-manns-sharper-directors-cut-of-blackhat-20160211)
Title: Re: Michael Mann
Post by: wilder on February 15, 2016, 02:06:40 PM
Michael Mann Talks Changes To 'Blackhat,' 'Last Of The Mohicans' & Possible Sci-Fi Project In 1-Hour Talk (https://soundcloud.com/happysadconfused/michael-mann)
Title: Re: Michael Mann
Post by: Mel on February 17, 2016, 12:26:29 PM
Some time ago I had opportunity to see "Thief" and I was blown away. I like Jean-Pierre Melville a lot, so heist aspect of the film did grab me. "Get Carter" is the most similar film I can think of, when it comes to mood. But then "Thief" is very stylized: music, lighting etc. Most of the film is made of night scenes and they all look great. I even like it more than "Heat", yet I have seen "Thief" only once, so I could have missed the weak points.
Title: Re: Michael Mann
Post by: wilder on February 19, 2016, 02:27:18 PM
Title: Re: Michael Mann
Post by: wilder on March 16, 2016, 04:28:01 PM
Michael Mann Plotting 'Heat' Prequel Novel
via The Playlist

Deadline reports that the director is launching Michael Mann Books, which, as the title suggests, will be a company dedicated to the printed word. And one of the first projects in the works is a prequel novel to "Heat," one that will focus on the early years of the characters in the film including Vincent Hanna (Al Pacino), Neil McCauley (Robert De Niro), Chris Shiherlis (Val Kilmer), and Nate (Jon Voight), and presumably establish even more of their histories together.

There's no word yet on who will exactly write the book, but the idea is that Michael Mann Books will have a crew of scribes on hand who will both tackle novels and develop concepts for movies and television. So yes, a prequel film or TV series to "Heat" is certainly a possibility.
Title: Re: Michael Mann
Post by: wilder on March 18, 2016, 04:57:51 PM
Michael Mann Sets First Book; 'Cartel' Author Don Winslow Writing On Crime Bosses Tony Accardo & Sam Giancana
via Deadline

EXCLUSIVE: Michael Mann has set the first publishing project for his new book imprint Michael Mann Books: he will team up with Don Winslow, the bestselling author of The Cartel to co-create an original novel about the complex relationship between two Organized Crime giants, Tony Accardo and Sam Giancana. The project will be developed into a feature film that Mann will produce and possibly direct, based on the novel and a pre-existing screenplay Mann co-wrote with Shane Salerno. Deadline revealed Mann's publishing imprint earlier this week, and his plans to work with top notch authors to generate a series of books including a prequel to his 1995 crime classic Heat.

Winslow will begin work late spring on this, after delivering his next book. Discussions with publishers will begin shortly and the book will be released in 2017. The subject matter has the potential to be as sprawling as Winslow's most recent bestseller The Cartel. Tony Accardo ran the Chicago Outfit – an efficient, unified and massive organization that was the single most powerful criminal enterprise in America. In 1959, LIFE Magazine estimated that the Chicago Outfit's revenue constituted 6% of the U.S. national income. Accardi ran the outfit after predecessor Frank Nitti committed suicide in 1943, but his career as a gangster started around the time of the 1929 St. Valentine's Massacre and spanned eight decades, through the Reagan era.

Giancana – mentored and installed by Accardo to front the Chicago Outfit from 1957 to 1966 – elevated the enterprise onto the New Frontier with bold moves that converged national commerce and industry with politics, Las Vegas, the music industry, Hollywood, and co-ventures with the CIA. His megalomania elevated him to heights never dreamed possible; that exposure eventually became radioactive. Giancana was brutally murdered in 1975.

For the book, Mann has acquired rights and previously undisclosed material from the Accardo family. Both Mann and Winslow have made a living writing about crime: Mann, with genre classics from Heat to Public Enemies, Thief, Manhunter, Miami Vice, Crime Story and the miniseries Drug Wars; Winslow with novels that include The Winter of Frankie Machine, Savages, The Power of the Dog and The Cartel. The latter two spanned the start of the Drug War and the rise of the cartels in Mexico, and those books sold at auction to Fox for a film that Ridley Scott is attached to direct. Winslow has won the Raymond Chandler Award in Italy, the Maltese Falcon Award in Japan and the RBA International Prize for crime writing in Spain, among other plaudits. Michael Mann Books is repped by Salerno at The Story Factory. Mann is represented by CAA, LBI and Attorney Harold Brown.
Title: Re: Michael Mann
Post by: wilder on September 09, 2016, 06:13:22 AM
From the 4K screening of Heat a couple days ago. Blu-ray from the new 4K transfer coming in Q1 2017











Title: Re: Michael Mann
Post by: The Ultimate Badass on September 25, 2016, 02:09:40 AM
I want a real director's cut of The Keep. Even in its current, incredibly butchered form the movie has so many amazing, unique, sequences that stick with you. This movie, and its soundtrack has influenced so many other movies that have come after it.

