211, 211.
We're being held up.
This is Heat.
It's arguably one of the best crime films ever produced.
Directed by Michael Mann, the visionary
behind Miami Vice, Thief and Collateral.
The movie has become a staple of crime cinema,
and yet despite all of its accolades and critical acclaim,
the film holds an even more interesting and unique title.
Heat is the only film Michael Mann directed twice.
Allow nothing to be in your life that you cannot walk out
on in 30 seconds flat if you spot the heat around
the corner.
Today, the film heat is looked at as a classic.
Its superb performances, slick cinematography,
and gritty realism propelled it to being a cultural phenomenon
when it was released in 1995.
It's so revered for its technical know how
and precise attention to detail that multiple criminal
organizations have said they've studied
the various heists in the film and modeled their real world
criminal efforts after it.
In fact, the US military shows it
in basic training as an example of the bounding overwatch field
tactics being deployed flawlessly.
The film follows two men on opposite sides of the law.
A detective, played by Al Pacino, and a criminal,
played by Robert De Niro.
However, unlike in other more trite genre explorations,
these men have lives outside of their jobs.
They have emotions, families, and individuals
who can be counted as collateral damage
to the all consuming nature of their extralegal work.
That's what sets Heat apart from other crime films.
The fact that it's equally about men
who give their all to a singular profession and are
wrapped up in the complexities of real world scenarios
that directly conflict with the nature of their work.
The finely honed balance of the dual
leads, the razor sharp dialogue.
What am I doing?
I'm talking to an empty telephone.
I don't understand.
Because there was a dead man on the other end of this [BLEEP]
line.
And the tension filled atmosphere of this modern day
crime classic all emphasize and reiterate this theme.
The film is intensely interrogating the idea
that nothing is free.
Everything has a cost.
Even things that are stolen.
The grounded realism of the film and the intricately woven
details of the story weren't just pulled from thin air
though.
Where the [BLEEP] heat come from?
They were created because Michael Mann
started this project almost a decade earlier as a TV show.
The story of Heat and the TV project
that came before it were based loosely on the true life
relationship between Chicago police officer, Chuck
Adamson, and the notorious criminal, Neil McCauley.
McCauley was a notorious professional bank robber
and thief that Adamson spent much of his adult life trying
to apprehend.
In some ways, the two men were a real life Sherlock Holmes
and Professor Moriarty.
Mirror images of each other.
Michael Mann met Adamson in the mid-1970s.
Adamson had retired from the police force
and was making his way through Hollywood
as a consultant on film and TV projects.
The two were running in similar circles
and both ended up working on projects together.
Adamson's stories of his time tracking
McCauley inspired Michael Mann to begin
to develop Crime Story.
A project that would seek to explore
the fine line between the criminal element of society,
and the officers who dedicate their lives
to tracking them down.
And how without the societal constructs and social contracts
of badges and uniforms, the men we
deem as heroes are more often than not
more similar to the criminals they hunt.
I do what I do best.
I take scores.
You do what you do best, trying to stop guys like me.
The key to breaking the story for Mann
came when Adamson told him a story that
was too outlandish to be true, and yet was completely real.
During his time tracking McCauley in Chicago,
Adamson went to a local diner for a cup of late night coffee
and literally bumped into McCauley.
The two men initially shocked and distrustful,
ended up sitting down for a cup of coffee.
They exchanged some veiled threats,
and then quickly discovered that they were very similar people.
Mann became enthralled with this story
and quickly dove into building a story
around the deeply emotional connection between the two men.
What do you say I buy you a cup of coffee?
Yeah, sure.
Let's go.
Follow me.
The early versions of this project
went by multiple names, L.A. Crime Wave
and Made In L.A. being two of them,
and then finally was produced under the title
of L.A Takedown.
Mann wrote a gritty street level story
that followed a robbery homicide sergeant, Vincent Hanna,
played by Scott Plank, who we follow
on the trail of a gang of ruthless professional
criminals.
The leader of the group Patrick McLaren,
played by Alex McArthur, is the mirror image of Hanna.
He's a devoted criminal.
Having little in his life other than a supreme devotion
to his craft.
He's dedicated himself to a life on the edge,
to an existence on the underbelly of society.
