Voted as one of the best movie shootout scenes ever, Heat’s reputation has only grown over the past several decades so much so that it’s now (correctly) considered one of American cinema’s greatest masterpieces. We add this to our “Never Forget” archives (as well as part of our greatest face-off movie scenes ever) even though there are more than one scene to choose from.
The diner conversation needs to be mentioned. Sitting down at a diner LAPD detective Vincent Hanna (Al Pacino) and master thief Neil McCauley (Robert De Niro) have a casual chat. It’s a momentous confrontation, to be sure, and one that was widely recognized at the time, too, since it was the first time these two legends shared a scene.
But this is not the scene we are adding today. Today we are the best shootout scene in movie history. The heat shootout scene: The chaotic centerpiece is a triumph of planning, right down to the sequence’s most notable feature: the deafening sound of heavy-caliber gunfire echoing throughout downtown L.A. The plan was to sweeten the noise in postproduction, but Mann didn’t like what he heard. He wanted the sound recorded on location during the meticulously choreographed filming of the shootout. That’s the special sauce that makes it the gold standard.
Who can forger De Niro’s prison-learned rule: “Don’t let yourself get attached to anything you are not willing to walk out on in 30 seconds flat…”
We added the diner scene above just for reference.
What do you think about this scene? Worthy to be a added to our growing catalogue of “Never Forget” scenes?