Title: Re: Michael Mann
Post by: wilder on January 17, 2017, 04:06:23 PM
Michael Mann On Muhammad Ali, Will Smith, And His New Cut Of 'Ali'
via Deadline
by Mike Fleming Jr
January 17, 2017

Some 15 years after its release and a half year after the death of its subject, a new version of the Michael Mann film Ali is today being re-released on DVD. With a career performance by Will Smith as iconic fighter and Civil Rights era catalyst Muhammad Ali, Ali is slightly different than the version widely seen in late 2001. Mann added footage to existing scenes, and excised a ring sequence where an in-his- prime Ali dominated journeyman heavyweight opponent Cleveland Williams to keep it at a comparable length. Mann strengthening the political elements and the depiction of covert government surveillance on a fighter who challenged the status quo when he embraced the Nation of Islam, changed his "slave name" Cassius Clay and refused on religious grounds to be drafted into the army during Vietnam. The latter move got him banned from the ring and cost him his prime years. I met Mann in his Forward Pass offices. He's made memorable movies including Heat, Collateral, The Insider, The Last of the Mohicans and others, but his office is dominated by memorabilia from Ali. Every item had a backstory. There is the photo from the airport recreated in Zaire, when it was designed one that scared pilots for whom the large red "Kinshasa" sign brought back ominous memories of a time when it was not a desirable place to land. There's a photo of Sugar Ray Robinson embracing Ali, years after Robinson (and Joe Louis) rejected the upstart fighter. Ali, of course, was gracious.

DEADLINE: What made you go back in and change the film, 15 years later?

MICHAEL MANN: With the hindsight of history, I felt the drama didn't get all the way there. It wasn't as strong as it should have been. I don't think I changed anything on a movie like Heat [rereleased in 2015 after 20 years], but here, the proportion and how it made you feel, wasn't quite right. I always knew how I wanted you to feel but I wasn't sure that you were actually getting it. And then it occurred to me, what to do to make it be there.

DEADLINE: How much of this was related to Ali's death?

MANN:  Some of it. It made me think about what he meant, who he was. And, what is his story? It's the story of defiance, a guy who says, 'I get to be who I want to be, not who you want me to be. As the heavyweight champion of the world, I'm going to represent something, and I know it's going to be motivational to my people, those rising up from below, all over the world.' And so he was going to craft himself and his representation into that motivational persona. It was a very political act, an evolution that culminates for me in the [George] Foreman fight. By design or by accident, it polarized the world. The '60s were over. It's 1974 in Kinshasa. The forces of the status quo were polarized around Foreman. The forces of hope, the aspirations of people rising up from below in anti-colonial struggles, poor people living in the outskirts of Mozambique, or the Congo, Ali personified that sense of aspiration. It really divided the world. It was the first world heavyweight championship fight like that in the world. It was also only televised in one house in Zaire and it was Mobutu's.

DEADLINE: The dictator who ruled Zaire at the time.

MANN:  He showed it at dinner, Idi Amin. You can't make this stuff up. I wanted to strengthen the struggle, meaning make more tangible the adversarial forces that were adversarial, against a meaning, FBI Cointelpro, the CIA operations in the Third World, particularly countering national racial front movements. There's a time compression. We specifically identified the man who's killed by the firing squad as Patrice Lumumba, who in fact was killed in '61 when Mobutu takes power. The infiltration to the Nation of Islam...all of those tracks are stronger now.

DEADLINE:  What does that do to a film about a man primarily known as the greatest fighter?

MANN: When you increase the adversarial opposition to Ali, the forces of oppression, a number of things happen. One, you really get a better sense of how much he's giving up to take the position that he takes against the war, when he loses the best years of his boxing career. And then the pressures of the forces arrayed against him, impacting and imploding into his romantic life which is tumultuous to begin with. What he stands for means so much more, and the imperative to defeat George Foreman means so much more. And the lack of faith about the outcome from Belinda is that much more poignant.

DEADLINE: She was his second wife, frustrated her husband was continually exploited by the Nation of Islam, and fearful Foreman was going to hurt him, after he had just knocked Joe Frazier around the ring like a rag doll...

MANN:  It doesn't justify what happens, but you come to understand his attraction to Veronica Porche.

DEADLINE:  He met her there when she was a journalist covering the fight in Zaire, and she became the third of his four wives.

MANN: The extra scenes impact everything. I think I told a better story here.

DEADLINE:  How much longer is the movie than the original film?

MANN:  I don't know that it is any longer, because I took out Ali's fight against Cleveland Williams, which is maybe where you saw the prime that Ali lost when he was banned from boxing. I took it out because it felt like it was getting episodic.

DEADLINE:  You said that Ali told the world he wasn't going to be the champ others wanted him to be, but then you show him becoming exactly who Nation of Islam leader Elijah Muhammad needed him to be. He turned his back on his friend Malcolm X when he fell into disfavor with the Nation of Islam. It was a terrible moment that left Malcolm X vulnerable, and he was murdered shortly after. Between that, and the infidelities, you show a lot of moments in Ali's life he wasn't proud of. What was it like, confronting the actual man, at a time he was universally beloved, with those lowlights?

MANN: That was very important to him. We met about it in a meeting in Las Vegas, which was hilarious for some other reasons. It was myself, Ali and Howard Bingham.

DEADLINE: The photographer who was Ali's constant companion, played by Jeffrey Wright.

