OxfordPress.com

Grade: A

Verdict: One terrific ride.

By STEVE MURRAY
Cox News Service

On the afternoon we meet Los Angeles cab driver Max (Jamie Foxx), one very good thing happens to him. He picks up a fare named Annie (Jada Pinkett Smith), a prosecuting attorney nervous about her next big case. Bickering over the best way to get downtown to her law firm, gradually bonding as the ride continues, the two spark a smart, flirtatious rapport.

Then Max picks up his next fare, Vincent (Tom Cruise). That turns out to be one very bad thing because Vincent is a very bad man. A hit man, to be precise, with a list of five people to kill before night's end. He recruits Max as a reluctant chauffeur, who can't exactly turn down a fare who wields a gun he has no qualms about using.

Max is about to have a very long night. And anyone who buys a ticket to "Collateral" is about to have a very exciting one.

A thing of lean, cool beauty, the movie's a killer showcase for Foxx and Cruise. It's also a reminder of the knack director Michael Mann ("Heat," "The Insider") has for pumping a routine genre movie into something more riveting than it has any reason to be.

Stuart Beattie's script is shrewdly engineered, its plot elements clicking into place with the efficiency of Vincent snapping a new clip into his gun. What looks to be a clean, high-concept plot gradually reveals as many surprises as Vincent himself.

"Collateral" complicates its throughline with unexpected detours, like an unscheduled visit to a hospital. Or a breezy chat Vincent and Max have with the owner of a jazz club -- a chat that turns menacing in the space of a heartbeat.

As the two men make their rounds, we also meet Fanning (Mark Ruffalo), a slick-haired, earring-wearing fellow who looks like a drug dealer but turns out to be a narcotics detective.

He's the first one to sense there's a hidden connection among the corpses that start littering the L.A. nightscape. With his partner Richard (Peter Berg), he tries to put the puzzle pieces together, racing to track down Vincent and Max's cab before all five targets have been plugged.

Taking place almost entirely in the nighttime neon streets of Los Angeles, the movie casts the city as a supporting character. Mann nails the feeling of late-night isolation, with shots of abandoned streets. And palm trees sighing in the wind, as if restless for dawn to break. And a wild coyote crossing an urban street. Shot digitally to capture a nighttime palette that 35mm can't, "Collateral" has a slightly gritty, independent-film feeling, adding texture to what could have been just a slick popcorn flick.

These visual grace notes are welcome in a movie wired on adrenaline. Among many set pieces is a shootout in a dance club, where the claustrophobia and panic of bystanders caught in the crossfire is palpable. After thoroughly unsettling the audience with well-judged surprises and bursts of violence, Mann delivers a final 15 minutes that are almost unbearably tense.

"Collateral" isn't perfect. Beattie's script requires characters to make the occasional idiotic choice. Its climactic Big Surprise really isn't one, either. But when something is this well-made and acted, it's easy to forgive the easy Hollywood shortcuts.

This is one of Cruise's best performances and his smartest career move since "Magnolia." Weathered and gray-haired, he's almost unrecognizable in both appearance and demeanor. He limits himself to only one of his famous grins, and the context is chilling; it comes when Vincent jokes about killing someone.

The movie's real star, though, is Foxx, cementing his rep as a serious actor even before his upcoming turn as Ray Charles in "Ray." As a man just trying to survive the night, Foxx ranges from pure terror (check out his crab scuttle out of the cab after his first big scare) to exhausted heroism. He makes this arc without ever losing the character's flawed humanity. (Knowing that Adam Sandler was once considered for his role can make you realize just how badly the movie could have turned out.)

In smaller parts, Pinkett Smith and Ruffalo are strong, as are Javier Bardem and Irma P. Hall in cameos. Barry Shabaka Henley is a standout as the jazz club owner. He delivers a speech about Miles Davis that's one of the welcome moments when "Collateral" takes time to breathe ... right before it makes you start holding your breath again.