Blackhat

A computer whiz (Chris Hemsworth) is sprung from prison to join his old MIT roommate, now a Chinese security officer (Leehom Wang), in tracking down a mysterious hacker who simultaneously causes trouble at a Chinese nuclear plant and on Wall Street. Who is this “blackhat” and what is he up to? From this cybercrime premise, Morgan Davis Foehl's script quickly devolves into a rehash of clichés from blockbuster franchises from James Bond to Mission: Impossible, with gunplay proving more reliably sexy than techies hunched over their keyboards. Fortunately, director Michael Mann invests this folderol with his customary urgency and visual panache; never let it be said that he doesn't know how to hold our attention. Hemsworth deftly nominates himself to become the next Bond when Daniel Craig's had enough. J.L.