Heat
(1995)
Rated: R
Runtime: 2 Hours and 51 Minutes
Reviewer: Dale
Grade: AYou hear about bank robberies every day. Do you ever stop and think about them? Ever wonder what it must be like to make your living as a man on the take? Ever wonder what cost there must be mentally, emotionally, physically? Ever wonder what goes through their mind?
What of a cop? Ever wonder what it takes to take a man like that down? Ever wonder what kind of a toll such a career must take? Ever wonder what must suffer in their personal life?
"Heat" is a film concerned with such questions, such suppositions. It is a film which flows with a fluid grace. It does not cheat. It does not take shortcuts. It does not click (although it still seems to move rather quickly). It takes its time. It flows like a symphony.
It has a tight plot, even though it is three hours long, or close enough to three hours that it counts. It is nearly Dickensian in its width and its number of characters. It allows you into their lives and see what toll the choices of their lives have made. It allows you to see that the cop's life is no better, no brighter, no less hectic or nerve wracking than those of the "crooks". He isn't even really that better of a man. Each of the men in this elaborate cat and mouse have their good points and their points of failure. Each of them, that is, is human.
If it were not for Pacino's sometime tendency to overact (after seeing him in "The Insider", well, this is definitely his lesser performance), I would say that the film is flawless. Even Val Kilmer does an admirable job. Then again, he was still in "Tombstone" mode here. He was icy, cool, and very convincing.
But DeNiro. Now he is what makes this movie. He is the noble, tragic heart of this film and he is pretty much excellent. DeNiro is one of those actors who can disappear into a role so far that you don't even think he is acting. He seems to have emerged from the womb as every character that he plays and it is astounding to watch. At the end, when he makes a very bad mistake, you can see in his eyes that he is wrestling with it but, in the end, he cannot overcome his own nature. You know what he is going to do, and you fear it, and you want him to do something else, but you know that such a thing would be false.
Oh, I could go on and on, and I have gone on a lot more than I expected. I could do more than hint at the scene where Pacino is running surveillance on DeNiro and someone makes a noise at a wrong time. I could do more than hint at the scene where Pacino stands in the middle of an open space and comes to a vital realization. I could tip off the scene with both men exchanging talk in a diner.
But it would be better for you to discover it for yourself. Just as I did.