HEAT Prequel (Michael Mann to Co-Write with Reed Farrel Coleman)

This was the best scene in Black Hat. I enjoyed it more than Miami Vice's stale acting.

 
I will not hear an ill word against MIAMI VICE. It's the best.

I've watched BLACK HAT about ten or twelve times, and my reception has improved each time. Similar to LAST OF THE MOHICANS, in which Mann took a property that wasn't great (he explicitly states James Fenimore Cooper's novel is drek; and hacker films are notoriously terrible translations onto film), and he executed a high-energy, largely tacit narrative. Almost all his characters are given at least one badass moment to shine. Tang Wei's English delivery leaves a bit to be desired, but she looks like this:

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I'd love to read novels set in Mann's universe, even though his muscular storytelling is my biggest draw.
 
Can't see how the movie could be any good. You can't just recast Pacino, DeNiro, Kilmer, etc. with younger lookalikes and expect it to be on the same level...

Leave it alone. Heat was brilliantly perfect. There's nothing more to the story that needs to be told.
 
LA TAKEDOWN is Mann's original version of HEAT, sharing some identical scenes and none of the actors (I believe). Despite glaring budget and cast differences, it's still very exciting. Even going from HEAT to LA TAKEDOWN, which I suppose is most of us.

The HEAT comparison is too damning. It killed PUBLIC ENEMIES for most people, and the digitally-added grain/noise finished off the rest of the survivors. Still -- a very well-told film.
 
I will not hear an ill word against MIAMI VICE. It's the best.

I've watched BLACK HAT about ten or twelve times, and my reception has improved each time. Similar to LAST OF THE MOHICANS, in which Mann took a property that wasn't great (he explicitly states James Fenimore Cooper's novel is drek; and hacker films are notoriously terrible translations onto film), and he executed a high-energy, largely tacit narrative. Almost all his characters are given at least one badass moment to shine. Tang Wei's English delivery leaves a bit to be desired, but she looks like this:

blackhat-usb-inline2.jpg


I'd love to read novels set in Mann's universe, even though his muscular storytelling is my biggest draw.

I fuckin haaaaaaaaaated Black Hat. It was like pulling teeth, out of my asshole.
 
It was like pulling teeth, out of my asshole.
Quite the specific comparison.

I didn't like it either, but it kept popping up on cable and I kept gravitating towards it. Strikes me almost like an exercise of Mann challenging himself. Like, "What are three things film audience absolutely abhor?" Computer films, right there it's tough. And you'd love to say, "Well, MATRIX is a hacker film!" but it's like 95% kung-fu on top of that hacking -- and we all agree Lexi is the worst part of an otherwise flawless JURASSIC PARK. (Incidentally, Timmy, you weren't do anything but rushing Lexi -- why not help Alan and fetch the shotgun for him?). Then, you have marble-mouthed dialogue -- coupled with Mann's penchant for flat deliveries. Some audiences find his cadence wooden and off-putting. I think his dialogue, like his visual storytelling, manages to elegantly cut to the point. To the quick. Lastly, there are banal plot points. Stock manipulations and tin commodities aren't too sexy. We've seen nuclear hot rooms before, getting horny after battle, knife fights, coffee-spilled-on-my-documents gag. It's not very new, storywise. BLACKHAT was like fighting with one arm and both legs tied behind its back.

Or teeth up inside an asshole, I'm not sure.

The first thing I liked about it -- the only thing, really, that first time -- was Holt McCanally. I love the way he introduces himself wordlessly into the film by sneering at Hemsworth, and then his finale was pretty awesome. From there it was easy to enjoy how easily Viola Davis integrates herself in this type of universe. I also liked the strong villain, who figured out he was being surveilled, and took harsh vengeance for having lost his part of his crew. And I like that they get to stick together in the end. That usually doesn't happen in a Mann film.

This was also the movie I noticed Hemsworth speaks with a lisp.
 
I didn't realize Mann fans were so down on Blackhat. I was actually surprised by how good it was.