MANN: He was Ali's closest friend. Ali's voice was very, very soft because of Parkinson's. I have trouble hearing out of one ear. And Howard stutters. So, Ali would say something in a whisper I couldn't hear. And then Howard would translate it for me with a stutter. Then I'd get it then, and I'd ask Ali a question and it started all over again. This cracked up the three of us, but one of the really important things to Ali that came through there was...because Ali had a one-time approval of the script...and he said the thing that was really important to him was he didn't want hagiography. He didn't want idolatry or any kind of sugarcoating. Imagine the amount of flattery that he received through the years. I understood that but I also wanted to know why. He said something really profound: that he was proud of the mistakes he made. He thought he had recognized not all of them but some of them and that he'd fixed some of them and had come to peace with them. And he just walked through life with a sense of, I am who I am and you're diminishing me if you sugarcoat or fictionalize it. I asked him, 'What was the one that you regret the most?' And it was Malcolm X, not having healed the fissure between the two of them that he created when he rejected Malcolm. He loved Malcolm. When we were shooting in Miami, I had working with us Attallah Shabazz, Malcolm's daughter. She looked very much like Malcolm, the light complexion, the reddish hair. Ali had never met her, and I introduced the two of them. He told her how much he loved her father and how much regret he had that he had never had a chance to make it right with him.

DEADLINE:  With the Nation of Islam, it sure comes off like he was pretty well...

MANN:  Indoctrinated?

DEADLINE:  Manipulated. And when he was banned from boxing, the Nation of Islam rejected him, only to come back when he was fighting again. How did he feel about that?

MANN:  At the end of the day he embraced Sunni Islam. It's portrayed accurately in the film, as Belinda says, "They're around you when you got it and they fall off you when you don't." She was the daughter of a very important figure in the Nation of Islam.

DEADLINE: Ang Lee wants to make Thrilla In Manila, a film about the Ali-Frazier fight, shot in 120 frames a minute with 40K resolution and 3D so you can feel what it was like to be Ali in that ring taking devastating punches from Frazier. That seems very much the vantage point of Ali, where the audience feels all this tumultuous stuff coming at him, and Ali reacting. That includes devastating punches from Sonny Liston, Frazier and Foreman.

MANN:  Oh, yeah. I wanted you to feel like you were in the ring, mixing it up. I wanted it to be the best boxing and to feel authentic. What is to be Ali, to listen to the echoes in that ring? We did a couple of things to get there and one of the main things was working with Will Smith. Nobody could have had an actor as courageous and dedicated as he was, as we both were, probably out of fear.

DEADLINE: Why fear?

MANN:  Because of the audacity of thinking we could...for Will to think, OK, I'm going to become Muhammad Ali, one of the most iconic people in the 20th century. And for my part, it was trying to get this right, and have you see the world through Ali's eyes and walk in his shoes and be inside of his skin. Early on when we were working together, there was the physical challenge: how do you become Muhammad Ali? If you're Will Smith, you dedicate a good chunk of time. In terms of the boxing, we came to the conclusion fairly early on, you're just going to have to become a boxer. Boxers take punches. Become a boxer, take a punch and that's what we did. We had tried previously some spring-loaded gloves and cushion this and cushion that. None of that stuff worked.

DEADLINE:  Why not?

MANN:  It all looked phony, and mechanical. And so we did an elaborate system in which I would break down rounds of the Sonny Liston fight for the choreography and in there find the story points we would faithfully re-create. In between we had improvisational sparring in boxing. Take the first round. It has a story. Liston steps through the ropes, assuming he's going to kill him. Ali happened to be perfectly proportioned so if he's 100 feet away you can't tell if he's 5'10 or 6'6. So when he's close to Liston you realize how big he is. He only weighed eight or nine pounds less then Liston. You could see from the fight films of that round that by the end, Liston walks into a left jab to the forehead. Ali is planted and you see Liston's head rock back and all of a sudden he realizes this guy is as fast as a middleweight who hits like a heavyweight. You see that realization dawn. And that became the story we needed to show. So then it became a training regimen literally every day for about three or four hours where Will boxed in a gym we built. We had various trainers. Angelo Dundee, Ali's trainer, was spectacular and around all the time. We had Angelo's instructions and a physiologist from UCLA who created a loop that Will would look at just before he went to sleep. It was Ali's head and shoulder feints. They were so blindingly fast, it was very difficult to acquire that. After about a week and a half, it started coming to Will. There was advanced science on the one end and then Angelo Dundee in the ring saying, "No, no, no. You've got zig then zag." Now I don't know what zig and zag meant but Will learned to. It became like the spirit of Ali was infused in him.

DEADLINE: How long did that take for Will to feel confident in the ring?

MANN: Will got to the point of being that boxer after nine or 10 months.

DEADLINE:  Ali had script approval. What were some of the suggestions he made that surprised you?

MANN: A level of trust had been established and me and Eric Roth were spending as much time with Ali as we could. He couldn't fly to Africa but everything shot here, he was around. And it was a thrill for me because I can only imagine what it was to have a specific memory of a piece of time and place that was meaningful to him. Like the 5th Street Gym, and this bus he loved to drive from Miami to New York, and all over. That 5th Street gym in Miami, we were able to build an exact replica, and were able to bring him into a world from his past. The house he was in, in Chicago, where he sees Foreman beat up Joe Frazier on TV, was actually Herbert Muhammad's real house.

DEADLINE: How did Will Smith's physical preparation compare to what Daniel Day-Lewis put into Last Of The Mohicans? How do you convince an actor to do it?

