Analyzing Evil: Vincent From Collateral

EDITED ON 5/24/2023 Note: I don't like to erase my mistakes, I prefer to learn from them, so where the original comment I made begins will be marked below. Hey all, Been awhile since I've come back to this video, and I haven't checked in on this comment. Looks like the overwhelming opinion regarding what I said here was that I was wrong, and I'd like to acknowledge that I indeed was! I initially made the statement that Vincent could have handled the muggers differently based on his expertise. I assumed that a man with a skill set like Vincent's is more than capable of incapacitating these men without killing them, but he chose to kill them because that's part of his villainous nature, and I used that notion to bolster my findings regarding his morality. However, as many of you have pointed out, no matter a person's skill set in such a scenario, the proper thing to do when someone is threatening your life is to eliminate that threat by any means necessary. For a man like Vincent, that could be shooting them in the legs or the shoulder, but even for a man like him, a death blow is much more appropriate in this scenario given the the threat. Also, I would like to emphasize again that I made this claim based on his SKILL SET. Anyone who is far less skilled than he, (which is the majority of us) should ALWAYS take the course of action that will save your life or the lives of those being threatened that you're trying to protect, and again, even if you are skilled like Vincent, you should do the same. Self defense is self defense, and you defend yourself as best you can when the time comes, and in this type of situation incapacitation is unreliable, unsafe, and bound to get you killed. Do what you have to do to survive by any means necessary when your life is threatened. I'm not perfect nor am I all knowing or versed in every subject and I get things wrong, so I appreciate it when you all point things out to me so I can learn from my mistakes. Sorry for the initial erroneous judgement I made and I apologize for the discord it may have caused. ORIGINAL COMMENT BEGINS HERE: “The muggers deserved what they got!” I’m pinning this comment in anticipation of more comments like this. This may be a matter of opinion, and perhaps I didn’t explain myself as well as I should have, but the reason I said they didn’t deserve it because he already had the one who was pointing a gun at him incapacitated, and the other was struggling to get his gun out of his pants when the other was dazed. A man with Vincent’s skills could have easily incapacitated both without killing them. (He could have even shot them in the legs or something to that effect) but he chose to kill them instead. That’s why I said that. Both are still idiots, and deserved to be punished and dealt with for sure, and if that scene had played out differently, I would agree with you. However it played out how it did, and in my opinion, they still didn’t deserve to die given that he didn’t have to kill them to incapacitate them.

"Think anybody will notice?" His last words almost perfectly sum up his personal philosophy on life. He sees people as nothing but insignificant specs of dust on a floating rock in a galaxy surrounded by billions of others like it. But uniquely, he includes himself in that. In his final moments he recognizes that even his own life doesn't truly matter in the end. Vincent is by far one of my favorite on screen villains, deeply complex and so mysterious with just enough substance for you to piece together who he really is.

If you watch the “Making Of Collateral” documentary, filmmaker Michael Mann states it’s canon that Vincent’s mom dies in childbirth, his dad was an abusive alcoholic, and he bounced around between foster homes in Gary, Indiana. Which makes Vincent actually a tragic character; a victim of his awful childhood. Complex & layered performance from Tom Cruise- he totally nails the villain persona.

I say this with 90+% sureness… there’s an easy to miss line with cops where they talk about a while back, where a cabbie went on a random killing spree like this one and then killed himself. That’s Vincent. Vincent is going to kill Max at the end of the night. Max can ID him and “no one knows what he looks like”. That’s why Vincent sent Max into the club to get the back up information. Every encouraging thing Vincent says to Max is hollow and meaningless, because at the end of this night, Vincent is going to kill him anyway. On top of that, it’s also very likely Vincent could very well kill Max’s mom as well sense she can ID him too.

He literally is the Ultimate Villain, I wish they made Movies like this still. Michael Mann is a Film Genius.

Vincent and Collateral as a whole are extremely underrated.

Collateral just blew me away. The story, the performances, even the soundtrack was stunning. Every scene completely roped me in. Absolute masterpiece.

I think Vincent does represent sociopaths accurately. It's not so much the lack of emotions or empathy, it's the ability to switch it on and off. That's how sociopaths operate in real life

When the thief points the gun it’s a credible threat of deadly force and there’s no issue taking his life.

"Yo homie! Is that my briefcase?" One of Tom Cruise's best performances, in my opinion.

Truly the most evil of all is The Vile Eye himself...for when I stumbled across the channel a few months ago I never realized I'd have to watch each new video because the character variety and how they are described are terrifyingly good.

"Did you kill him?" "I shot him. The fall killed him." ... technically correct. You should do Dennis Peck from "Internal Affairs" (1990). Richard Gere is fkin terrifying.

One thing that just came to me when I was looking at it: The coloration of Vincent's suit is exactly that of a Great White Shark's, an apex predator that's most famous for being a completely emotionless killing machine.

Those two goons that stole vincent's briefcase absolutely had it coming. One already leveled a gun at Vincent's head, and the other started to draw his own as soon as Vincent made his move on the first guy. There was no way he could have gotten that briefcase back through melee without being shot, because the two thieves were spaced too far apart for him to pistolwhip one guy and have enough time to punch out the other, even though the second guy was fumbling his draw.

I love this character. Cold, calculated, determined. Cruise nailed this role and surprised me, and probably the world. Someone write him another villain to play please, other than Lestat ofc.

I'm glad this movie is slowly getting the recognition it deserves! It's much deeper than your everyday action movie. It's almost phylosophical in nature. Tom's best performance and one of my all time favorite movies.

In the Making of Collateral Tom Cruise was trained by Mick Gould an ex SAS (Special Air Service) operator. Gould talks about giving Cruise the kind of training he would have had if the actor spent eight to twelve years in special forces. That's some intense training!

“You promise you won’t tell anyone right??” *Max frantically shakes his head No “Get in the fucking car” Lmao. Funniest part of the movie.

Imagine being chased by Vincent and in the midst of getting away you steal the transporters car, hit John wicks dog and the equalizer sees it all.

A moment to appreciate how absolutely stunning this movie looks