Here we are with yet another movie based on a television show: Miami Vice, an '80s series which I never watched, but one with a strong enough force in pop culture that it's impossible not to have heard of it and to know it had something to do with Don Johnson, cops, bright colors, and having a fashion sense. I think, even at the time, the show must've seemed a bit cheesy. It was executive produced by Michael Mann, who became the most famous name attached to the program from the creative side. Now Mann, who since those days has become an accomplished auteur, looks like he wants to take Miami Vice back -- back from the cheese, back to the nitty gritty.

Mann's movie, starring Colin Farrell as "Sonny" Crockett and Jamie Foxx as Ricardo Tubbs, bears little resemblance to any incidental memory I have of the show. It's all business as the film adopts a cold efficiency in its telling and its characters. Crockett and Tubbs are detective partners who are so professional at what they do that they never smile and only ever seem to talk in business lingo. Their world is not a glitzy Miami hiding a seedy underside -- now it appears seedy on the outside too, and their range of coverage in this adventure includes even seedier locations in Cuba and South America. It's all very serious, with barely the time for any kind of joyful release -- even when the lads are showing off the hot vehicles they drive or enjoying the company of a beautiful woman, they look cool and detached.

The movie is a display of style by entities who aren't trying to draw attention to their stylishness. Mann sets the mood by using a dulled color range and occasional digital video graininess to bring urgency and danger to the darkness. Meanwhile, Crockett and Tubbs drive a slick Ferrari, but in a matter-of-fact manner -- they exist to do their jobs and seem barely aware of their privileges in being able to play with fantastic toys. If a sexiness is communicated through this approach, it's from our interpretation of it, our tendency to see macho attitude as more desirable the more genuine it seems. In other words, these guys aren't pretending to be good because they're masking insecurities -- they really are that good, and they don't make a big deal about it.

Unfortunately, an ode to the perfect male modus operandi is exactly as paper thin as it sounds. Miami Vice has a lot to look at but little to actually watch. The plot is a standard "cops go undercover to expose drug ring" story, and the characters have no personalities. Really, nothing seems to distinguish Crockett and Tubbs -- they both talk the same, have the same skills, wear the same scowl, and don't interact with each other in any meaningful way. Farrell looks slightly sillier than Foxx in his appearance and delivery, but that's about it. If I, a non-Miami Vice viewer, wanted to know what made Crockett and Tubbs distinct as people, I didn't find any answers here. Other characters don't fare much better -- Crockett's love interest is played by Gong Li, looking fabulous but struggling with English; their pairing, like Crockett's with Tubbs, exhibits no chemistry. Only John Ortiz as a drug sub-lord gets to act with some flair and range.

Maybe none of this matters in a movie exploring the depths to which men must go when being very serious about going undercover, but it's not very involving if all we see is the outside of this process. Crockett and Tubbs are so efficient that we can't discern any signs of weakness. We don't understand the extent of the price they're paying, psychologically or otherwise, so how can we really be concerned about them? We can only admire them the way we'd admire well-sculpted statues. This phenomenon is demonstrated in the movie's best parts -- its (very few) gun battle action sequences -- where the effectiveness comes more from their technical bravura and brutal, cold-as-ice execution than from character-based suspense.

Nonetheless, there's something cathartic about watching the sudden, ugly violence staged in one of these bleak crime thrillers. It's forceful, no-nonsense, as if we feel we're being given more credit as an adult audience if we can't tell anyone's joking around. It's like a reality check in a world of PG-13 action; yet, the whole of Miami Vice is never truly believable. It's still escapism, and distant escapism at that. Instead of the hero vicariousness we usually expect from an action pic, we're placed on an observational platform. This might be a good way to show that professional immersion for these men means separating one's self from humanity, but now we can't even tell what made them appealing characters in the first place. We're a long way from the '80s indeed.

(Released by Universal Pictures and rated "R" for strong violence, language and some sexual content.)

Review also posted on www.windowtothemovies.com.