0:04

If the action

0:08

is the juice for you,

0:12

you've come to the right

0:15

podcast.

0:26

Welcome

0:30

to Manhunting. I'm your host Rob Zachney

0:32

here with NextLander's Alex Navarro and

0:34

Philadelphia's own Dia Lotzina

0:37

to continue our journey through the career of

0:39

director, writer, and producer Michael

0:41

Mann to examine his timeless themes of craft,

0:44

labor, capital, and dudes rocking.

0:48

So I think something we've realized as we've gone

0:51

through Mann's body of work to date,

0:53

especially Alex and I, is that he

0:55

recycles

0:56

scenes and ideas constantly and

0:58

an awful lot of iconic

1:00

moments from his 1995

1:03

crime opus Heat

1:04

crops up in bits and pieces

1:07

throughout the rest of his career.

1:09

And you haven't seen the last of it. In later movies,

1:12

you will see these things crop up as well.

1:15

But

1:15

by the time we hit Heat in this journey,

1:18

I now feel like I've seen constituent

1:20

parts of Heat,

1:23

like almost like stitched together body parts

1:25

sort of out of place in other works because I know

1:27

them from Heat first and foremost. You

1:30

know, there was a bit of this

1:32

in, you know, in

1:34

Miami Vice. Some of the themes of Thief

1:37

come through this. There were some scenes lifted

1:39

directly when you're talking about

1:41

a crime story. And yet, Heat

1:44

doesn't get a reputation for being

1:47

a pastiche of Mann's

1:49

own ideas or fixations

1:52

or quirks in part because

1:54

it is far and away the best known

1:57

of Mann's crime films, the one that broke through to.

2:00

wide acclaim and classic status.

2:02

And I think that's kind of where I want

2:05

to have this conversation

2:07

framed. Heat's a movie

2:09

a lot of people know really well. I don't think we need

2:11

to go through it in like, it's

2:14

a very long movie too. So I don't think we need to go through it in

2:16

like really intense point

2:18

by point detail. Well, and we also

2:20

did that already last time. We went through the entire

2:22

plot of Heat because the Heat already made

2:24

this whole damn movie at least once. Right,

2:26

well, we saw the rough walkthrough. He

2:30

just happened to film for

2:33

a network of Heat. If

2:35

you really want to see people going

2:38

down the manhole

2:40

all the way

2:43

over Heat, check out One Heat Minute,

2:45

a podcast where the conceit was to

2:47

do a

2:48

podcast episode,

2:50

analyzing one minute of this film each

2:54

episode and started as a weird conceit.

2:56

It got increasingly good as it went along, I would

2:58

say. I mean, that's a guaranteed 180 episodes right there.

3:01

I mean, that's why wouldn't you do that?

3:04

Why was this movie so long? When

3:07

you first mentioned the One Heat Minute thing, I was just like,

3:09

okay, well, you know, like that's 90

3:12

episodes, that's a healthy thing. And

3:14

then I realized, no, Heat is fucking two hours

3:17

and 50 minutes long, are you fucking kidding me? It's

3:19

the opposite of a healthy thing.

3:21

Yeah, it is three

3:23

glorious hours

3:25

of crime

3:27

epic. And I think that's- A pure testosterone

3:30

fueled melodrama.

3:32

So I guess that's kind of my question

3:35

is, why do we think

3:37

that this is the definitive man

3:39

film in most people's minds?

3:42

Like, why does this one loom so large?

3:45

Even when you have like truly great

3:47

films like Thief there kind of being

3:50

eclipsed by it. Why does this

3:52

one break through and become like kind

3:54

of a household reference

3:56

as it were in a way that like, I'm not

3:58

sure any of his other films.

3:59

really do. Because when

4:02

Al Pacino and Robert

4:04

De Niro yell, straight

4:06

guys dicks get hard. Yep.

4:09

You're not wrong. And if they are going to do it together

4:11

in the same movie, that is, I

4:14

mean, how do you say

4:16

no to that? I mean, do it like,

4:18

to be fair, this is one of the

4:21

most powerfully cast films.

4:24

Oh yeah. In the man filmography.

4:26

And I think they're probably ridiculous cadre

4:29

of character actors and people you will come

4:31

to know in the ensuing decades.

4:34

Yeah, it is. It is a

4:37

strangely stacked thing. Like you don't see

4:39

many films like of it, of

4:42

its like prior to getting into

4:44

either like big Hollywood epics where

4:46

you have people just randomly cast at,

4:48

you know, Ted Danson popping up and like save your private,

4:51

save your private Ryan or something. Or

4:53

you get to like

4:55

the big Marvel films where the whole point

4:58

is to get as big name and actor

5:00

as you can for the part

5:02

of like random superhero in the background

5:05

there, no matter what. Like getting Christian Bale

5:07

movies, Batman to play some

5:10

guy who is called a God killer, who

5:12

I assume was in a comics run in the 1970s

5:14

and has not been heard of since then.

5:17

Right. So

5:20

I think there is a lot to recommend that theory

5:22

that like it is a movie that sort of succeeds

5:25

on pure star power where like

5:28

we're not messing around here with

5:31

my cool

5:33

Chicago theater friends. Like

5:36

all those guys like, sorry, I'm

5:38

in Hollywood now. No more room

5:40

for y'all. I have entered

5:42

my LA phase.

5:44

Yeah, sorry. John

5:46

Santucci. I hope, I hope you're all

5:48

right. You may be back in jail, but

5:51

like, hope you get your, get your

5:53

shit together or whatever. Sorry that happened to you.

5:55

Bless your heart. Maybe next time we do a TV pilot,

5:57

I'll find a spot for you. But until then.

6:00

Yeah, so here's the thing. The reason

6:03

this movie looms most large for me

6:05

and why it is sort of, you know, I

6:08

think kind of my diff...

6:10

Going through this, I will say that I think ultimately

6:12

I feel like Thief is maybe actually a little bit, like

6:15

works a little bit better for me overall as a movie.

6:17

Partially because it does lack some of that bloat

6:19

that he has. But this

6:21

was my first man movie. This movie came

6:23

out in 1995. I was about 13 or 14 when it came out. I

6:27

did not see it in theaters when it came out,

6:29

but being a suburban child whose

6:31

parents had HBO, I was exposed to it soon

6:33

enough after the fact. And it was definitely

6:35

one of those movies that I remember watching on like some

6:37

random middle of the night

6:40

channel surfing like, Oh, I've never seen this before.

6:42

It's like 1130. I don't go to bed for another

6:44

four hours. Fuck it. Let's see what this is. And

6:47

having my tiny mind blown just by...

6:51

Not one, the sheer star power of it,

6:53

the sheer number of actors I had heard of were like, Oh

6:55

my God, how are all these people in this movie?

6:57

But two, it is...

7:01

I don't know how to explain this any better other than to say

7:03

this is a movie that is... Masculine

7:08

to the most absurd

7:10

degree. And

7:11

I think that being a teenage boy

7:13

at that time, I was extremely

7:16

receptive to the idea of stoic,

7:19

you know, intense men doing

7:21

stoic, intense things while

7:24

also incredible violence is playing

7:26

out in the background.

7:29

Yeah, I think...

7:32

And there was an awful lot of...

