De Niro and Pacino in Heat: A Bygone Era

RickBlaine

I watched Heat again yesterday and it is obviously a great modern American classic. The legendary pairing of De Niro and Pacino drove a lot of the hype and expectations back in 1995. It got me thinking if that could ever happen again. In 10 years time, will we be looking forward to finally seeing Adam Driver and Ryan Gosling in a movie together with the same significance as De Niro and Pacino in Heat. I doubt it somehow.

As good as Driver and Gosling are, there is a legendary status that De Niro and Pacino have reached that seems to have transcended their raw acting skills and instead is the result of something more rare and mythic - a product of their time that cannot be reproduced. The landscape of cinema has changed with less emphasis on A listers that it is almost impossible for the newer generation of actors to achieve the cultural weight of De Niro and Pacino who probably benefited from starting their career during the American New Wave era. A huge bulk of cinema going audiences today seem more excited about the pairing of individual superheroes characters than actual actors. Cinemagoers in 1995 were excited about the collaboration between De Niro and Pacino; cinemagoers in 2024 are excited about seeing Deadpool and Wolverine together.

Just wondering if anyone has any thoughts on this.

expectationlost

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/2058369777/de-niro-and-pacino-in-heat-a-bygone-era

you end up saying most cinema-goers aren't excited about seeing such thing again but started by saying it won't happen…, so how could any cinema going plebs be excited by something you say isn't happening?

(It could and does on happen TV)

MfMan

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/2058369777/de-niro-and-pacino-in-heat-a-bygone-era

Yes, Heat is the usual Michael Mann superficial eye candy with a typical-of-the-era way OTT performance by Pacino. Even though I am usually non-plussed by both actors, De Niro is restrained enough in fairness. (For me, both did their better screen work prior to 1980). I'm ambivalent by Gosling's minimalism but I like Driver so may catch the remake.

Sorry.

Decuc500

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/2058369777/de-niro-and-pacino-in-heat-a-bygone-era

You're spot on about modern audiences being more concerned with superhero matchups. It's all a bit depressing really. Mass saturation of superhero films have dumbed down popular cinema.

It's all a far cry from mainstream cinema catering to actual adults. Heat successfully melded the cultural power of titans from the New Hollywood era with crunching 90's thrillers.

magicbastarder

If one of the more remarkable things (in the sense that people remark on it) is the long awaited on screen meeting of Pacino and DeNiro - that doesn't say much about the movie! It's an alright scene. If it hadn't been their first meet we wouldn't be talking about it; I've seen the movie a couple of times (albeit probably 15 years since the last viewing) and I can't remember much of it, except the street shootout and the above scene. It's not a movie which stays with you, IMHO.

The J Stands for Jay

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122637930#Comment_122637930

The only part that really stays with you is the shootout. That's the bit that is from a bygone era. There's no way they'd get away with firing automatic weapons in the streets of LA now.

breezy1985

Heat was hyped up because two wrongly typecast actors were together in the type of movie they were typecast for.

The rest of the post is just Abe Simpson talking about what "it was"

yagan

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122637994#Comment_122637994

Interestingly Heat uses almost the exact same script as Mann's TV movie LA Takedown from a few years earlier, all Pacino and Deniro do is make it a bit more intense as they are both older than the original actors used.

Ardent

Heat is a great movie with superb action and perfect pacing. The De Niro / Pacino diner scene though is hugely overrated.

Ardent

On the point of Pacino being OTT, there's an interview with him on YouTube somewhere where talks about how Hanna was portrayed as a coke fiend in the screenplay and he was paying service to that.

Ted222

There was nothing particularly good about Heat. Pacino and De Niro starring together for the first time was just a marketing ploy.

Michael Mann directed Miami Vice. That’s the level the movie’s at.

johnny_ultimate

Too young to have noticed or cared about the hype around Pacino and De Niro being ‘together at last!’ Instead I have merely belatedly enjoyed Heat for what it is - an immensely slick and operatic thriller from the master of slick and operatic thrillers. Long, indulgent, sprawling - and all the better for it.

~Rebel~

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/2058369777/de-niro-and-pacino-in-heat-a-bygone-era

Think there's a certain amount of, perhaps errant, "things were better back in the day" thinking to this - that audiences back then were more discriminating than now, with the present day folks only interested in superhero nonsense.

The reality is that the number one box office movie in 1995 waassssssss - Batman Forever. And the atrocious Ace Ventura: When Nature Calls was number 5. Heat, meanwhile, only came in at number 53. (Now, part of that is because of its late-year release, so some of its box office takings came in 1996 - but even if you total them up together, it's barely troubling the top 25). The likes of Heat or Deadpool x Wolverine (and Batman Forever) are answering very different film niches to each other. They're not in competition.

As for the lack of names with that gravitas within pop-culture now… that's just sort of part of the reality of a more saturated media landscape. There was less room at the top before, so those that were there got more name recognition. Now, with a billion high quality TV outlets, and nigh on infinite movie streaming churn, it's hard for any individuals to register that same level of clout.

eightieschewbaccy

The oversaturation is a big aspect but we also tend to have a lot of big actors showing up in prestige TV. You get pairings of the likes of McConaughey and Harrelson in True Detective. None have the level of fame of DeNiro or Pacino at their peak but it's great combos.

Plenty of great examples of ensemble casts in the likes of Knives Out, Snowpiercer, The Departed(older admittedly), anything from Wes Anderson etc.

I do think for cinema fans that there are plenty of actors that are an automatic draw. We can look at the past in rose tinted glasses. I'd easily rank the likes of Tilda Swinton, Daniel Day Lewis, Christian Bale, Joaquin Phoenix, Gary Oldman,Cate Blanchett, Natalie Portman among the likes of DeNiro and Pacino. They do plenty of shite among their greats(exception of DDL maybe) but DeNiro and Pacino do too. That's ignoring all the non US centric actors that are readily accessible to us all now. But I'm pretty sure if Daniel Day Lewis decided to exit retirement to do one more movie, half of Hollywood would be fighting to be in it.

NIMAN

I have seen Heat maybe 3 or 4 times, as used to own it on Laserdisc and had a surround sound system at home when I was younger, and it was an intense watch, even outside of the shootout scene. But that was amazing to listen to.

As for the film itself, very enjoyable from what I remember but haven't watched it in years and wondering how I would see it now. Often when I go back and watch some older films, I find them quite cheesy and/or outdated. But they were of their time.

I do remember thinking Pacino really hammed it up too much in Heat, like he has done in other films too. De Niro was a much better performance. I guess if I watched it again now his performance would annoy me!

But agree that there simply isn't the actors now that you'd want to see paired up on screen. Although I do enjoy seeing Pitt and Clooney together.

flasher0030

Some movie. Haven't seen it in ages. This reminds me to throw it on one of the days.