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Global thing: Heat (1995)



 
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Videos (3)
created on: 26/02/2017
by: CinemasFringes (219)
Globalises the following things :
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Movies properties

Displayed (non textual) :
Person : Al Pacino
This endpoint is approved in the database from previous submissions.
Person : Robert De Niro
This endpoint is approved in the database from previous submissions.
Person : Val Kilmer
This endpoint is approved in the database from previous submissions.
Displayed (written) info :
AL PACINO ROBERT DE NIRO
AND VAL KILMER
A MICHAEL MANN FILM
HEAT
Movie Genre :
Crime
This endpoint is approved in the database from previous submissions.
,
Drama
This endpoint is approved in the database from previous submissions.
,
Thriller
This endpoint is approved in the database from previous submissions.
Color & sound :
Color
Originally released :
1995
Language - Spoken :
English
Rating :
BBFC (UK) 15 (UK)
MPAA (US) R – Restricted
Running time :
170
Movie credits (on artwork) :
A Film By : Michael Mann
This endpoint is approved in the database from previous submissions.
Actor : Al Pacino
This endpoint is approved in the database from previous submissions.
Actor : Amy Brenneman
This endpoint is approved in the database from previous submissions.
Actor : Ashley Judd
This endpoint is approved in the database from previous submissions.
Actor : Diane Venora
This endpoint is approved in the database from previous submissions.
Actor : Jon Voight
This endpoint is approved in the database from previous submissions.
This endpoint is approved in the database from previous submissions.
Actor : Robert De Niro
This endpoint is approved in the database from previous submissions.
Actor : Ted Levine
This endpoint is approved in the database from previous submissions.
Actor : Tom Sizemore
This endpoint is approved in the database from previous submissions.
Actor : Val Kilmer
This endpoint is approved in the database from previous submissions.
Actor : Wes Studi
This endpoint is approved in the database from previous submissions.
Directed By : Michael Mann
This endpoint is approved in the database from previous submissions.
Director Of Photography : Dante Spinotti
This endpoint is approved in the database from previous submissions.
Executive Producer : Arnon Milchan
This endpoint is approved in the database from previous submissions.
Executive Producer : Pieter Jan Brugge
This endpoint is approved in the database from previous submissions.
Film Editing By : Dov Hoenig
This endpoint is new to the database, please check he (it) is not in with a similar endpoint name association (and use the ENA function if necessary).
Film Editing By : Pasquale Buba
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Film Editing By : Tom Rolf
This endpoint is approved in the database from previous submissions.
Film Editing By : William Goldenberg
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Music By : Elliot Goldenthal
This endpoint is approved in the database from previous submissions.
Producer : Art Linson
This endpoint is approved in the database from previous submissions.
Producer : Michael Mann
This endpoint is approved in the database from previous submissions.
Written By : Michael Mann
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A Production From : Forward Pass, Inc.
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In Association With : Regency Enterprises
This endpoint is approved in the database from previous submissions.
Presented By : Warner Bros.
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End credits (not on artwork) :
Casting By : Bonnie Timmermann
This endpoint is approved in the database from previous submissions.
Costume Design By : Deborah Lynn Scott [Deborah L. Scott]
This endpoint is approved in the database from previous submissions.
Description (by producer & GT in English only) :
Academy Award Winners Al Pacino and Robert square off in this groundbreaking cat-and-mouse thriller written and directed by Michael Mann. The personal lives of a brilliant thief (De Niro) and an obsessive L.A. cop (Pacino) intertwine - and quickly unravel - as the criminal plans his final heist. Co-starring Val Kilmer, Jon Voight, Tom Sizemore and Ashley Judd, HEAT sizzles with hard-hitting action and gripping suspense!
Comments & Reviews :
Posted by CinemasFringes (219) on maart 01, 2017
Michael Mann’s multi-stranded cops-and-robbers drama set in Los Angeles features Robert De Niro as Neil McCauley, the leader of a criminal gang who instigates a heist on an armoured security van with Chris Shiherlis (Val Kilmer), Michael Cheritto (Tom Sizemore), Waingro (Kevin Gage) and Trejo (Danny Trejo). They ram it off the road, holding the driver and guards hostage while they scour the vehicle for its contents - following which they find a package filled with bonds. Unfortunately the itchy-fingered Waingro loses it and shoots one of the hostages, forcing the gang - with the threat of a 1st degree murder rap on their hands - to kill the others so as to avoid leaving witnesses. With efficient precision they rush away from the scene, bursting the tires of the pursuing police cars via some spikes they left behind. Nate (Jon Voight), the brains of their operation, finds out that the bonds belong to Roger Van Zant (William Fichtner) and advises that they can sell them back to him.

Lt. Vincent Hanna (Al Pacino) is assigned to the case. However as he chases up various leads his absenteeism from the life of his wife Justine (Diane Venora) and adolescent daughter Lauren (Natalie Portman) causes their family relationship to gradually deteriorate. McCauley meanwhile has his own issues as he attempts to balance his criminal career with a fledgeling involvement with a lady he meets in a bar, named Eady (Amy Brenneman). He also deems the psychotic Waingro to be a loose cannon makes a botched attempt to have him done away with, resulting the latter teaming up with Van Zant in order to wreak vengeance on the gang.