7:34

I think of the time...

7:37

I'm with you. I think for a long

7:39

time I would have said...

7:42

Mohicans is my first Michael Mann film. So

7:44

that one, that's the one that I probably came into

7:46

this maybe overwriting a little bit. And

7:50

Thief is one that I think of the years goes by does

7:52

sort of like rise in my

7:54

estimation. But

7:56

for a long time there, I think...

9:59

I would agree, but yeah.

10:03

Yeah, I would say there's

10:05

just moments where Pacino's

10:07

just going for it, and I think he still does have

10:10

grace notes as well. I think him

10:13

trying to figure out where he stands in,

10:16

one of the things they introduced here that is not an

10:18

LA takedown is the fact that

10:20

his new relationship

10:22

also now involves a stepdaughter.

10:25

Right. And an absentee

10:27

biological father. Literally

10:30

never seen in the movie. Right. And

10:33

I think those scenes he plays very well where

10:35

he's trying to figure out where do I stand in this.

10:39

This kid is being neglected kind of by both

10:41

parents, and I'm not

10:43

her

10:44

dad, but I feel obliged to

10:47

somehow be involved in this. I think he plays

10:49

that stuff very straight and handles it very, very well. But

10:52

then at the same time, every time he

10:54

goes into

10:56

the movie, oh,

10:58

you know, like NYPD Blue, Sipkowitz

11:01

mode, like shaking down some scales and

11:04

things like this, every time he's got to go

11:06

like work his CIs,

11:08

man, he just, you know, takes

11:11

all the restraints

11:14

off the performance.

11:15

I'm not entirely sure if this is

11:18

actually true or if it's just one of those

11:20

urban legend things that has gone around for so long

11:22

that it's been accepted as canon, but I think

11:24

there was somewhere, and this is not

11:26

mentioned in the commentary anywhere by man, so who knows if

11:28

it's true or not, but there was some point

11:31

in which the script involved

11:34

Vince and Hannah having a coke addiction, in

11:36

addition to, you know, kind of everything else

11:38

going on.

11:39

And if you think about that, some

11:42

of the notes that he hits throughout this performance,

11:45

you can pretty easily imagine him just doing

11:47

a big old line right before he walked

11:49

into that club or went to that dog

11:51

fighting pit or wherever and just being like,

11:53

all right, time to go to work.

11:56

Yeah, and it is established his wife

11:58

is doing cocaine.

11:59

throughout the film, right? She's

12:02

on pills. I don't know if she's on cocaine or not.

12:05

She says grass and Prozac. Yeah.

12:08

Yeah, I mean, that's very also very 90s. Yeah.

12:13

But yeah, I think the other

12:15

thing to note here is fundamentally,

12:17

this is LA takedown. I

12:19

think some of the differences are maybe more

12:23

illustrative of what's going on

12:25

here than the similarities.

12:28

Because I think one of the other things that separates

12:30

this from his other works, including

12:33

Thief, is that I think he really

12:35

is now trying to capture

12:41

a very broad field of view

12:44

into the stories, sort of telling

12:47

a crime epic that touches on

12:49

a lot of different lives and in varying

12:52

degrees of detail. And is

12:54

also trying

12:56

in the way that Thief kind of tries

12:58

to, to at least allude

13:00

to the fact that there are structural

13:03

or societal factors that lead

13:05

people down this road and certainly make

13:08

this road maybe even a hell

13:10

of a lot more appealing and sensible

13:12

than sticking it out in the

13:14

grind of the working world. And

13:17

so I think if you look at LA takedown, it

13:19

is entirely about the

13:21

crack cop. And

13:24

the master thief. And

13:27

here in this film, it is

13:29

also much, much more about

13:33

the failures,

13:38

as we talked about,

13:39

the politics of a second

13:42

marriage and affects the divorce on

13:44

kids. We're dealing with stuff like

13:47

the fact that their getaway driver

13:49

for the job that ultimately goes so wrong

13:52

is a minor character in the story, but he's also

13:54

somebody established as trying

13:56

to walk the straight and narrow getting

13:58

out of prison.

13:59

and discovering that like there

14:02

is an entire system of

14:05

abuse and exploitation set up specifically

14:07

for parolees

14:09

that like, you know, it's

14:12

it's kind of a race to see

14:15

whether or not you

14:18

know, he's going to be hit

14:20

up with a parole violation, you

14:22

know, just to just to sort

14:24

of push him back in line or he's going to snap

14:27

because he's he's basically trapped in

14:29

a shitty diner job where his wages

14:31

are being stolen.

14:33

And his employer

14:35

and his parole officer are like in on it. Yeah.

14:38

And is this this is the kind of stuff where

14:40

like man

14:44

is interested in this stuff, but

14:46

also he's not quite as interested

14:48

in it as the view from

14:50

like a penthouse overlooking

14:53

the Hollywood Hills or

14:57

the or the incredibly

14:59

blue beach house that is, you know,

15:01

only spare. Hmm.

15:07

Hmm. Yeah.

15:20

I know that fucking desk toy. Um,

15:24

and like, that really feels like kind of encapsulating

15:27

of all of man's things. Like he wants this kind of

15:29

all encompassing view of everything, but

15:31

really at the end of the day, he's focused on like who,

15:34

who is like, you know, the, the, the

15:36

exotic object that he

15:38

can, you know, project all this fantasy through.

15:40

And

15:41

it is, it's, it's, it's, you know, it's

15:44

the dead tech post-modernist, you

15:46

know, uh, bullshit house,

15:49

bullshit house.

15:51

Well, here's the

15:53

question. but he wants to frame the working man

15:55

through lots and lots and lots of

15:57

like box glass. Yes.

16:01

He wants an elevated working man here,

16:03

especially. Are you saying

16:06

this? You're going to say like, you just

16:08

don't get like the whole thing, but like Hannah with his master's

16:10

degree and things like that. Like, yeah, you know,

16:13

it's just this, you know, man has specific

16:15

kind of interests, we'll say.

16:18

Yes, specific interests. And they manifest

16:20

through very specific aesthetic choices that

16:23

he makes repeatedly throughout his career.

16:25

Well, I think that something else is

16:28

I do feel like aesthetically, this

16:30

is also a film that's charting the

16:32

next direction. He's going with his career.

16:35

Yes. Which is that

16:37

like

16:38

he is now really

16:40

fascinated.

16:42

You know, it's cliche at this point, but like

16:44

he is fascinated by like urban loneliness

16:47

and like the city at night and the way that like

16:50

emphasizes and exaggerates that

16:52

loneliness. And I think it it comes through

16:54

from the start of the film. I think like you know, I

16:56

start a sense this is a differently paced man

16:58

film in some ways because like it's got that

17:00

opening on

17:02

a long shot

17:04

that's just holding on a commuter

17:06

rail station in Los Angeles.

17:09

And you stare at it so long that it begins to like sort

17:11

of just like dissolve into like abstract

17:14

shapes and colors and like form. And

17:18

it's it's really a shot. He hasn't really done since

17:20

like maybe the opening shot of Thief where

17:22

he sort of pulls down through the

17:25

fire escapes in the rainstorm in Chicago.