MANN: Both were similar, to the extreme. It comes down to the actor, who has to want to be ambitious and want to take the artistic journey. That doesn't mean that every single film should require what they went through. This is not what Russell Crowe did in The Insider, or Tom Cruise in Collateral. Those were different. But if you're going to take on something that risky, to say, I'm going to try and portray Muhammad Ali and get it right, you're down for the cause. It would be foolish to go near this, otherwise. That included one of the most difficult things to get with Ali, the speech patterns. Ali rotated among different regional accents, and sometimes in the same rap he would switch perspective. He would have a narrator voice, an Uncle Remus voice, and innocent voice and then come back right around again. Louisville is border south, a very confusing place. You had "colored only" drinking fountains when he's growing up on one side of the river, and across the bridge there aren't any. Will was determined to nail the nuance in the speech patterns and he did. Having Ali around gave us huge insights. He'd be lying down, and we noticed he would keep his hands together across his chest, his fingers poised delicately on his sternum. It clicked with us, one day, that he relates to his hands and his fingers like a pianist. These were his tools and he protects them and he puts them someplace safe. It told us how Ali sees himself, with delicacy. His strength was a given. He didn't see himself that way; he was at that frontier between what he knows he really can't do natively, which he doesn't worry about, and the edge to where he'll push himself to.

DEADLINE:  You grew up admiring Ali; what was most surprising about getting to actually know him?

MANN:  The strength of his spirit. Many people have Parkinson's. Because they can't articulate, people start relating to them as if they're children. The person suffering from Parkinson's, there's no mental effect, but there's a kind of an acculturated reaction and many Parkinson's suffers slip into a kind of simpleton persona, in a way, when people speak to them and over enunciate. They have no trouble hearing or understanding. That never happened to Ali. If you looked at any of his clips later on...they're on a Blu-ray, he says some very, very funny stuff. I mean he's sharp, mentally acute, and he wasn't going to let the Parkinson's in any way diminish his spirit.

DEADLINE:  Joe Frazier was very kind to Ali during his ban, giving him a title shot. Ali was unkind in the names he called Frazier leading up to the fight. Many said he never forgave Ali. What was his perception of that?

MANN: Pretty much what you just said. I mean it falls in the category of was Ali overly abusive about Frazier? Yeah, probably. But don't forget, Ali wanted to get the other guy angry. He told me that if you get angry, you just lost the fight. He was constantly strategic to the most extreme detail. I was never a boxing expert but for that brief period of time in which I was making this film I became something of a boxing expert. The training that he did for the Foreman fight a lot of it had to with sloughing off punches, meaning that if something is coming in he would just duck his head a certain way and maybe 15% of the impact would land. That conflicts with the statements he's made elsewhere, that he decided at the end of round one or round two to do the rope-a-dope.

DEADLINE: That was where he deliberately absorbed Foreman's punches so the opponent would tire himself out. It was a dangerous strategy.

MANN:  There's a line in there that he told me, and it's in the former of inner monologue when he gets hit and almost knocked out. He probably got concussed two or three times and was almost unconscious or unconscious briefly standing, and he said, "I told myself get out of that green room." I said, "What green room?" He said, "That's the room you go into." When he became nearly unconscious he would find himself sitting in a green room, this whole imaginary place where there's alligators playing musical instruments and stuff.

DEADLINE:  Sounds like a dangerous place to be...

MANN:  I said at the beginning of this that if there's a theme to the movie, it's defiance. Ali defied that, along with every expectation about him. To come from the 1950s and the early '60s, what America was like. Coming from Jim Crow Louisville, all the expectations of what being well behaved is supposed to mean. That's kind of very much what the front of the film was about. The kind of cultural imperialism imposed by white America on black America, to be in that world and then imagine what he wants to make himself into. It was such a radical movement. It takes me back to this thing that Malcolm X said and Ali would say it. We'd all been brainwashed. We see white with blonde hair, blue eyes. We look at all the angels, they're all white. Angel food cake is good, and white. Devil's food cake is black. White Rain shampoo. Everything positive is white. He was talking about a certain kind of value system, in 1964, when he is going to make himself as a heavyweight champion of the world. He's going to become a motivational personification of something totally different, a black man in his own culture with his own pride. That is why people identify with and worship Ali, because he represented the enormous possibility the poetics of actual self-determination. He does it. We can do it. That's what he stood for. To do that, he had to defy not just the establishment and not just white America and not just people who were feared militancy but also the NAACP, Joe Louis, you name it. Everybody who was centrist and had an interest in maintaining the status quo. We are still talking identity politics in 2017; try understanding that perspective in 1963-64.

DEADLINE: We might be headed into a strange place in the world right now, but there was no precedent for his journey then, was there?

MANN: There was no precedent. Then there was Malcolm X. Ali is a hero, somebody who committed to something outside the interests of the self-interested circumscribed "I." He did it at great cost to himself. The cost was the best years of every heavyweight were the ones where he was suspended and could never fight, and everything he went through including the possibility of going to prison and cross the board condemnation. We may be heading into another repressive regime. And where is the Muhammad Ali now?

DEADLINE:  Much was made at the time you made this movie, of the $108 million budget. When you were going back, and making changes to the cut, were you glad you stuck to your guns? And why did it require that high a budget to make the movie your way?

MANN: People talk about budgets as if they're flexible and negotiable. Certainly peoples' above line fees sometimes are, but a lot of it is fixed costs. You want to go to Africa or not? You want to shoot Chicago, in Chicago? You do all the smart things you can. The house on the river in Kinshasa [where Ali lived while training for the Foreman fight] was actually done in Miami but if you are going to really do the Foreman fight, you got to do the Foreman fight. What is the training? What is the preparation? It all relates to content. Do you want this piece of content, or not? If you do, it cost x. And that added up to more than the very generous budget that Sony was authorized to spend. And so then it became about being lucky like I was, and having the best partner anybody could have on the planet, which is Will. Will and I we wrote checks going in.

