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Information
- Year
- 1995
- Runtime
- 170 min.
- Director
- Michael Mann
- Genres
- Crime, Drama, Thriller
- Rating *
- 8.2
- Votes *
- 411,175
- Checks
- 43,938
- Favs
- 3,381
- Dislikes
- 232
- Favs/checks
- 7.7% (1:13)
- Favs/dislikes
- 15:1
Top comments
-
Flicker
Uh, yeah. Very little of this film worked for me.
The dialogue was horrendous, made several degrees worse by Pacino delivering one of the most bizarre performances I've ever seen from him. It's not forgivable, especially considering the acting he's proven he can do, and that the character he's playing is little more than the well-trodden, workaholic cop with messy home life.
DeNiro was better, although he created a character so completely incapable of chemistry or romance that his relationship with Edie doesn't make a lick of sense throughout the entire film. Honestly, he doesn't even smile at her, they just fire off questions as if they're in some two-way interrogation–no back and forth–and after they've extracted enough information from each other they decide to start making out. What?
Other than the fact that I didn't find either of the main characters worthy of empathy, which is sort of huge, the film tried to go way too big. There are too many supporting characters and side stories, most of which are unnecessary and jarringly spliced in, and because of it few of the scenes flow at all. It would have been okay if the plot was competent enough to keep track of everything it introduces, but the pacing completely misappropriates its time. The result: the few great stories with some promise, which only needed patience to be masterfully developed, were severely truncated. As another commenter previously mentioned, what the hell happened to Val Kilmer? I guess that one scene was supposed to imply him leaving forever, despite the entire movie insisting that his wife meant everything to him?
Apart from a tiny handful of great scenes and shots that were well composed, Heat doesn't earn that much redemption. The score had the tendency to be both out of place and in your face, all the characters seemed to live in confusingly similar houses, and the movie had two obnoxious cases of "just forcibly embrace the rightfully emotional women until they do what you want."
Ultimately, I don't know how a film could drag so severely and still have such attention deficit, but this poorly executed mess manages to pull it off. Worth watching if you don't like DeNiro having emotions, enjoy Pacino speaking as though he's always on cocaine, and get off on watching male characters assert their dominance by randomly breaking shit in bursts of spontaneous and unprovoked anger. 8 years ago -
tom waits for alice
Saw this again this weekend, for the first time since it originally played in the theaters over here. It has stood the test of time very well, I think. I myself have not, and had to split it over two nights. 8 years 3 months ago -
herk mondo
I saw this, and i really don't get the hype, This is a so so heist movie. For me it wasn't the great actors movie movie everyone is making it out to be. 3 years 3 months ago
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In 21 official lists
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This movie ranks #24 in Time Out's The 101 Best Action Movies Ever Made
Time Out's The 101 Best …
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This movie ranks #27 in IMDb's 1990s Top 50
IMDb's 1990s Top 50
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This movie ranks #32 in IMDb's Thriller Top 50
IMDb's Thriller Top 50
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This movie ranks #33 in IMDb's Crime Top 50
IMDb's Crime Top 50
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This movie ranks #37 in MovieSense 101
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This movie ranks #38 in Empire's The 500 Greatest Movies of All Time
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This movie ranks #54 in FilmTotaal Forum's Top 100
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This movie ranks #90 in 101 Gangster Movies You Must See Before You Die
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This movie ranks #98 in FOK!'s Film Top 250
FOK!'s Film Top 250
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This movie ranks #123 in IMDb's Top 250
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This movie ranks #241 in Reddit Top 250
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This movie ranks #393 in TSPDT's 1,000 Noir Films
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This movie ranks #395 in The Guardian's 1000 Films to See Before You Die
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This movie ranks #453 in Mark Cousins's The Story of Film: An Odyssey
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This movie ranks #696 in Sight & Sound's The Greatest Films of All Time
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This movie ranks #879 in Box Office Mojo's All Time Worldwide Box Office
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This movie ranks #949 in David Thomson's Have You Seen?
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This movie ranks #959 in Box Office Mojo's All Time Adjusted Box Office
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959