I fucking loved it. I've been waiting for Mann to make something approaching that level ever since Collateral. Nowhere near as good, mind you, but unlike Miami Vice and Public Enemies, I was proud for Mann and grateful that I had the privilege to watch him work at such a high level again. The shootouts were vintage Mann, the chase to the subway reminded me of Collateral, and Hemsworth's growing obsession with the hacker was shades of William Petersen in Manhunter. I'm still not as high on his [recent] aesthetics [...] the shots of the team running around when they raided the bagman's place were fucking nauseating, it made footage from Cops look Oscar-worthy. I also would've liked a little more insight into Hemsworth's character. He has like three lines when he's with the sister in the restaurant for that trick meeting, and like two more lines after they do it, but otherwise we never really learn what makes him tick. The nature of the hunt (like Manhunter) precludes a rivalry like in Heat or Collateral, but to at least have gotten inside Hemsworth's head a little the way we get into Petersen's head would've made the film even better. Still, though, the plot was slick, the action was on point, and Mann's general command of the story made me feel for the first time in more than a decade now that Mann still has some gas left in the tank.

As far as Mann going back to Heatland: Leave it alone, dude.
 
It would have to be 2 separate stories taking place in the same movie since Hanna and McCauley didn't have any runins until the 1995 movie.
 
I didn't realize Mann fans were so down on Blackhat. I was actually surprised by how good it was.



As far as Mann going back to Heatland: Leave it alone, dude.
Here's the template for a Mann crime-drama

- Professional Alpha male cop and/or criminal lead

- awesome sleek aesthetic, cinematography, musical cues

- drawn out, progressive plot ; random conflict with love interests

- p4p best shootout scenes

I enjoyed Blackhat because it felt like another standard Mann crime flick, but it definitely could've been fleshed out more and refined to make it a legendary classic alongside Heat. Chris Hemsworth looked the part of a prototypical Mann alpha-male lead, but he's a shit actor at times and certainly didn't help the cause. Everything else was great standard MM fare imo.

I'd kill for a sequel to Miami Vice since it's one of my favorite movies in the past decade or so, although that will never happen.

Don't want to see Mann go the full Ridley Scott route and go back to playing his greatest hits with the "Heat Universe".
 
I'm surprised so many Mann fans didn't like Miami Vice
 
Quite the specific comparison.

I didn't like it either, but it kept popping up on cable and I kept gravitating towards it. Strikes me almost like an exercise of Mann challenging himself. Like, "What are three things film audience absolutely abhor?" Computer films, right there it's tough. And you'd love to say, "Well, MATRIX is a hacker film!" but it's like 95% kung-fu on top of that hacking -- and we all agree Lexi is the worst part of an otherwise flawless JURASSIC PARK. (Incidentally, Timmy, you weren't do anything but rushing Lexi -- why not help Alan and fetch the shotgun for him?). Then, you have marble-mouthed dialogue -- coupled with Mann's penchant for flat deliveries. Some audiences find his cadence wooden and off-putting. I think his dialogue, like his visual storytelling, manages to elegantly cut to the point. To the quick. Lastly, there are banal plot points. Stock manipulations and tin commodities aren't too sexy. We've seen nuclear hot rooms before, getting horny after battle, knife fights, coffee-spilled-on-my-documents gag. It's not very new, storywise. BLACKHAT was like fighting with one arm and both legs tied behind its back.

Or teeth up inside an asshole, I'm not sure.

The first thing I liked about it -- the only thing, really, that first time -- was Holt McCanally. I love the way he introduces himself wordlessly into the film by sneering at Hemsworth, and then his finale was pretty awesome. From there it was easy to enjoy how easily Viola Davis integrates herself in this type of universe. I also liked the strong villain, who figured out he was being surveilled, and took harsh vengeance for having lost his part of his crew. And I like that they get to stick together in the end. That usually doesn't happen in a Mann film.

This was also the movie I noticed Hemsworth speaks with a lisp.

It felt like a student film, or practice film, leading up to Mann having the ability to make Heat. Instead of a movie that he made a zillion years after Heat. It commits the capital offense of being boring. And I don't mean slow, because I love slow, but boring. Even the shootout, which someone youtube posted above, somehow manages to be boring, within a span of 8 measly minutes.

And yeah it doesn't help that he chose Chris Hemlslmworth as his lead, who makes Keanu Reeves seem like Gary Oldman.
 
Love heat but if this novel reveals what happened to Frank from Thief 1981( voights character talks about hanna taking down a frank in chicargo in heat ) it will kill me. Thief is my faviroute film ever and i love the ending of him walking into the night and not knowing his fate. though i will end up reading it cos Manns a king
 
I'm surprised so many Mann fans didn't like Miami Vice
MIAMI VICE sits at the nexus, perhaps nadir, of a few trends. The television show had become a well-worn joke by that point, and no one had much faith in Colin Farrell and Jamie Foxx as leading men. Farrell had used up a lot of credit, and Foxx was just coming into his own. Further, this was Mann's second film in his exploration into digital so it's a little jarring in places. The subsequent PUBLIC ENEMIES really bugs me, because adding the digital grain nearly destroys the experience of watching it, and it feels almost like a step backwards.