DEADLINE: What does that mean?

MANN: We wrote checks. We wrote checks for some of the financing of the movie. I'm not going to say how much, but we wrote checks and financed part of the movie ourselves, to make it possible. We were committed, and that was it. Ali was one year older than I am. What enraged him, the Birmingham bombings, the news from Vietnam on the 6 o'clock news in 1967, enraged me and my generation. I knew those days and those years and he was an icon to me.

DEADLINE: Meaning you were not going to half-ass it to make some bean counter comfortable?

MANN: To give them credit, they were generous with where they elected to go. But to really be able to go to Africa and do this, to go to Accra and to also go to Maputo, Mozambique.

DEADLINE:  Did you think about faking Africa?

MANN:  No. You saw it...does Africa feel like Africa in that movie? You bet your ass it feels like Africa in the movie because it was Africa. I'm not going to fake it.

DEADLINE: I recall you put yourself on the hook for overages...

MANN:  It was beyond that. We knew going in that they could put up X amount of money and that we needed X millions more. Will and I committed to that; we would put the rest of that up, and that's in preproduction. That's not about, well, if you go over budget it's on you. There's no if about it. We knew we had a budget that was in excess of what Sony could finance. And what Amy Pascal could approve back then was a lot of money, a hell of a lot of money.

DEADLINE: Filmmakers are constantly faced with budget battles and compromise now. Looking back on it now, how does it feel to have not compromised?

MANN:  I can't even think about this film without thinking about that. The whole time, every time I spend a production dollar, I'm spending some of my money and I'm spending some of Will's, and I never had one question ever. I had the complete faith and trust from Will and [his Overbrook partner] James Lassiter. Never a question. Do we really need that? Does that...? Nothing.

DEADLINE: After you do that, it's inevitable financiers on the next one say, hey you took a haircut on Ali and guaranteed overages, so how about making our movie like that? Did you ever feel as staked in a movie after that, where you were willing to put yourself on the hook financially and write checks as you said?

MANN:  Sure. But the particular need wasn't there. All directors have these clauses in our contracts. There is some penalty or another. I've had them as well and I've also shot going up against the actors frankly, like on Public Enemies... or trying to figure out the hell to shoot around three hurricanes in Miami on Miami Vice, Rita, Katrina and one other while me and a whole crew were in the Dominican Republic and heading to Paraguay and Brazil. You always run into those things like that, but [Ali] was different. Going in, we knew that we had to do this.

DEADLINE:  Could you get this movie made the way you shot it in today's Hollywood?

MANN: I really don't know. They spend a lot more than we spent on Ali, every day of the week because it fits into the perception of what's going to work. Nobody is better at that than Disney, where there is no hesitation on pulling the trigger on 150, 175 million dollars, whatever the hell it is. They take big swings and Bob Iger and Alan Horn hit a lot of balls out of the park.

DEADLINE:  On high concepts and branded visual effects extravaganzas. A deeply personal biopic?

MANN:  I know. It's a deeply personal bio but it's also a very political film.

DEADLINE:  I wonder how many studio heads not named Amy Pascal would have backed this, and she's no longer in that post.

MANN:  Well, the landscape is always changing. I mean take a look at the television that's getting done. This stuff is spectacular, evolving to where you wonder where movies end and television begins. It is becoming a hybrid. So it's a luxurious time to be making movies because there's so many different platforms and modes of presentation so that you can do the strongest possible thing to make something work and let the narrative itself dictate what's the best way to present this.

DEADLINE: You have developed films on Enzo Ferrari and the war photographer Robert Capa. What's ahead for Michael Mann?

MANN: There are two things I want to do. I've got a Western that Eric Roth wrote called Comanche, and I've got a science fiction thing I want to do.

DEADLINE:  That's one you and Roth have talked about for a decade that is as epic in scale as The Revenant. You are finally going to get to make that?

MANN: We'll see. The sci-fi I can't talk about. I'm sworn to secrecy.
I mean if the right thing presents itself and we're working on a slate of four different things in television. If the right thing presents itself and the right opportunities. I also like the fact you can do eight hours, 10 hours. It's completely flexible.

DEADLINE:  What about doing any of these for TV?

MANN:  If it is the right thing...It's different when we were doing those shows, shooting Miami Vice episodes in seven days, doing 22 of them a year. By the end, talk about the walking dead. That was us.

DEADLINE: In a year that saw so many iconic personalities pass away, did you go to Ali's funeral? What was it like?

MANN:  Man, last year was unbelievable. There were so many people who were too young to go. Howard Bingham, a very close friend of mine, died in London. Ali with Parkinson's, OK, he was in decline. But his funeral was amazing because he designed it himself.

DEADLINE: What do you mean?

MANN: He stipulated who he wanted up on that stage. He had his Imam, and two rabbis, two evangelical ministers, two rabbis. He had Oren Lyons who I used as a technical advisor on The Last Of The Mohicans, who's Mohawk. He had two Buddhists. He was celebrating variety. I don't want to say diversity because that sounds like an obligation. It's just the wonderful variety that's there in life with humor and a kind of charismatic aggression. I feel like I don't know how to put it. Will was a pallbearer.
The thing about Ali is, his whole life was out there. It was all expressed. I can't imagine what it would have been like to get into a ring with him if you're a boxer. That shuffle wasn't just a dance for cameras; its purpose was to confuse his opponent. If his left foot forward, he's coming with a left lead, right foot forward, it's a right lead? What's going to come at me, out of that shuffle? And then he's ducking and feigning; it's like fighting a lightweight. He had speed but he hits like a heavyweight. I can't imagine what it must have been like in there. All of it was a life filled with powerful, powerful emotions. And so smart.

