Blackhat Review
By Karen Dahlstrom
Under-Manned
Director Michael Mann can be a polarizing figure for movie buffs. Just ask one if they’ve seen "Heat" — people either love it or hate it. But there should be no argument with his latest, "Blackhat". It is unequivocally, profoundly tedious — a hack job about computer hacking.
The film opens with a cyber attack on a Chinese nuclear power plant. In needless, minute detail, we see a fly-through of the affected circuitry and electrical paths taken by the new code (or "malware"). The hackers succeed in sabotaging the plant, while a similar attack on a U.S. plant is thwarted by "different software." (Yes, that’s the reason we’re given.) As a result, Chinese and American authorities agree to work together to track down the black hat hackers and stop other attacks.
But of course, they’ll need help, right? Conveniently, the lead Chinese agent, Chen Dawai (Leehom Wang of "Lust, Caution") recognizes some of the code as written by himself and his former M.I.T. roommate, Nick Hathaway (Chris Hemsworth). Inconveniently, Hathaway is now bunking in federal prison for hacking banks. A deal is struck, and Hathaway is furloughed in order to help the task force, which includes Chen’s programmer sister Lien Chen (Wei Tang, also of "Lust, Caution") and Carol Barrett (Viola Davis) of the U.S. Justice Department.
What follows is a lot of running around, typing on Microsoft devices, and sweating profusely in far-off asian locales, punctuated by the occasional action scene and romantic interludes between Hathaway and Lien. Not much more can be said about the plot, which defies logic at every turn. What one can actually understand of the dialogue (which sounds like it was badly dubbed) is cheesy at best, outright laughable at worst. Screenwriter Morgan Davis Foehl should seriously consider returning to his previous job - editing Adam Sandler movies.
Not even Michael Mann is at his best here. The murky, grainy look of "Blackhat" is literally a shadow of the eye-catching, handheld, uplit style he developed as director of "Miami Vice" (and subsequently on movies such as "
Collateral", "
Ali" and the aforementioned "Heat"). Not only does the film seem cold and impersonal, it’s not even remotely interesting.
Hemsworth, for all his pleasant physical attributes, does little to make the 2:13 running time fly by. He’s woefully miscast as a computer genius, albeit bulked up and shiv-experienced due to his years in the prison system’s "gladiator school." The one star given in this review is solely for the presence of Viola Davis. Saddled with the merest suggestion of a character and an unflattering wig, she still shines. No one can deliver subtle threats like Viola Davis. She makes more out of a single scene than Hemsworth does with the entire movie.
In the notes I took during the "Blackhat" screening, I can count no less than eight exclamations (in all-caps, mind you) of my frustration and boredom. ("I DON’T CARE" and "I WANT THIS TO END NOW" seem to be the primary sentiments.) In our current climate of cyber warfare and hacks of major governmental and private institutions, "Blackhat" is a missed opportunity. Without a sense of personal stakes, without a satisfying payoff, the film merely sits there like unexecuted code, waiting for someone to hit the "enter" key. Unfortunately, no one ever does.
