Review of Heat (1995) by Kitty89 — 15 Oct 2019

Heat was technically the first-time acting legends Al Pacino and Robert De Niro would star in, and this was, and is big news. Both stalwarts had starred in the Godfather 2 but they were never together on the screen.

In Heat they still only have two scenes but they more than make up for it by some exemplary work by the director Michael Mann and the rest of the cast. Heat looks at both sides of the law as it chronicles an armored truck robbery and the subsequent fallout.

With typical precision, Mann builds tension not through contrivances but through character identification and the ever-present prospect of violence. Everything in Heat builds to a climactic confrontation that occurs with nearly an hour still remaining.

Employing a forceful score by Elliot Goldenthal, evocative imagery by the legendary Dante Spinotti, and top-notch acting by a dream cast, Mann works his magic to fashion an epic crime story out of a seemingly standard-order story.

(A must watch for any cinema enthusiast).