17:28

But like it is that sort of interest

17:31

in just like

17:33

looking hard at like

17:35

vacant like space

17:39

in the city

17:40

and just like observing the form there

17:43

and then isolating a character within that

17:46

like sort of creating like creating this canvas

17:48

and then like dropping a

17:51

character into it

17:52

who is going to

17:54

sort of stand apart

17:57

for the duration of the film. I think that's this is how

17:59

we introduce.

17:59

Daniro is

18:02

that he is this guy who emerges from a train

18:04

in a crowd, but like is

18:06

also a man apart throughout

18:09

this opening sequence where we

18:11

see him setting up you know, the first

18:13

score of the film. But like

18:15

his, like Neil Collie's

18:18

gift and calling card in this opening stage

18:20

is the fact that like

18:23

nobody notices anybody and nobody knows

18:25

anybody

18:26

in the city. I think, you know, you're gonna see

18:28

this, this becomes an acute anxiety by

18:30

the time you hit collateral, right? Collateral

18:33

is about the dread of realizing

18:35

like

18:36

the reason you can pass through the world

18:39

and use it as like camouflage

18:41

is also because in some ways you're already dead

18:44

to it, you're a ghost within it. And

18:48

this is sort of what man is really

18:50

into exploring now with

18:52

this next stage, both like thematically

18:55

and also just like as a visual stylist.

18:57

Yeah, and I think here, you know, he's

18:59

pulling at those threads before

19:02

I think he fully knows exactly what he wants to

19:04

do with that sort of thing. You know, the thing

19:06

he's more fixated on here is trying to tell this

19:08

story that he's been trying to tell it in some form

19:10

since the early 80s.

19:12

And you know, there's an aspect of that certainly

19:14

with the crew and you know, their ability to sort

19:16

of exist outside the purview

19:19

of, you know, law enforcement and even really knowing who

19:21

they are for the most part

19:22

until the heat comes down. We

19:25

will be hearing the word heat a lot throughout this.

19:28

I didn't realize how much we heard the word heat

19:30

until the It's at least a dozen times. messages

19:33

last night.

19:35

It's in there a lot.

19:37

Dia, you were keeping count. How many did you come

19:39

up with? I didn't count. I just took, I just

19:41

paused and took a photo of my

19:44

television every time it happened.

19:46

Yeah. And then

19:48

sent them all to the group chat. God,

19:51

it's,

19:53

the thing that is striking, I will say, is that

19:55

there are a few shots in here that

19:57

you can definitely see like how They

20:00

informed what he the kinds of shots

20:02

he was looking for and stuff like Miami Vice

20:05

and and collaterals especially going

20:07

forward You know, but

20:09

like you can see here This is where he fell in love

20:11

with the idea of the LA landscape in its various forms,

20:14

you know It's the it's the shot of the subway

20:16

at the beginning It's kind

20:18

of that big airport thing at the end You

20:20

know the way he kind of shoots and light it lets the natural

20:23

lighting of that thing Sort of just kind

20:25

of govern that entire scene and

20:27

then there's also that shot on On

20:30

Edie the woman that DeNiro's character

20:32

falls in love with on her balcony that Apparently

20:34

he couldn't get quite right because he decided

20:36

to green screen part of that to make sure he got

20:38

the exact frame of it And as Dia

20:41

put out it pointed out last

20:43

night when she was watching it The

20:46

they did not do a great job It's

20:49

really rough. Yeah, it's it's the only

20:51

shot in that movie I can point to him be like Oh, they

20:53

should have not done that

20:54

and it's really funny cuz he can tell it's like, okay you

20:57

did you had a very specific vision

20:59

in mind of how you wanted this scene to play

21:01

out and You the only

21:03

way you could apparently get it was green screening it and that

21:05

just did not

21:07

No does not work. That's gonna

21:09

look especially rough on that 4k edition Like

21:13

try and clean that up because

21:16

The last blu-ray release they called

21:18

the directors definitive edition and it

21:20

did not actually change the edit of the movie

21:22

at all So I feel like they might actually just be done

21:25

doing that with that movie

21:26

The interesting thing about this movie aesthetically and also

21:29

like with you know, like his is falling

21:31

in love with like shooting LA as a city That's

21:34

what 60 million dollars and like what

21:36

is it 107 days gets ya. Yes,

21:38

like yeah, it was at least a four-month shoot I think

21:41

like

21:42

Yeah, yeah, it's it's it's very easy

21:44

when you have like, you know a very very

21:47

high-end cinematographer

21:49

like Dante Spinozzi Who's

21:51

very technical and like man really

21:54

likes his technical shots He

21:56

does like to get up close and get me kind

21:58

of messy here and there with like the stand

21:59

But a lot of times he

22:02

really likes these, you know, extremely

22:04

technical shots. Like the one, like the

22:06

opening of thief even is a very technical shot. It's

22:08

just, he did it with like no money and like,

22:10

right. As much time. Um,

22:13

like we get, we get the one, the, the, the

22:16

point of view of like, um,

22:19

DeNiro like pistol

22:21

whipping Wayne grow at the end where

22:23

we flashed, we flashed

22:25

to a point of view shot for like two

22:28

seconds. What?

22:29

It's a really, like you can tell that there was

22:31

probably a different version of that sequence

22:33

he had in mind that probably had more of that.

22:36

And

22:36

then at certain point he was like, this is one nauseating

22:39

and two doesn't look very good. So let's just

22:41

have that impact shot in there. Do you know, to kind of

22:43

jar the audience? And I think it works

22:45

that way, but I, a longer version

22:47

of that would have just been unpleasant to look at.

22:50

But it's also so weird because it is

22:52

such a kind of rough, messy, not

22:56

like it's like, okay, yeah, I see why you,

22:58

you, you did this for like that impact shot,

23:00

but also it's kind of tonally

23:03

at odds with the rest of the cinematography for

23:05

this movie.

23:06

Yeah. There's a few technical things

23:08

like that throughout like that between the green screen, that shot,

23:12

some very liberal use

23:14

of stunt men who I'm going to say maybe

23:16

do not particularly

23:18

resemble the actors in which they are, they're portraying

23:22

and also there's maybe lingering on

23:24

them a little too long. But,

23:26

you know, like stuff like that mostly I think adds flavor.

23:29

It's really just that one green screenshot that I remember.

23:32

He actually comments on it in the

23:34

commentary and I was like, oh, is this going

23:36

to be where he finally is like, I hate the shot. No, he's just like, yeah,

23:39

we couldn't get the shot we wanted. So we

23:42

had to use the green screen and then he immediately

23:45

moves on, does not speak of it again.

23:47

Well, this is like him and the man under commentary

23:50

also being like, man, I wish you

23:52

could see the magical blessed shot we

23:54

got a dollar hide the

23:56

morning after Dante

23:59

loved the shot we had.

23:59

But I just felt like those tattoos

24:02

were too much. And so you'll

24:04

never see it because the light was only perfect

24:07

for that one moment. I

24:09

do appreciate that we got the Tooth Fairy and

24:12

Buffalo Bill in the same movie. Yep.

24:16

Yeah, no, I'm always happy to see Tom Noonan. I like

24:18

his little his little character.

24:20

This is great. I want a whole movie of just that guy.

