Review of Blackhat (2015) by Simon L — 16 Jan 2015

"Blackhat" is such a ridiculous, unbelievable, chaotic mess, filled with the kinds of extreme close-ups that director Michael Mann ("The Insider") has used to better (and far less confusing) effect in other films, that I cannot recommend it to anyone other than Chris Hemsworth ("Rush") fans (and even then .

. .). Hemsworth plays Nicholas Hathaway, a brilliant (and very hunky) hacker who is sprung from prison by the Department of Justice at the request of his former MIT roommate - now a rising star in China's security apparatus - to help solve a mysterious spate of dangerous computer breaches at nuclear power plants and stock exchanges in Asia.

If you can buy Hemsworth as a hacker - or buy the fact that a computer specialist would somehow have become a weapons and hand-to-hand combat specialist after a few years in jail - then you might enjoy the film.

I could not. Filled with jittery cheap-looking video footage, the movie doesn't even have the usual lush feel of some of Mann's best work. Stay away.