McCauley’s philosophy is “Don't let yourself get attached to anything you are not willing to walk out on in 30 seconds flat if you feel the heat around the corner.” His younger accomplice Chris - whose marriage to Charlene (Ashley Judd) is struggling - finds that advice difficult to cope with. However with Lt. Hanna’s own relationship on the rocks it’s clear that “the heat” have a lot in common with the people they pursue. This is the theme that lies at the core of this story.

Heat is widely regarded as Michael Mann’s masterpiece, although I personally don’t think it quite deserves such a classification. Sure it’s a very good film - even a great one - but it does fall some way off perfection. With a runtime clocking in at 2 hrs and 50 mins it’s a very long film, and while it’s often terrific it doesn’t consistently grip all of the time. Ironically it’s not because it’s overlong, but because some of its many story strands and characters feel cut down to the point where they lose impact. It might well have made a fantastic 10 hour miniseries rather than just an impressive but rather cluttered feature film.

Still, there’s plenty to applaud here. For one thing we get two powerhouse performances from Pacino and De Niro. Unlike some other directors who have languished in excessive awe of their respective reputations, there’s a sense that Mann is deliberately keeping them restrained until specific scenes require them to let loose with the dramatics. It’s Pacino more than De Niro who gets the lion’s share of these latter moments; he can be a very intimidating character during scenes when he’s turning the screws on an informant, or later when he discovers his wife has brought a man back home in his absence. However he does so with a sense of humour (some of which was reportedly ad-libbed) that makes him as hilarious as he is scary. De Niro doesn’t have any singular “you talkin’ to me” style moments but his work here still carries an undeniable electric charge when he’s conducting his often brutal business.

The best moment for both actors is the now-legendary “coffee shop” scene where these two powerhouses converse across the table from one another. Both avoid showiness but come across as two normal guys whose respective intense focusses on the lives they have chosen to lead creates as much affinity between them as it does animosity. The scene is a riveting self-contained piece of cinema despite being filmed in what seems to be a relatively straightforward shot-reverse-shot manner.

The supporting cast, while overshadowed by the two main stars, is also uniformly solid. Val Kilmer (the third major star here; he shot his scenes concurrently with his high-profile gig in Batman Forever) is again kept down-to-earth by Mann and does generate some sympathy as a guy who is too young and inexperienced to handle the potential emotional fallout of juggling family life with criminality. Dennis Haysbert gains our sympathy in his limited number of scenes as a getaway driver whose parole job (flipping burgers under an overbearing runt of a boss, played by Bud Cort) is causing him more frustration than he can handle. Kevin Gage exudes a gloatingly unpleasant menace as the psychotic redneck Waingro.

The direction by Michael Mann is as significant to the film’s impact as the cast. He’s best at handling the action sequences, which rely on tight back-and-forth edits, Elliot Goldenthal’s charged score and some subtle use of the hand-held camera to keep the viewer fully involved in the proceedings. The highlight is a lengthy gun battle in the middle of a busy central L.A. street, a sequence that has gone down in history as one of the finest shootouts ever committed to film. While Mann’s camerawork is relatively conventional and TV-like it does benefit from the atmospheric yellows and blues brought out by Dante Spinotti’s cinematography. His touch is subtle and makes clever use of lighting and camera distance. During the aforementioned coffee shop scene he builds the momentum of the interplay by getting just a little closer to the actor’s faces in each alternate shot until they loom large on the screen. When De Niro is driving his car through a tunnel with Eady beside him, when he proclaims to her that he’s “home free” the white glare from the ceiling lights pours through the vehicle’s windows (in stark contrast to the film’s normally dim visuals) imbuing a palpable sense of a burden being lifted.

Some fine micro-moments come purely from little details worked into the scenes, such as Charlene’s minimal hand gesture to Chris to warn him away from returning to his home (since the police are waiting) or Vincent Hanna cooling off from family conflict in the kitchen while a hand-painted portrait of his daughter hangs on the wall. The world portrayed onscreen feels real and feels like there’s a legacy that extends far beyond the film’s timeframe.

The main weakness is that the wealth of characters involved in the film means that some are left rather poorly drawn. It’s the female characters who suffer worst in this regard, as the four main ones (Justine, her daughter Lauren, Eady and Charlene) are defined more by their relationships to their male counterparts than by their own lives outside of this. The actresses playing these roles do their best with what little they’ve got, but ultimately their characters feel more like stock parts from too many other male-orientated action-thrillers. In a more conventional film of this type thinly-defined female characters are usually a given, and normally serve their purpose as the focus is on delivering the requisite thrills. However here, where there is a heavy emphasis on the difficulties of maintaining steady relationships in the fraught world of the cop and the criminal, it means that the inevitable dramatic payoffs don’t carry the weight that they should have done.

Still, despite this issue it’s testament to the quality of most of the rest of Heat that the film as a whole regarded as such a seminal example of intelligent, realistic action cinema.

Rating:

9,33

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Item number : 15225

Submitted by : CinemasFringes (219)
on : 26/02/2017
Refined by : Lo55o (12462)
Last updated on: 07/03/2017