24:23

Like he's the guy that they clearly

24:25

based that GTA 5 side character

24:28

on. The guy who gives you all your missions, Lester,

24:30

but they decided that the way to do him was to make him

24:33

a thousand times more annoying, which

24:35

is a very rock star move to do. But yeah, like

24:38

I like his little turn. I think he's one of the better,

24:41

like one or two scene pop ups in this movie.

24:45

And he did like it. Oh, go ahead.

24:47

No, I was I was just going to say, man,

24:49

again, shout out to shout out to an era

24:51

where you would actually deploy character, actors and character

24:53

roles. Right. Yeah. And I think

24:55

that's that's a good thing that like actually works

24:57

here is like, you know, I was thinking about this movie

25:00

in like,

25:01

you know, like the the

25:04

babel era of filmmaking where

25:06

we get these ensemble casts of like, you

25:08

know, we get like eight different stories that are

25:10

all kind of happening simultaneously or, you

25:12

know, asynchronously or whatever, but they're full and complete

25:15

and we don't get just a character actor just showing

25:17

up to be a character to add texture and

25:20

flavor to the world. And that is the one thing

25:22

that this movie does really good. Like at first I was kind

25:24

of like

25:25

like with Dennis Haysbert's character, I'm like, damn,

25:27

like and William Fickner, like I was like, damn,

25:29

you guys are just like you're barely

25:31

in this movie, but

25:33

when you are, I am focused exclusively

25:35

on you and what you're doing. Yeah. Well,

25:37

like they're

25:38

well, in the Haysbert thing, I will just say like it's

25:41

a that is a that is a plot thread that

25:43

stands out much clearer in my mind than the first time

25:45

I saw all the way to today where

25:48

like,

25:49

because of the little details in

25:52

his performance and like,

25:54

just the like,

25:57

I cannot think about that moment where he

25:59

tries to explain

25:59

how excited he is by the idea of being a

26:02

grill man at the diner. And

26:04

the guy shits all over it. And he's like, no,

26:06

you're not like good for you. You're also going to take out the garbage.

26:09

You're also going to clean the bathrooms. You're also going to do all this other

26:11

shit.

26:12

Yeah. And like just that

26:14

little beat of like seeing him try

26:16

to like I'm like, I'm good at stuff,

26:19

right? I can do stuff like I can

26:21

be useful to society in a variety

26:23

of ways. And the like

26:25

sadistic joy this guy,

26:28

like this this diner owner has in

26:30

like taking that away from him. And also the fact

26:32

that it works right. That like, yeah, Haysburg's

26:35

like Haysburg's performance and every single

26:37

one of it is like it

26:39

reminds me a lot of.

26:42

Oh, gosh.

26:44

Out of sight. Yeah, we're like looming

26:47

in the background of out of sight is

26:49

like Clooney's like pressure cooker

26:51

tightening over the realization that like

26:54

it's either crime or being

26:56

jerked around by like

26:58

petty tyrants at work forever.

27:01

Right. And it's like and both are prison. Like

27:03

both are like a kind of death.

27:06

And there's he'll he'll take

27:08

the one that involves like the hail of bullets. And

27:11

I like this sort of calls that to mind,

27:14

that that that sort of sense of like after

27:16

a point, you like fully understand

27:19

how that character who like started the film,

27:21

the few scenes we get with him, he's

27:23

trying real hard to keep it together, even though he's not

27:25

getting much support and how

27:28

easy

27:28

it is. And the fact he almost like.

27:31

Are kind of like it's tragic, but you

27:34

fully are with him when he throws that apron aside

27:36

and goes off to like join the heist,

27:39

he's going to get killed. But like that

27:41

moment where he's like, fuck you, I'm out of here. Like

27:44

you are totally riding with him at that moment.

27:46

And even now, having seen this movie dozens

27:48

of times over the years, like I always know

27:51

like what the dark turn is going to be. But

27:53

I always feel it because I think

27:56

of the things that man

27:58

adds to this.

27:59

compared to like, say what is in LA takedown.

28:03

It's like, I remember back in the day, a bunch of people being

28:05

like, I don't understand why the Dennis Haysbert storyline

28:07

is in there or whatever. And it's like, no,

28:09

this is actually one of the few things that has like legitimate

28:11

heart outside of just

28:14

the bromance between De Niro and

28:16

Pacino. And like,

28:19

yes, it's kind of dropped into the story in

28:21

a slightly awkward way, but Haysbert

28:23

and the actress who plays his wife, they

28:26

give those scenes a humanity that

28:28

like almost like a good chunk

28:30

of this movie just does not have. It is a

28:32

movie that is very much obsessed with cool and

28:34

technicality and you know, like

28:36

sort of just vibes throughout, but

28:38

that is like a real good human story.

28:41

And like the way Haysbert

28:43

plays it throughout, I think is like what

28:45

makes that a success and why I think it's great

28:47

that they did not cut that out of the movie. Cause

28:49

you could easily see a lot of those scenes being the thing

28:51

that like a studio would bulk out and say,

28:53

just put it on the DVD, whatever.

28:56

You know, and I think one of the things it's like really

28:58

great about Haysbert's whole

29:00

arc is that like, yes,

29:04

we know it's inevitable.

29:06

Like we, you know, we understand

29:09

the way fiction works enough

29:11

to know this is what, this is the only possible

29:13

arc for Haysbert's character,

29:16

but it's the one, it's one of the few things in

29:18

the movie that doesn't feel like it's accepted

29:21

its inevitability, right?

29:23

You know, with, with De Niro

29:26

and Pacino, both of them are so

29:29

like they have played, they are playing

29:31

two men who have accepted the inevitability

29:33

of their lives and they're like, you know, their

29:35

roles and what they're supposed to do. And

29:38

like, they do it very well. And

29:40

especially cause I think at this point in their careers,

29:42

they've kind of accepted their own inevitabilities.

29:45

It really feels like as actors.

29:48

And so like

29:51

Haysbert's the only real place where it feels

29:53

like there is a kind of like, something

29:56

could have gone differently

29:58

and just pivoted. and

30:00

he would not have ended up at this ending. And

30:02

just society just kind of stepped

30:05

in and went, no, boom, this

30:07

is not gonna happen for you.

30:08

It's very much like

30:10

there's that quality to Khan's

30:13

performance in Thief where like, yeah,

30:15

he's a master thief. And also

30:17

he is so clearly a guy desperate to

30:19

just claw his way into

30:21

a pretty normal

30:24

middle-class life, right? With like security.

30:26

Straight society basically. Yeah, and that is palpable

30:29

in every scene. And so, and by the time

30:31

you get to this De Niro character,

30:33

it is man in love

30:35

with this portrait of himself

30:38

in some ways, the master technician, the

30:42

dedicated craftsman.

30:46

But he's now being played so

30:48

cool

30:49

that he seems now, yeah, like

30:52

divorced from those kind of like,

30:54

that level of humanity, those concerns.

30:57

And he accesses it through a bit through ED. But

30:59

I think you're right, like Haysbert's

31:01

still there as somebody who's like,

31:03

I keep getting backed into these situations,

31:06

right? Like something

31:08

went wrong years ago, and I think

31:10

basically being America, and

31:13

I can't get out. And that's Khan's story, right?