Things spiral out of control for our group of robbers
after a job goes wrong, and the new guy on the team,
Waingro, played by Xander Berkeley,
kills an armored guard, and the cops turn up the heat.
Sounds familiar, doesn't it?
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And now, back to the video.
Michael Mann began writing the story in the mid 1970s,
prior to him having a substantial film career.
He took what he claims was roughly 40%
of the original script and turned it
into a pilot for a show called L.A. Takedown.
This would eventually be reworked again
for a made for TV feature film.
L.A. Takedown failed to manifest a TV show
despite being the follow up to Miami Vice for Michael Mann.
When watching the finished film version of the story,
you can kind of see why.
It has all the style of Miami Vice,
but it doesn't have the bright characters or vivid setting
of Miami.
It takes place in L.A. It's a gritty, seedy, more grounded
version of police life.
Vincent Hanna doesn't have a pet alligator like Sonny Crockett,
and so the project just died the death
that most do in Hollywood.
It was just put on the shelf.
But cut to a few years later in 1994,
and now the fully established, post Last of the Mohicans
Michael Mann, was having lunch with the producer Art Linson.
They discussed what projects Mann was working on,
and the topic of the failed L.A. Takedown came up.
After reading the original screenplay,
Linson convinced Mann to make it his next project.
Remake the movie.
Retell the story the way it should
have been done the first time.
L.A. Takedown was produced in 19 days,
with 10 days of pre-production and a modest budget.
This time, Heat would be produced
with six months of pre-production, 107 day
schedule, and a budget of $60 million.
Heat released in 1995, follows the exact same plot structure
as L.A. Takedown.
Wayne Grove, played by the incarnation of Kevin Gage,
loses his cool and shoots a guard
during an armored car robbery.
The film follows all of the same beats of the story,
but just with more texture and time spent with the characters.
If things work out I'd consider working with you guys again,
you know.
Yeah, if this works good I'd consider going again, you know?
The major difference between Heat and L.A. Takedown
come from the scale, intensity, and ferocity of the two
pictures.
The films are structurally the same.
We meet Hannah, learn about his life, which then transitions
into the McLaren McCauley character committing
an armored car robbery and looking to steal bearer bonds.
The car robbery share the same building blocks
but have a much bigger scale.
In L.A. Takedown the criminal crew
just use a garbage truck to knock over the armored car,
throw a smoke grenade, and steal the bearer bonds.
In Heat it's much more elaborate.
They use a semi truck.
They have a spike strip and an ambulance,
which they use as both a means of stopping the armored car,
and as an escape vehicle.
The same can be said for the infamous diner scene.
Yes.
The story that Adamson told Mann back in the 1970s
about having a cup of coffee with Neil McCauley.
Buy you a cup of coffee.
What do you say I buy you a cup of coffee?
That is the linchpin of both narratives.
The moments when our two rivals sit down and recognize
their similarities.
Much of this scene in both films is
word for word the exact same.
You looking to become a penologist?
You looking to go back?
I ain't never going back.
It holds the same thematic spot in each film too.
It's where our two main characters, each supremely
dedicated to their jobs, recognize
that the other man is their mirror image
and don't back down.
The third acts of the film are slightly divergent in that they
both have crime's gone wrong, but the fallout
manifests in different ways.
This all leads to a simple question.
Why?
Why would Michael Mann redirect a film he had already produced?
What would the benefit be?
The answer is simple.
He didn't get it right the first time.
Heat, L.A. Takedown, Made in L.A., whatever
you want to call it, was a story he
had in his head for close to 30 years.
And when he finally got a chance to make it,
he didn't have the resources to make it right.
So he did it again.
Maybe that's the way it'll be.
Well, maybe we'll never see each other again.
In 1995, Michael Mann could have literally done
anything he wanted to, and he chose to remake L.A. Takedown.
Michael Mann was so compelled by the thematics of L.A. Takedown,
which are very similar to those in Miami Vice, Collateral,
and Thief, that he used his newfound star
power to literally refilm a script he believed in
but that hadn't gotten a fair shake.
He chose to double down on his own vision, and it worked.
He took a forgettable made for TV movie
and turned it into a genre classic.
And that's all we have this week.
Do you think you'll be reading the New Heat 2
novel that Michael Mann is putting together?
Comment down below and let us know.
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