In the reviews of new box office king Collateral, Tom Cruise gets most of the ink, but Jamie Foxx get a nearly equal tone of respect. The respect is coupled with surprise, but anyone who had done anything but uncouple previously would have been unhinged.
A plot point that draws much of the critics' attention is how Foxx's character feels about his work. The cab driving for him is temporary, something forming a reality he refuses to recognize as anything more than an in-between. At face value, however well it plays in the film, his attitude sounds like the moviemaker's more than a cab driver's. Waiting tables is temporary; when a big break comes, you can break. Getting a hack license and maintaining a competitive taxi in Los Angeles strikes of more permanency.
I haven't seen the movie yet and have never worked as a taxi driver, so my assumption about Foxx's character could very well be wrong. But being in a car all day doesn't seem too escapable — at least not after 10 years. A Washington Post story today about a taxi driver's struggles seems to agree.
But having not seen Taxi Driver, the only movie where I can turn for more back-up here is — don't you know it — D.C. Cab. After previously praising the movie and Jamie Foxx here in an entry, I'm glad they can be together again. The character of Baba in D.C. Cab hits exactly along the Collateral plot point: "The big fear … is the fear that the music you're writing or your brilliant first novel that's like a draft away from being a best seller or your plans for law school have to wait … and in the meantime you're becoming a cab driver."
The quote comes from a 1983 Post piece by Edward Sargent, who liked the movie but thought that its realism was hit-or-miss. "Producers of the movie probably don't know that the real-life models for several of their cinematic caricatures rarely drive or ride in taxis," writes Sargent, in the article's generally stilted manner. "These folks usually stand on street corners or travel on the back seats of inner-city Metrobuses where they can be seen smoking marijuana, drinking liquor and talking loudly."
Sargent takes an up-with-people approach to their situations, and now the article reads with the hopefulness of the city's early Barry years and the naivete of the growing cultural gap where crack and the gang wars would slide. But Sargent also picks some spots that more traditionally restrained media commentators would have missed. Take this cover-pulling: "The most astonishing thing about D.C. Cab is its depiction of the Florida Avenue Grill, a Washington inner-city landmark, as a white establishment with a black cook and black cashier who smile and clap, but say nothing. The real restaurant is black-owned."
It's always interesting to see how the movie world and the real world connect. Or don't. Thanks to a friend with archive access for sending me Sargent's article and a couple more. Of the D.C. Cab coverage in '83, the Post reviewers unintentionally hit on topics with lasting saliency. First there's Gary Arnold, writing for the Style section. Notes Arnold:
The most dynamic performer is the young black comedian Charlie Barnett, as a hostile, larcenous driver named Tyrone. If "D.C. Cab" becomes a hit, this debut should do as much for Barnett as "48 Hrs." did for Eddie Murphy a year ago.
Barnett, of course, would not go on to similar movie stardom. But he would gain regular appearances on Miami Vice and be recognized, along with Murphy, as standing among the few break-out black comedians at the time. Barnett would also become well known in New York for his Washington Square Park performances, where he mentored an 18-year-old Dave Chappelle in the early 1990s.
Chappelle talked to Illini Media last year about Barnett: "When I moved to New York, in '91, I walked into a comedy club, and he was just standing at the top of the steps. I had heard that his life had changed, he's addicted to crack, he had AIDS, all this crazy stuff had happened to him. But he used to watch me. At that time he was trying to kick drugs. He had learned that when you're a drug addict you pick your friends by your addiction. … [H]e liked hanging out with me, because I wasn't doing drugs, so he felt like I'd keep him clean."
Barnett would die of AIDS not long thereafter. According to stories in recent years, Chappelle is slowly working on a movie about the comic's life.
On a lighter note, Arnold's D.C. Cab review then goes on to give a 1983 impression of Mr. T:
To universal relief, there's just enough, and not a frown more, of the glowering Mr. T, who has busily worn out of his welcome since justifying the existence of Sylvester Stallone's "Rocky III." T's characterization is pretty squareball, but his wardrobe–knit, skintight jammies in Popsicle colors–supplies plenty of decorative merriment.
Funny how times change. Or don't. For the Weekend section, Rita Kempley's review of the film uses a local cultural touchstone only recently revived:
"D.C. Cab" is a recreational vehicle–a rabblerousing, rambunctious, ramshackle, razzle-dazzle, rickety-rackety, reggae movie in the hack and sack mode.It's about a cosmopolitan cab company and its crew of multi-colored, multi- talented, mostly benign road warriors, an unlikely assortment of Yankee Doodle Dandies who get into upward mobility via their bootstraps. It's a hometown crowd- pleaser set in the streets, hallelujah, and not on the Hill.
But not much really happens here, and if you're looking for motivation or reasonable plot evolution or anything more than a night that feels like sitting in the stands at a really rowdy Redskins game, don't hail this cab.
For those wanting a rowdy Redskins game these days, a Gibbs team returns to the preseason tonight. Pray for permanency.