31:15

It's, you know, in Thief, his character's- This

31:17

is what I was good at, and this is the life I found

31:20

myself in, and once you're in that life,

31:22

it is extremely difficult to extricate yourself

31:24

from it.

31:25

Yeah.

31:28

And so I do think that

31:30

is a plot beat that sticks with me, because

31:33

I do agree, like they, like there

31:35

is such a

31:37

formal mirroring of De Niro

31:41

and Pacino in this, that

31:44

like both of them are operating

31:46

on a more like heroic

31:49

level in some ways. They

31:52

feel superhuman compared to just about every

31:54

other character in this movie.

31:56

Yeah. One,

32:00

Another huge upgrade though, I think that like one of

32:02

the other things that sticks with me

32:04

here is

32:07

Wayne Grow is recast

32:10

and becomes a more

32:12

Like he's pivotal in terms like how the

32:14

plot unfolds in LA takedown But

32:16

like he is pivotal as a character

32:18

in the character has no texture in

32:21

an LA takedown Like he's just a guy who thinks

32:23

too much of himself and there's no real

32:25

sense of who he is other than a guy with

32:27

an inflated Sense of importance. Well, it's funny

32:29

because he's a TV character. Yeah, not

32:31

a movie character Like he's very much like

32:34

oh, this is the guy who shows up as like,

32:36

you know Maybe like a three episode

32:38

arc villain that kind of you know pops his head

32:41

around the corner every now, right? There's

32:42

right. There's an episode in season two called Wayne

32:44

Grow returns, right?

32:48

And like and like Kevin

32:51

Gage is kind of that kind of actor too.

32:53

Yes, but he finds

32:56

this Gear with

32:58

this performance and this energy with

33:00

this performance and

33:02

it's It's

33:04

such a

33:05

new like it There's literally

33:07

the gravitational difference between the gravity on Pluto

33:09

and the gravity on the Sun Like it

33:12

is it could not be more disparate

33:14

well, and the weird thing too is like I think this is

33:17

another thing like I think ages well in

33:19

this film is I think

33:21

So, you know you alluded to Buffalo

33:23

Bill being a character we've seen man, you

33:26

know manhunter at this point

33:28

but I do feel like man is

33:31

also tapping into You

33:34

know

33:35

a type of

33:37

Broken

33:40

American manhood and like white

33:42

male rage That is

33:45

you know, there is there's an alarm There's

33:47

something alarming that man is seeing at this point

33:49

that this is a new archetype in American life But

33:52

like this is far and away like the

33:54

scariest character in this film and

33:57

the other crooks are all scared of him, too

33:59

Yeah Part of it is that he is, when

34:02

they talk about that, do you see me holding up liquor stores

34:04

with a born to lose tattoo? That they're describing

34:06

Wayne Grow. He is the sort of cowboy who is like,

34:09

does kind of want to go out

34:12

in what he thinks will be a blaze of glory

34:14

in some ways. But also

34:16

we're talking about like the themes of like loneliness

34:18

and alienation. I think one of the things that Gage taps

34:21

into early,

34:22

the thing that sort of like

34:24

starts to count down in his head

34:26

before, you know, like the

34:28

massacres, the mayhem, the

34:30

serial killings,

34:32

is he's

34:34

basically a guy trying to find

34:36

buddies with this

34:37

job. He's trying

34:39

to make friends with, he's trying to find a crew.

34:41

Yeah, he's contracting in with this crew. And

34:44

he's like, he wants regular

34:46

work,

34:47

but also he kind of wants to like

34:50

get in tight with a crew somehow.

34:52

And like, his

34:54

vibes are just off. None of them like him. Sizemore

34:58

has no patience for him. Tom

35:00

Sizemore has no patience for you. That's

35:02

how unpleasant and just miserable

35:04

your presence is. And you can see like

35:07

the hurt

35:08

when Sizemore's like, do me a favor, slick,

35:11

shut the fuck up. Stop talking. Yeah. You

35:15

can see the hurt there, but

35:17

also you can also see immediately like the

35:20

little bit of like

35:21

rage descending. It starts bubbling.

35:24

Yeah. And it never stops for

35:27

the rest of the film. And

35:29

I think this is one of the other parts

35:31

of this is, you know, we see, you

35:33

know, we see through both like Hannah and,

35:38

and Cauley sort of a

35:41

loneliness and alienation that comes

35:43

from being

35:46

dedicated to a vocation and

35:48

also being like, being

35:52

someone with a craft in a society where like

35:54

generally people don't have a craft anymore.

35:56

They don't like take life for

35:59

themselves or.

38:00

just because he's part of a gang in prison.

38:02

It doesn't really matter, because in the end

38:04

he's still just kind of evil incarnate.

38:07

He is a pure psychopath. He does not

38:09

have any regard for anyone. And he's

38:11

more than happy to serial murder

38:14

sex workers in his off time to make

38:16

himself feel better.

38:18

Yeah, and in that scene also

38:20

that sticks with me is the fact

38:23

that the woman he kills,

38:24

the

38:29

fact that she's

38:32

a black woman, he's sitting

38:34

there in the hotel. With that Nazi tattoo

38:37

just fully splayed out. And she's completely

38:39

unfazed. She has to be. And

38:41

you see her, she is used to navigating

38:44

this

38:44

type of situation. It is a normal

38:47

day at work until abruptly

38:49

it is not. I think about that a lot too, where

38:52

that is a character you can sort of see.

38:57

The risks a person is forced to run

39:00

and accept just as the cost

39:02

of staying alive and doing

39:05

business in this world. And

39:08

the fact that

39:09

can't take evasive action, because

39:12

this comes with the territory. This

39:15

risk comes with the territory. And by the time you identify

39:17

that this one is not like the others,

39:19

it's too late.

39:23

It's a horrible scene in part, because

39:25

you know what's coming, you can see Wayne

39:27

Girl building up to it. But also

39:30

you can sense,

39:32

I always feel like that scene's well executed because you're very

39:34

much

39:35

in it with her as she tries to massage

39:38

his ego and navigate.

39:41

How do we keep this guy from boiling over? And

39:43

then, okay, how do I get out of this room?

39:47

And she can't. But

39:50

it

39:51

is a scene that I think,

39:54

in LA Take Down,

39:56

it's a very tossed off scene.

39:58

And it is, It's

40:00

also not an LA takedown. What?

40:03

It's out of order. Like they do the scene with the mother

40:05

before they show the scene with him in the sex

40:08

worker. Yeah, another

40:10

another very weird choice.

40:12

But yeah, it's

40:14

but like and I'm not going to say like

40:16

man, like, you know, sometimes man has a surprisingly

40:19

progressive feminist lens on this

40:21

film. The fact that I'm racking

40:23

my brain to remember if the

40:25

sex worker has a name is, you

40:28

know, is is is one factor here. But

40:32

I will say it is.

40:35

There are a lot of movies

40:37

like man has made them where

40:40

people just sort of show up as.

40:43

Murdered bodies and

40:46

like kind of like stripped of their humanity. I think

40:48

some of that some of the values that animate manhunter

40:51

are here as well, which is that like, nope,

40:53

these are lives. These are people. And

40:56

they are not just like

40:57

built to be victims

40:59

in these stories. Like he tries to get

41:02

at something about the nature of this work and

41:04

like what it means for character like Wayne

41:06

Grove to enter society.