DEADLINE: You played up a moment where he enlisted his old friend Howard Cosell to interview him while he was sidelined, where he campaigned to get back in the ring against Frazier. What did he accomplish there?

MANN:  It provoked. People wanted to see the fight. He entertains. He makes you laugh. He paints this dramatic picture and then tells you, you can't see it. And then the phones start ringing and the demand for that fight escalates. He says, "I don't know about Frazier, or this guy. I got bigger opponents, the whole U.S. government." That's who he was fighting. He was fighting the whole U.S. government. He was provoking a mass audience response, because they wanted to see this guy fight. But don't forget, these are those years when Malcolm X starts to talk to Martin Luther King and suddenly Malcolm X is getting very dangerous. In fact when Fred Hampton and the Black Panthers in Chicago started to talk to Hispanics, poor whites, Appalachian whites and the anti-war movement. You start getting that lateral class consciousness and that's dangerous. So Fred Hampton gets murdered. Malcolm X gets murdered. That was the world. It's not insult television from 2016 with bubbleheaded blonds. It was serious stuff. I wanted to make that more tangible, the surveillance operations that were going against Ali. At the time, you might have thought you were being paranoid. We now realize we were underestimating. I just wanted to get it right...get it more right. This experience stays with you, forever.
Title: Re: Michael Mann
Post by: wilder on March 09, 2017, 06:16:03 PM
Michael Mann's 'Ferrari' Back On The Road With Hugh Jackman & Noomi Rapace
via The Playlist

Hugh Jackman will now get behind the wheel of the newly titled "Ferrari," with Noomi Rapace still attached to co-star. Based on Brock Yates's book, "Enzo Ferrari: The Man, the Cars, the Races," with a script by Mann, the film tells the story of the founder of one of the world's most famous car brands, and his battle against Maserati for world prestige. Filming isn't expected to start until summer 2018, and considering Mann takes his time with everything, this is looking like a 2019 release.
Title: Re: Michael Mann
Post by: wilder on March 22, 2017, 05:42:12 PM
May 9, 2017

Heat (1995) on blu-ray from a new 4K remaster.

The color timing on the new transfer is a bit controversial...been pushed closer to an orange/teal look. Screencaps from the equivalent UK version here (http://www.blu-ray.com/movies/Heat-Blu-ray/170336/#Screenshots). and screencap comparisons between the old and new transfers are here (https://www.caps-a-holic.com/c.php?d1=9769&d2=9770&c=3937).

(https://xixax.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fi.imgur.com%2FqcdafPX.jpg&hash=15093eedf60473465f842c2e46f5360959c8edca)

Heat (1995) - Amazon (https://www.amazon.com/Heat-Blu-ray/dp/B06XS9TPYR?SubscriptionId=AKIAIY4YSQJMFDJATNBA&tag=bluraynews-20&linkCode=xm2&camp=2025&creative=165953&creativeASIN=B06XS9TPYR&m=ATVPDKIKX0DER)
Title: Re: Michael Mann
Post by: wilder on April 24, 2017, 04:00:41 PM
Michael Mann Returns To TV With Vietnam War Miniseries 'Huê 1968'
via The Playlist

Aside from his abortive collaboration with David Milch on HBO's "Luck," which was cancelled while early in production on a second season after controversy over mistreatment on set of horses, Mann hadn't yet followed many of his A-list contemporaries to the current small-screen boom. But Deadline reports that that has just changed, with the news that Mann is teaming up with "Black Hawk Down" author Mark Bowden for a new limited series.

Mann and producer Michael De Luca have picked up the rights to Bowden's new book "Huê 1968," which will be published next month, with the intention of turning into into an 8-10 hour event miniseries. The book tells the story of the Tet Offensive, the key event in the Vietnam War that saw a mass surprise attack on the capital of Vietnam in the title, with characters ranging from a young revolutionary schoolgirl to President Lyndon Johnson.

Title: Re: Michael Mann
Post by: wilder on July 06, 2017, 04:36:55 PM
Michael Mann Goes To FX Vietnam War Miniseries 'Huê 1968'
via The Playlist

Michael Mann is returning to television, and as fans of his work know, it's hardly a step down. The filmmaker made his mark on the small screen far before Peak TV came rolling along with shows like "Police Story," "Miami Vice," and "Crime Story," however, as he heads back to the episodic format he's leaving procedurals behind and trying out something a little new.

"Huê 1968" is a miniseries adaptation of the book by Mark Bowden which dives into the Tet Offensive, the key event in the Vietnam War that saw a mass surprise attack on the capital of Vietnam in the title. It's a sweeping look at the event, with characters including everyone from a young revolutionary schoolgirl to President Lyndon Johnson, so we can already see the appeal of the epic scope of the story. FX does too, as they've swooped in and landed the rights to the show. Here's the book synopsis:

In the early hours of January 31, 1968, the North Vietnamese launched over one hundred attacks across South Vietnam in what would become known as the Tet Offensive. The lynchpin of Tet was the capture of Hue, Vietnam's intellectual and cultural capital, by 10,000 National Liberation Front troops who descended from hidden camps and surged across the city of 140,000. Within hours the entire city was in their hands save for two small military outposts. American commanders refused to believe the size and scope of the Front's presence, ordering small companies of marines against thousands of entrenched enemy troops. After several futile and deadly days, Lieutenant Colonel Ernie Cheatham would finally come up with a strategy to retake the city, block by block and building by building, in some of the most intense urban combat since World War II.

