“Blackhat” is being advertised as an action thriller, and strictly speaking, it is, and at an almost literally elemental level.
While following many of tropes of the genre, the approach taken here by veteran director Michael Mann is a more impressionistic one than even his more recent films (“Miami Vice” and “Public Enemies”), which were less concerned with plot than with mood and feeling, using the technical possibilities of digital cameras to create an impressionistic canvas more common to art house films than mainstream productions.
“Blackhat” continues this trend, with numerous sequences that are more contemplative than narrative in nature, favoring the journey over the destination.
The dual simplicity and absurdity of the plot (one that wouldn’t be out of place in a “Die Hard” sequel) suggests a deliberate distillation of action movie conventions, and the film is so abstract that the more basic story components became practically disposable. In short: an opening sequence sees a terrorist hijacking the computer systems at a nuclear power plant, with devastating results. The cooperating American and Chinese agencies on the ensuing case draft the help of convicted cyber criminal Nicholas Hathaway (Chris Hemsworth), who helped write the code that was ultimately used in the attack.
The more ruminative, almost dreamlike qualities of “Blackhat” contrast sharply with the violence its characters both give and receive – swift, brutal, and often unexpectedly – with a particularly unforgettable image of a character’s face transpiring in a moment where the two intersect. Mann’s images are nothing if not intensely present-tense – an inversion of digital’s more commonly dehumanizing effect. The quality of the compositions and the acute editing rhythms demand that we savor moments many other films would throw away altogether, and the sum is almost meditative in nature.
The script’s themes evoke questions about the nature of identity, and how its characters must reconcile their inner selves with the outside world, whether it’s the prisons that contain them or a profession that force them to play a specific role. There’s an innately intangible quality to such material in the first place, and the images of metadata (such as the earth visualized as nothing more than threads of moving information) and the larger subterfuge employed by its characters suggest something profound about the way we live now, and how real privacy is sacrificed in favor of the illusion of safety.
Unfortunately, these qualities don’t quite gel into a cohesive whole, and despite the poetry and filmmaking chops present, an initial viewing was more frustrating than rewarding. The characters are often thinly drawn, with the talented cast having little to work with besides on-the-nose dialogue, yet still creating something that feels like flesh-and-blood. While not without caveats, it’s an experience I look forward to revisiting.
A double-feature of “Blackhat” and “Citizenfour” could prove revealing for both works, the latter opening this week at the GoggleWorks Film Theatre. Filmmaker Laura Poitras was among those hand-selected by Edward Snowden to share the secrets he’d obtained about the reach of the NSA, and her documentary (one of last year’s best, and a current Oscar nominee) maintains the same rigor of its subject: the data he exposed is the point of main concern, and is presented with matter-of-fact directness, but neither will the individuals bringing that information to light be silenced to anonymity.
While moral and practical arguments persist about Snowden’s actions (I’m of the mindset that they’re a necessary subversion, however problematic in their own right), the judiciously presented footage – recording over eight days with the whistleblower in hiding – is itself a compelling argument for greater transparency. As far as historical cinematic documents go, it’s as essential and chilling as any since the Zapruder film.
“Blackhat” is currently playing in theaters nationwide; “Citizenfour” opens at the GoggleWorks Film Theater Friday, Jan. 23.
Robert Humanick is a contributing writer for slantmagazine.com Follow Rob on Twitter @rhumanick