41:08

Yeah, and I don't know if

41:11

I mean, the ongoing joke about this movie

41:14

is that, you know, it's a dude's

41:16

rock movie. And part of that is that

41:18

the women characters in general do

41:21

not fare well in this story.

41:23

And that is some of it is by design.

41:25

Some of it is by the fact that I just don't think that

41:27

Michael Mann has a particularly good

41:30

focus here on what he wants his

41:32

women to be in this movie outside

41:34

of, again, the man thing

41:37

of these are complicating factors in these

41:39

intense men's lives. You know,

41:41

I think the one character who does

41:43

avail herself in a way beyond

41:46

kind of the scope of maybe what the script gave her is

41:48

actually Judd as Chris

41:50

Harris's wife. Like what's

41:52

on paper there is not particularly detailed.

41:55

You know, she's having an affair. She doesn't like

41:57

his gambling addiction. She's pissed off.

42:00

you know, and at some point she has to decide whether she's

42:02

gonna betray him or not. But I think she

42:04

as an actress gives that part

42:07

more gravity and more emotion than

42:10

I think what some of these other actresses are kind of able

42:13

to do with the material they're

42:15

given. Because as much

42:17

as like Diane Verona as, you know, Al Pacino's

42:19

wife in this is, I think,

42:22

a better sketched character than the one

42:24

that they gave him in LA Take Down. She

42:26

is also a caricature of a sort

42:29

of zoned out upper

42:31

middle class, you know, single parent

42:33

mom of that era, the Xanax

42:35

and, you know, and Grass kind

42:38

of mom.

42:39

And

42:40

I think her and Pacino have some very good scenes together,

42:43

but the character never fully

42:46

evolves beyond

42:48

just sort of the eventual realization that this shit

42:50

ain't gonna work. Well, she's still an appendage

42:52

to Hannah.

42:53

Yes, exactly. And the

42:56

Natalie Portman character also is, I

42:58

think is maybe the one that going, as I kind

43:00

of sat there trying to like kind of think about this movie, she's

43:03

not a character, she's a concept. Like

43:06

she is a notion of what a troubled

43:09

teen in that era, a child

43:11

divorce and, you know, probably an anxiety

43:13

disorder,

43:15

what she would be.

43:16

But there isn't much for her to do with that

43:19

other than be very freaked out and very sad

43:21

and eventually try to kill herself in just

43:24

about the most melodramatic way possible. And

43:26

Natalie Portman, you know, I mean, I'm up and down on her acting,

43:29

but I do like some of her performances very much.

43:31

There's just nothing here for her to

43:33

work with other than to just embody

43:35

this concept.

43:37

Yeah,

43:39

especially the ending of that where like

43:41

he's, you know, the good

43:43

responsible parent in some ways,

43:46

like this, well, she makes the point of like going

43:48

to his space to like cut

43:50

her wrists and sort

43:52

of make the point that like, you

43:55

know, as

43:57

Diane points out,

43:59

you know,

43:59

that it is,

44:02

she chose you in the end, right? Like

44:05

she makes this point in this

44:08

way. But yeah, I'm like,

44:11

I think

44:12

Pacino wrestling with what he's supposed

44:14

to do in this situation is effective, like his

44:16

portrayal. It's like, what is my

44:19

place here? But I don't

44:21

think the, you're right, the family dynamics are

44:23

really a series of like broad

44:26

archetypal sketches.

44:29

Like culminating in the scene where their

44:31

marriage, like finally, like

44:34

just the marriage with Justine, finally in

44:36

complete collapses with her

44:38

with making that absurd, I had to

44:41

demean myself with- Ralph.

44:44

Ralph, fucking Ralph. In order to get closure.

44:47

And it's like, I love this scene because

44:49

it's like,

44:50

it's bad, it is bad. But

44:54

there is a gleeful wine mom

44:56

energy to the entire scene

45:00

that like- Oh, she's thumbing her nose at

45:02

him. Like just saying like, hey, yeah, check

45:04

it out. I could have tried to hide this

45:07

from you, but I don't even feel the need to anymore.

45:11

What does this mean? It's like, you know, you got cucked

45:13

by Xander Berkeley playing Ralph.

45:17

Yeah. Like- Original

45:19

wangro. Here you go. Look

45:21

at this. And like, it's really like, it's funny

45:23

because, you know, Xander Berkeley

45:26

is actually really perfect as Ralph. It's

45:28

just like some of the best like

45:31

work in this movie is like Xander

45:33

Berkeley just like bringing the

45:35

same energy he brought to like the dad

45:38

from Terminator, the

45:40

foster dad from Terminator 2. Yes,

45:42

yes. So the kind of scumbag, but not overly

45:45

scumbag, just kind of a dirt bag. Like

45:47

a dirt bag that would be down your street. He's just

45:49

like sitting on his, like he just like, you

45:52

know, he just banged someone's wife and now he's

45:54

like sitting

45:54

on this couch, just kind of watching television,

45:57

just like lounging.

46:00

It's crazy. It is. It's so good. His,

46:03

like, bafflement to see

46:05

Pacino show up throughout

46:07

that scene. And it's,

46:10

and again, like, the scene was

46:13

done in, in,

46:15

in Crime Story, but it is so funny. The

46:18

way Pacino's like, no, no, stay

46:20

here, Ralph. Make yourself comfortable. Sit

46:23

down! It's so good. And

46:26

it's why I don't mind you banging

46:28

my wife, but I'll be damned.

46:31

Just ripping the TV off the console.

46:34

It's great.

46:34

Oh, it's so good. He doesn't know that

46:37

that CRT is going to be valuable someday. Oh

46:39

man.

46:40

If only he knew about the color

46:43

reproduction and the refresh

46:45

rates. The

46:49

other thing I kind of dig here as well. I

46:52

think it's not sketched out at all in like Take Down,

46:54

but we're talking about the broader lens here.

46:57

I really do think that like in a lot of man's work,

47:00

there's this dread.

47:04

Like you say, it's of capitalism

47:06

writ large, but I think genuinely it's about a couple

47:08

like very specific types that appear in capitalism.

47:10

And one of them is like

47:12

the middleman,

47:13

like the person profiting

47:15

off like the other, the risk other

47:17

people are running, the guy who is

47:19

the, you know, the point

47:22

of exchange between the person doing the work

47:24

and the market, their goods are ultimately being sold

47:26

on.

47:27

And like he is

47:30

not, it is not a major role. He is an easy

47:32

character to forget in

47:34

the story. He doesn't get much screen time, but

47:37

everything as much as Wayne grow is like

47:39

kind of the fulcrum of the story.

47:44

Like William Thickner's Van

47:47

Zandt is also

47:50

like the point where all

47:52

of this goes wrong because

47:54

he is like

47:56

in thief. He's a big time fence.

48:01

And what launches, like what dooms

48:03

De Niro's crew is one, they

48:06

fail to kill Wayne Gro. When

48:09

they have the chance, but two, that

48:12

they take umbrage at

48:14

Van Zandt's attempt to slaughter

48:17

them

48:18

and like steal their cut

48:20

of the first job.