The mini-series is planned to run between eight and ten episodes, with Mann directing multiple installments, and leading the overall creative vision. Filming is aiming to get started by the end of the year, so hopefully we'll see this before 2018 runs out the clock.
Title: Re: Michael Mann
Post by: Robyn on August 12, 2017, 02:53:31 AM
I just rewatched Heat and it's fucking great, isn't it? I mean, the film isn't anything we haven't seen before but it is so well crafted. The dialogue is pretty bad at times tho, even in that famous coffee shop scene, but Pacino and De Niro carry the whole film and that scene in particular to the next level. It's all about how the way they look at each other, the expression in their eyes and voices. What they say doesn't even seem that important! It's amazing to see, really. I miss old Pacino and De Niro.
Title: Re: Michael Mann
Post by: wilder on October 16, 2017, 12:51:51 PM
Guillermo del Toro Is Working On A Documentary About Michael Mann
via The Playlist

On the face of it, you probably couldn't imagine two filmmakers more dissimilar than Guillermo del Toro and Michael Mann. The former creates intricate fantasy worlds, weaving fairy tales and dark-edged stories, with his own distinct fingerprint and creative spirit. The latter is a filmmaker who studies characters obsessed with process, shoots with precision, and places an emphasis on realism. However, both filmmakers are immaculate craftsmen, which makes this next bit of news tremendously exciting.

At the Lumière Film Festival, Cannes honcho Thierry Fremaux presented the recent director's cut of Michael Mann's "Heat," and revealed a fascinating nugget of information: Guillermo del Toro is making a documentary about Michael Mann.

That's about all the details there are at the moment. There's no word if it's a feature (though Mann certainly has the filmography to support that), or if it'll be the kind of thing with an extra feature on something like a release by The Criterion Collection.
Title: Re: Michael Mann
Post by: wilder on May 23, 2018, 04:26:17 AM
The Jericho Mile (1979) is coming to blu-ray from Kino July 3rd

(https://i.imgur.com/zCQoT0c.jpg)

Larry "Rain" Murphy is stuck in Folsom Prison for life on a first-degree murder charge. An inmate who prefers to be alone, Murphy spends much of his time running around the facility's track. When he begins reaching a mile in under four minutes, Murphy gains the attention of the jail's officials, who contemplate entering him in the Olympics. While Murphy is initially resistant to the idea, eventually he starts training to be an Olympic competitor.

The Jericho Mile (1979) - Amazon (https://www.amazon.com/The-Jericho-Mile-Blu-ray/dp/B07CXBY1RQ?SubscriptionId=AKIAIY4YSQJMFDJATNBA&tag=bluray-011-20&linkCode=xm2&camp=2025&creative=165953&creativeASIN=B07CXBY1RQ&m=ATVPDKIKX0DER)


In his video essay series 'Zen Pulp (http://www.movingimagesource.us/articles/zen-pulp-pt-1-20090701)', Matt Zoller Seitz discusses the visual and thematic trademarks Jericho Mile contains that can be seen throughout the rest of Mann's filmography.
Title: Re: Michael Mann
Post by: wilder on May 15, 2020, 01:33:22 PM
'Heat': Michael Mann Wants To Make His Prequel Novel Into A Film, As Well As Make A Sequel
The Playlist

A little under a year ago, Michael Mann teased the release of his upcoming novel (https://theplaylist.net/michael-mann-heat-novel-2020-20190705/) that will serve as a prequel to the acclaimed crime thriller, "Heat." Without even knowing anything about the plot, fans of the film were ecstatic at the idea of Mann returning to the world of "Heat" one more time. Well, won't those fans be excited to know that Mann also has dreams of making a film based on that novel, as well as a potential sequel.

Speaking to Deadline (https://deadline.com/2020/05/michael-mann-resuming-ansel-elgort-ken-watanabe-hbo-max-tokyo-vice-heat-prequel-1202934528/), Mann updated progress on the "Heat" novel and revealed, "We're on it, and I'm putting time into that and a screenplay I can't tell you about. But I absolutely want to make a movie of the 'Heat' prequel, and a sequel."
Title: Re: Michael Mann
Post by: wilder on December 11, 2020, 05:06:29 AM
December 8, 2020

Collateral (2004) on 4K UHD blu-ray from Paramount

(https://i.imgur.com/h74D4dE.jpg)

Vincent is a cool, calculating contract killer at the top of his game. Max is a cabbie with big dreams and little to show for it. Now, Max has to transport Vincent on his next job - one night, five stops, five hits and a getaway. And after this fateful night, neither man will ever be the same again. Tonight everything is changing...

Quote from: blu-ray.comCollateral is not a film of vivid colors and scrumptious textures. It's a gritty experience, blended between film and digital construction. It's packed with grain and noise, low light conditions, and not a lot of visual splash. It's not a film that immediately springs to mind as one that would benefit from the UHD treatment, but the 4K/Dolby Vision presentation does offer some subtle refinements that altogether make for a pleasing, and ultimately critical, series of visual improvements. One of the most immediately obvious benefits is the disc's ability to render the grain and noise a bit more pleasantly and efficiently. On the UHD it's more organic, less spiky and dense, still a very noticeable and daresay critical component of the visual experience. Texturally the upgrade is a little more nuanced but still evident, even as it's reportedly sourced from a 2K digital intermediate. The UHD renders skin details, textures inside the cab, and location specifics both inside offices and out in the city with increased command of fine point details. Clarity is improved even through the mess of grain and noise and viewers will note more pleasantly crisp and authentic intricacies that help to elevate the film's visuals to greater heights. It's not revelatory but rather more clearly realized.

