IF there was an Academy Award for the most realistic shoot-out in a film, director Michael Mann would have more Oscars than you could shake a high-powered assault rifle at.
But there's not, so Hollywood's slickest filmmaker must settle for sending bodies scuttling for cover under a barrage of gunfire rather than collecting figurines for his mantelpiece.
Well, thank God for that because his latest offering, Miami Vice, is every bit as stylish and intense as previous works like Heat, The Insider and Manhunter.
Starring Colin Farrell and Jamie Foxx, Mann's film adaptation of the hit 80s TV show he executively produced is a gripping tale of drug lords, dirty cops, filthy money, love and guns.
Interestingly enough, there's no vice as such, but Farrell's character Sonny Crockett still faithfully sports the greasy mullet, dodgy sideburns and handlebar moustache which, along with those' suits, made the original so memorable.
Thankfully, his partner Ricardo Tubbs is rather cooler, both in dress sense and demeanour, and the cops work together to infiltrate a seriously heavy drug gang after a botched FBI sting.
Posing as experts in moving drugs around the global narcotics network without arousing suspicion, Crockett and Tubbs, backed up by their team of slightly renegade but fiercely loyal police officers, begin to unravel the murky dealings of drug lord Montoya and his beautiful girlfriend Isabella.
What ensues is an action-packed film of the highest quality. The cars are fast, the speedboats faster, the jet planes faster still and the gun battles so loud and in-your-face they serve to shock rather than glamorise the violence.
The ending may be predictable and the love story involving Farrell's slightly wooden Crockett and Isabella cliched, but, for sheer heart-stopping drama and tension, you won't find a better film this year - I'd bet Crockett's speedboat on it.
8/10 - an action film of the highest quality
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