Digital made it easy to usher in the cinematic language that started with the French New Wave, continuing with Malick, and into the Mexican directors of the late 90s, and brought into mainstream with BOURNE. Today story is told more visually and by piecemeal. Flits and snatches of hints here and there. The best comparison I can make is how black and white films were so stagey by comparison to the method aesthetic of the 70s and the decadent 80s. It's now more about mood and performance, rather than structure and dialogue. The St. Crispin's Day speeches are getting less and less grandiloquent.

MIAMI VICE sits between eras of talky exposition and bite-sized dialogue poems, but then Mann-dialogue has never been for everyone. I think it's great. And I like to say it's the movie BAD BOYS 2 wishes it was. I love how it cuts right to the point.


It felt like a student film, or practice film, leading up to Mann having the ability to make Heat. Instead of a movie that he made a zillion years after Heat.
I think the opposite. I love HEAT but it takes a while to get where it's going and I'm more aware I'm watching a thriller unfold. Because it's like a game of tennis, we have to wait for the narrative to bounce from McCauley to Hanna, seeing what each does with the moment he is given. We have to wait for the reflections in order to discern the context and direction -- where we are in the film, and where we're going.

With Mann's later work, the storytelling is still external but the internal is made much more vivid. We're drawn inside the psyches of the characters, feeling as they do and discovering their plans of actions as they do. Mann's current work is more immediate and visceral. You're locked in the moment, and that can be a problem once the moment is over. Like with porn, after you've come it becomes a bit embarrassing -- but IN THE MOMENT.

IN THE MOMENT.

Yes, yes I get the boredom, but this is what happens when you're not really a fan of movies but a fan of MOVIE. Every Mann film becomes either HEAT or not-HEAT. And that's too bad because there's some special shit going on there. I look forward to his new Ferrari film, but wished it was Christian Bale still and not Hugh Jackman.
 
I think the opposite. I love HEAT but it takes a while to get where it's going and I'm more aware I'm watching a thriller unfold. Because it's like a game of tennis, we have to wait for the narrative to bounce from McCauley to Hanna, seeing what each does with the moment he is given. We have to wait for the reflections in order to discern the context and direction -- where we are in the film, and where we're going.

With Mann's later work, the storytelling is still external but the internal is made much more vivid. We're drawn inside the psyches of the characters, feeling as they do and discovering their plans of actions as they do. Mann's current work is more immediate and visceral. You're locked in the moment, and that can be a problem once the moment is over. Like with porn, after you've come it becomes a bit embarrassing -- but IN THE MOMENT.

IN THE MOMENT.

Yes, yes I get the boredom, but this is what happens when you're not really a fan of movies but a fan of MOVIE. Every Mann film becomes either HEAT or not-HEAT. And that's too bad because there's some special shit going on there. I look forward to his new Ferrari film, but wished it was Christian Bale still and not Hugh Jackman.

The way you are describing a certain aspect of Blackhat for you, that's the way I feel about HEAT. I am instantly sucked in, lost in the moment, the visceral movieness from the very beginning, when Neil is stealing the ambulance. Every random piece of character information is compelling to me, even when it isn't immediately obvious how it fits the plot. Every landscape shot for the scene transitions is like honey being poured on my face. Full homo.

And it's not just that I'm comparing every other movie he makes to HEAT, well I am, but that becomes a footnote. In the same way when Tarantino puts out a flick I will rank it against the others, but that won't be the main drive behind my feelings about the movie, I can still get completely lost in Death Proof, criminally underrated, without constantly comparing it to Pulp Fiction or whatever. Same with Mann's flicks, except I just happen to think he has had a far more severe gap in quality between say, Collateral which I love, and Blackhat which I almost loathe.

Totally agree with you on the new Ferrari movie he is working on. I was totally excited to hear Christian Bale was onboard, he just FITS that part & Mann's aesthetic SO well that it seemed like fate, and I was totally gutted when he parted ways with the project. We got JACKED, MAN.
 


Aside from including what seems to be HK's strongest street advert ever, this scene RULES. When I saw Kassar, he reminded me so much of that anonymous criminal in GHOST IN THE SHELL, with the high velocity rounds.


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And it's not just that I'm comparing every other movie he makes to HEAT, well I am...
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