> What I want: a fiction as brave as a simple scene in a Michael Mann
> film; the camera's eye patiently settles on an LA street in the dead of
> night in such a way that the hidden things, the vastness, the adapted
> wildlife, the deep technological-ness of the place is made clear.
>
> A Mann shot seems to look through the skin to the skull beneath.
I've thought the same thing. The movie version of Miami Vice had terrible dialogue ("I'm a fiend for mojitos") and a not so great story, but the photography was extraordinary and captured the reality of global commerce better than anything else I've seen or read (there's a great scene where a caravan of SUVs are driving through a bunch styrofoam chucks all over the street in the DR).
Not sure why Mann pulls this off though. Any ideas?
-WD