Full disclosure from South Beach

It's all starting to make sense now. According to David Buxton in From the Avengers to Miami Vice: Form and Ideology in the Television Series, 'Vice was the first series to make use of neurophysiological research on the viewing process: research carried out in the Communication Technology Laboratory of the University of Michigan has shown that (American) viewers tend to become impatient with overly elaborate stories or characterisations. In an attempt to maintain constant visual and sound excitement, the series uses aesthetic devices from the clip (aggressive camera movements, "unnatural" colour schemes and mood music) to fill out the story rather than resorting to "irrelevant" complications of plot and dialogue, both reduced to a minimum' (p.140).* With hindsight, it's clear the 2006 big-screen adaptation took these traits to a greater level of abstraction.




* Manchester University Press, 1990.