MIAMI VICE: what a crock(ett)!

Director Michael Mann's 2006 big screen version of the 80s smash hit tv show is a bloated empty hulk devoid of interest or entertainment.

No amount of snappy editing and flashy camerawork can conceal the fact that there's absolutely nothing worth watching going on here. The action is framed with all the style and grace of a fidgety kid with way too much energy, presumably in the mistaken belief that a multitude of movement will somehow distract from the lack of meaningful story.
Colin Farrell as Sonny Crockett and Jamie Foxx as Ricardo Tubbs are little more than ciphers - one dimensional characters going through the motions of being cardboard cops chasing a bunch of stereotyped, foreign accented drug dealers back and forth across the Caribbean and Gulf of Mexico. 
But MIAMI VICE isn't just boring, it's also largely unintelligible. When Tubbs and Crockett aren't muttering to each other they're mumbling, and Farrell's dreadful attempt at an American accent doesn't help matters. Quite why Mann felt an Irish actor was the only man capable of taking on the part made famous by Don Johnson is a mystery. Beyond a droopy moustache and appallingly awful haircut Farrell brings nothing memorable to the part.
Foxx's greatest achievement, meanwhile, is in making his interpretation of Ricardo Tubbs even less memorable than that of Philip Michael Thomas.
This is a surprisingly misstep for Mann who's work on "Heat", "Collateral" and "The Insider" has earned him a reputation as one of the most distinctive and stylish directors currently working. MIAMI VICE shares many of his trademark touches but in this case they just don't add up to anything worth investing 2 and a quarter hours of your life in.