48:22

Yeah. And

48:25

because he tries to rip them off and it fails

48:27

and they're like, we got a great scene, I'm

48:31

talking to a dead man.

48:35

He realizes that like, it's just a matter of time

48:37

before this crew like comes against him. And

48:39

so he makes it his

48:42

business to find a way to

48:44

strike at them first. And Wayne Gro is the

48:46

person who sort of shows up and makes that possible.

48:49

But the thing that like

48:51

sets it all in motion is the fact this is a

48:53

guy who,

48:55

you know, to

48:57

borrow a bit

48:59

from like Miller's crossing, he's not content

49:01

with the honest money he can make off a vague,

49:04

right? He's got to take it all. He

49:07

has to, he cannot, he can't

49:09

help himself.

49:10

Even though it's a really skilled crew, there's more money

49:12

on the table probably down the road. Doesn't

49:15

matter. It is like, he

49:18

wants to rip them off

49:20

when he has the opportunity.

49:23

And then when it goes bad,

49:26

he is like pure vindictiveness

49:29

and fear.

49:30

And so I think like without calling

49:32

too much attention to it, like he's not

49:34

a major character in this story, but

49:37

like lurking in the background of this

49:39

is like, De Niro's crew is

49:41

kind of doomed by the fact that they have

49:43

to deal with people like that.

49:45

That like

49:48

in a lot of ways, he's, you know, he's,

49:50

he's kin to the

49:52

diner owner, right? That there's, there's always

49:54

somebody, you know,

49:57

with his trying to get

49:59

his foot on the.

49:59

throat of the guys working

50:02

for him.

50:02

Yeah, I mean, the ruthlessness of the

50:05

William Fechner character is in the math. Like, he's

50:07

clearly a numbers guy. He's a Cayman

50:09

Islands, you know, style, like, you know, financial

50:12

type dude. And his whole thing is just

50:14

like he runs the numbers like, well, if I

50:16

deal with these guys, then people will think that it's

50:18

easy to rip me off. So fucking kill him. You

50:20

know, he doesn't really think about it. Like the consequences

50:23

of that, if it goes wrong, he's just like, nope,

50:25

can't have this affect the business. So I got

50:27

to do this.

50:28

I think

50:29

for me, apart from the very obvious

50:32

lead actor and the scenes that come along with

50:34

them upgrades you get with De Niro

50:36

and Pacino, I think

50:38

the addition of Fechner's character is probably

50:41

the single best addition that

50:43

comes to this this script. One,

50:45

because it sort of gives a much better

50:48

runway for the eventual Wayne Grove

50:50

betrayal than what the LA takedown

50:52

version was. But two, Fechner is just good. Like

50:54

he's just slimy as shit.

50:56

He's very good in this part. And he's so

50:58

good. He's one of my favorite character actors. And

51:01

there's like one of the things I like about

51:03

Fechner in this role and like this fan then is that

51:06

he is, you know, again, there's the inevitability.

51:08

He's convinced of his own inevitability,

51:10

though. And it's not like Fechner

51:13

doesn't think anything of just like sending Henry

51:15

Rollins who fucking

51:17

Henry Rollins as his like, yes,

51:20

man. What?

51:21

See, you did the thing that Michael Mann does

51:23

on the commentary multiple times throughout this, like

51:25

usually when he talks about a performance in this

51:28

movie, he's like gives a little detail, a little story,

51:30

something, whatever. Two or three times when

51:32

Henry Rollins appears on screen, just goes, there's

51:34

Henry Rollins

51:35

and then nothing after that like no, like

51:38

he does what everyone else does when Henry Rollins

51:40

shows up in a movie and just says, ah, there's Henry Rollins.

51:43

He has no thoughts beyond that. It's

51:45

it's so it's it's very it's a very

51:47

weird thing because yes.

51:50

Um, but like

51:54

when with Fechner

51:56

is like, you know, he's like he calls, he knows

51:58

that he's like, he's like, go kill. these guys. He's

52:01

used to telling people to do things and it just

52:03

happening. And so like,

52:05

never suffering even one consequence.

52:08

Yeah.

52:10

Um,

52:11

and so like, you know, but then like,

52:14

there's that moment when De Niro

52:16

shows up at like, you know, he's like there

52:18

and he's like surrounded by his giant floor

52:20

to ceiling plate glass windows and he's like having

52:22

a drink and he's just chilling out. And then the

52:25

fear that thickener has when he realizes

52:27

that, oh no, I'm not inevitable and

52:29

I, I am going to die now is

52:32

fucking great. I should not have left my

52:34

office. Fuck. Yeah. It's like,

52:37

it's so good.

52:39

Well, and like, and you have those weird iguana

52:41

eyes that William thickener has in order to play

52:44

that, that, that, that kind of like, you know,

52:46

terror.

52:47

Well, I think to that point, uh,

52:49

you mentioned earlier, Dia about like the way

52:51

he likes to situate

52:54

characters in this type of like glass box

52:56

architecture in some ways, I think something that

52:58

crops up here and

53:00

a lot of pictures too is like

53:02

the sort of

53:05

the view of the masters of the universe

53:07

character looks like

53:10

a commanding, like, uh,

53:12

like, you

53:14

know, all, all powerful, all same

53:17

view until you realize that it's also a deeply vulnerable

53:19

one. Right? Like the, the realization

53:21

that he has when he realizes like

53:24

the plate glass, like he is the

53:26

fish in the, he is the fish in the aquarium.

53:29

Yeah. Right. That like, and he's about to drown.

53:31

Yeah.

53:34

And like, there's a similar sort of shot

53:37

in, um, you know, in, in Miami vice,

53:39

but that, that sense of your, like it's

53:41

exactly that. Like that is a, is a,

53:43

is a place where he's often contemplated his

53:45

own inevitability. And then there's that

53:47

realization of like, I can't see

53:51

something is out there and I can't see it.

53:53

Like this, it's opaque to me now.

53:56

Um, but it's, it's not too, it's

53:58

not too DeNiro.

53:59

But that is such

54:02

a part of this where

54:05

you have in the background

54:07

these characters who simply

54:12

because of their kind of casual

54:14

greed and viciousness and

54:17

just sort of reflexive need to

54:19

screw people over in a deal

54:21

will do massive

54:24

incredible harm. And one of the fantasies

54:26

of heat

54:27

is that you could get at that guy. This

54:29

is in man movies

54:31

pretty much across the board. I think one of the other fantasies

54:33

is like you could

54:36

just go to these people's houses and you'd kill them. You

54:39

find them and you could kill them. Like

54:42

happens in thief, happens

54:44

here, happens

54:47

in black hat.

54:49

Like this is a huge part of the

54:51

fantasy is like you realize

54:54

like oh man like my tormentor is

54:56

the guy with the capital and I

54:58

know where he lives

55:00

and I got nothing to lose. So I guess the

55:02

real question is who does Michael Mann actually want

55:04

to kill?

55:07

We'll never find out. He'll never tell us but I

55:09

mean someone out there someone in a big glass house

55:11

has wronged him and he has been getting it

55:13

out through screenplays. I

55:17

feel like we're off the we'll have to go back through like okay

55:19

which major studio producers

55:22

they never work with more than once.

55:26

But

55:29

yeah I mean that like and

55:31

all that stuff is sort of in the background

55:34

of the story.

