Character mistake: In the scene where Detective Fanning and the other cops are investigating the first murder, one cop tosses a shell casing in a baggie out the window to Fanning. The cop then remarks, "You can still smell the cordite." This is incorrect because cordite has not been used as cartridge propellant since approximately the end of World War II.
Collateral (2004)
1 character mistake
Directed by: Michael Mann
Starring: Tom Cruise, Mark Ruffalo, Jamie Foxx, Jada Pinkett Smith
Continuity mistake: Near the beginning of the film when we see Max pull up to the first hit location and Vincent is talking to him in the back; watch closely and in one shot we see that Vincent has his hands below (probably on his knees), but in the following shot we can see his left arm is now up and grabbing onto the glass that separates the driver from the passenger inside a taxi. (00:16:25)
Trivia: The film was almost entirely shot in high definition. Director Michael Mann states he did this to capture the night scenes more vividly.
Suggested correction: The number of movies shot in less-than-HD could be counted on one hand.
I believe it refers to the fact that Collateral is considered to be the first major movie to use a digital camera, not the traditional film support.
Question: I noticed from the previews that this movie looks very different. What is it? Is it a digital camera that has been used? Or no lighting effects used? The movie really has a "behind the scene" feel.
Chosen answer: It was shot with a digital camera. IMDB is a great place to answer questions like this. Go to *Technical Specifications* in the *Other Info* section of the menu on the left hand side of the screen. In an interview in American Cinematographer, Michael Mann said that as far as he was aware, this was one of the first movies to attempt to make a "look" out of digital video rather than trying to make Digital Video look like film. This approach meant the movie could be shot in the low-light scenes of urban desolation Mann wanted - because Digital reacts much better to low light than film. The approximately 20% of the picture that was shot on film was mostly, according to Mann, the portion set in the "Fever" nightclub - because this is the scene with the brightest lighting states, a condition in which Digital Video does not perform as well.
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