The Dolby Vision color grading does some good work in tightening up the picture's color spectrum. This is a dark film and black levels are mission critical to its success. The UHD presents these darker nighttime blacks, shadows, and low light interiors with greater depth but also more realistic accessibility. The movie greatly benefits from a more stable and consistent black level series through a wide range of deeper and lighter shades of black as lower light locations are influenced by an array of surrounding light sources, whether streetlights at night, dim lights inside a club, or instrument readouts and signage glowing inside the cab. Opposite, white balance and brilliance are improved, though never to the point of compromising tonal integrity to match the film's color timing and mood. There is a slightly less green cast to parts of the movie and essential colors, including skin tones, are improved as well (look at the cab scene when Max first meets Annie). Even the brightest colors are only tweaked for depth. This is a very tasteful Dolby Vision application. The palette is reinforced but only within Mann's and Cinematographers Dion Beebe and Paul Cameron's vision for the film. The picture is free of obvious encode artifacts as well. This is by no means a "looker" but fans will find the upgrades to add up to a fairly good looking take on the film and the clear-cut best presentation yet for home consumption.
Title: Re: Michael Mann
Post by: wilder on January 19, 2022, 04:13:15 PM
Michael Mann's Heat sequel novel will be published in August (https://deadline.com/2022/01/heat-sequel-prequel-novel-michael-mann-august-9-publish-date-william-morrow-al-pacino-robert-deniro-1234914977/)
Title: Re: Michael MannAh
Post by: Robyn on January 20, 2022, 08:15:07 AM
Ah! Cool
Title: Re: Michael Mann
Post by: wilder on February 09, 2022, 03:48:29 PM
Adam Driver, Penélope Cruz & Shailene Woodley Set To Star In Michael Mann's Passion Project 'Ferrari'; STX Inks Big Domestic Deal & Handles Int'l — EFM
Deadline

Heat director Michael Mann is getting closer to the start line on his passion project Ferrari thanks to some strong new cast and a big domestic deal with STX.

We can reveal that Oscar nominee Adam Driver, Oscar winner Penélope Cruz and Emmy nominee Shailene Woodley are newly aboard for the big-budget biopic of racing mogul Enzo Ferrari.

Star Wars and House Of Gucci actor Driver is replacing Hugh Jackman in the title role while Parallel Mothers star Cruz will play Enzo's wife Laura. Big Little Lies star Woodley will play mistress Lina Lardi. Four-time Oscar nominee Mann is gearing up for a May start in Italy.

STX is handling International rights and has now picked up domestic in a big deal with Mann. As we revealed in previous reporting on the project, Amazon is aboard in a handful of international markets. STX International will look to close remaining deals this week with some big international pacts already secured, including Leone in Italy.

The movie, which Mann has been working on for two decades, is set during the summer of 1957. Ex-racecar driver, Ferrari, is in crisis. Bankruptcy stalks the company he and his wife, Laura, built from nothing ten years earlier. Their tempestuous marriage struggles with the mourning for one son and the acknowledgement of another. He decides to counter his losses by rolling the dice on one race – 1,000 miles across Italy, the iconic Mille Miglia.

The project has famously been through multiple iterations, but this is as far along as the casting has been at any stage.
Mann will direct from a script by Troy Kennedy Martin (The Italian Job) and Mann based on Brock Yates' book Enzo Ferrari – The Man and the Machine. The filmmaker is also producing via his Moto Productions banner alongside P.J. van Sandwijk and Birdman producer John Lesher, as well as Lars Sylvest, Thorsten Schumacher and Gareth West with Niels Juul executive-producing.
Title: Re: Michael Mann
Post by: wilder on June 06, 2022, 11:38:33 PM
August 9, 2022

(https://i.imgur.com/CObkOWw.jpg)
Title: Re: Michael Mann
Post by: WorldForgot on June 07, 2022, 10:34:12 AM
Quote from: wilder on June 06, 2022, 11:38:33 PMAugust 9, 2022

(https://i.imgur.com/CObkOWw.jpg)

QuoteBlu-ray Special Features Include:

NEW Academy Panel reuniting Mann, Pacino and De Niro and moderated by Christopher Nolan
NEW Toronto International Film Festival Q&A with Mann
Commentary by Michael Mann
The Making of HeatTrue Crime
Crime Stories
Into the Fire
Pacino and De Niro: The Conversation
Return to the Scene of the Crime

Additional Footage:

- Deleted Scenes
Scene 5 - Season's starting early
Scene 42 - Nicest guy on the block
Scene 55 - Albert and Hanna (Alternate Take)
Scene 62 – Shakedown
Scene 76 - Murder in C-Block
Scene 96A - Let's Dance
Scene 125 - Late arrival
Scene 148/147 - Where's Anna?
Scene 177B - Double the worst trouble
Scene 191 - Nate delivers
Scene 204A - No response
Theatrical TrailersSurprise of a Lifetime
Two Actors Collide
Closing In