55:38

I think

55:41

when we

55:45

turn to like the respective

55:48

crews themselves I think something I regret

55:50

a bit is that I always feel like a very good sense

55:53

for Macaulay's crew.

55:55

And

55:58

as much as I love the cast.

55:59

of actors that make up Hannah's

56:03

like detective squad like it is a is a killer

56:05

cast like McKelty Williamson West Stu

56:07

D, Ted Levine,

56:10

another guy the one guy that no one remembers

56:12

the name of, there's another

56:14

guy, a younger guy he's the one who gets shot but

56:16

not killed and like he shows up later

56:18

like with a cast on but I don't know that

56:20

actor and I don't know if I've ever seen him anything since

56:22

should have been him and not Ted Levine yeah

56:26

but I think that's that's part

56:28

of his landing a bit of like unfinished work here

56:31

is the way that I think the

56:33

attempt to mirror not just Hannah

56:36

and McKelley but also

56:38

their respective crews I

56:40

think quite comes off here like

56:42

this the the scene of like

56:45

man is this crew good or what this crew

56:47

is good and like now that

56:49

now the two crews are observing each other it

56:53

still feels like

56:54

I know a lot about

56:57

McKelley's gang and I

56:59

will never stop thinking of every detective

57:03

in Hannah's squad as

57:05

their actors or as like

57:07

their other roles right

57:10

it's very hard to me that not think

57:12

like all

57:13

right maga what's down to you now go get him

57:16

but like

57:17

and they gave maga an

57:19

assault rifle in this one at least so you know he's

57:21

got something to do

57:23

but also on the same as like it's a bit squandered

57:26

a little bit

57:27

like it's that happens with

57:29

big ensemble casts like this but I think it's it's

57:32

part like

57:33

part of I think his

57:37

like going back to crime story

57:39

man loves this notion of like well

57:42

the cops are a gang too

57:43

and here I don't

57:45

think it it comes across it's like alluded

57:48

to but I don't think it it

57:50

comes across you

57:51

know because Ted Levine's Mike Bosco

57:54

is handled much better by Ted Levine and the alien

57:56

ass

58:00

Alienist yet. Yeah, wait.

58:02

He's not Teddy Roosevelt is he no He's

58:06

a cop okay Watch

58:10

the yes, it was actually pretty okay,

58:11

but like yeah like he he's just like watching

58:14

it I was just like oh, that's Ted Levine with

58:16

the exact same like Doing

58:18

the exact same thing that he did in the alienist which

58:20

I watched before this Because

58:22

I don't exist in chronology like

58:25

it was just

58:27

What West Doody is in this and it's like why is

58:29

West Doody in this is just cuz you knew

58:31

him like he You happen to be available and

58:33

you're like,

58:34

you know, whatever I mean

58:36

I think that's the answer for a lot of these castings

58:38

especially on the cop side is that these are actors

58:40

he likes and he Just wanted to put

58:42

them in the movie somewhere Like West Doody's

58:45

character is not well defined

58:47

Michael T Williams is like a little bit more but not

58:49

much and you know Ted Levine might as well

58:51

just be his dude from monk like You

58:53

don't really have no enough about his

58:56

character to get a real picture of

58:58

them The only time you really kind of get any of that is

59:00

in that scene where they're mirroring the two dinners

59:03

You know the one where they're the crew is out

59:05

and they're having their big, you know Kind of like banquet

59:07

feast before the next score and then

59:09

the one where the you know The cops are out kind of out dancing

59:12

having a good time But of course Al Pacino gets

59:14

called away because you know the violence of the world

59:16

that pulls him away at every turn But

59:18

there really isn't much there for the other characters

59:21

Like that scene is all about Al Pacino

59:23

and

59:23

his wife

59:24

and him sort of being pulled away yet again

59:27

Whereas I think with the crew you kind

59:30

of get a little bit of flavor there You kind of see what

59:32

my you know, Michael Chirino's life is like you

59:34

kind of see what you know Ashley Judd

59:36

how she interacts with the rest of that crew Danny

59:39

Trejo does not have a lot to do in this movie But you

59:41

know, he's there and his wife is there and

59:43

his Al Camino is there his Al Camino

59:45

is there. Yes

59:47

They Actors

59:51

so magnetic they renamed the character to

59:53

just the actor's last name

59:56

Who wasn't he wasn't like

1:00:00

At this point, that's not like, hey,

1:00:02

that's Danny Trejo. No, he'd been in

1:00:04

a couple of things before this, but not much. But

1:00:07

they do the thing where, yeah, they name

1:00:09

the character after the actor, it's

1:00:11

great. I mean, something else, though, is that the

1:00:14

relationship isn't mirrored because

1:00:16

in some ways,

1:00:18

or maybe the mirroring operates on different lines,

1:00:21

we see Hannah sort of oblivious to what's

1:00:23

happening at home, sort of oblivious

1:00:25

to the wave and

1:00:27

speed at which his relationship is

1:00:30

unraveling.

1:00:32

And meanwhile, you've got

1:00:34

McCauley,

1:00:36

who is keenly attuned to

1:00:39

the inner lives of his crew, particularly

1:00:41

to Scheherless, Val

1:00:43

Kilmer, and playing the role

1:00:45

of marriage counselor and

1:00:48

best friend. I think to your point about, they're

1:00:51

all a bunch of

1:00:53

sociopaths whose intimacy is

1:00:55

reserved for everyone in their circle, but

1:00:59

in this weird way with McCauley, there's

1:01:01

this, I

1:01:04

always, I can never work

1:01:06

out, because De Niro plays him

1:01:08

as kind of a brusque, cold fish, even when he's trying

1:01:10

to be compassionate and a

1:01:12

stand-up guy for people. But he

1:01:15

walks this line

1:01:17

with Charlene and Chris, where

1:01:20

he's trying to help them,

1:01:24

and he is trying

1:01:26

to be a buffer between the fact

1:01:29

that Chris is a violent

1:01:31

abuser

1:01:34

when he's drunk or when he's

1:01:37

feeling vindictive.

1:01:40

But at the same time, he's also trying to

1:01:42

be supportive of both

1:01:44

of them. But also, it has this cast

1:01:46

of, is he doing this because it's the

1:01:49

family, or

1:01:51

is he doing it because he

1:01:54

needs to make sure the crew is, everybody

1:01:56

is locked in and focused, and if that means he

1:01:58

has to go like...

1:01:59

be dad in this

1:02:02

like fucked up marriage, he will go do

1:02:04

that because this is how,

1:02:07

like this is part of, this is

1:02:09

as much a tool

1:02:10

as

1:02:11

the shit he's using to cut like cut

1:02:14

their safes. Yeah,

1:02:15

I think I'd lean more toward the latter.

1:02:18

Like there is definitely an affection there,

1:02:21

but everything he does, every move he

1:02:23

makes around, you know, his

1:02:25

crew, his friends is about making

1:02:27

sure the crew is working at optimal efficiency.

1:02:31

You know, and, you know, the few times

1:02:33

when he kind of lets that mass slip, like, you know, once

1:02:35

the heat is on them and he's debating whether

1:02:37

they should even do the big bank job,

1:02:40

you know, he kind of says to Chirino, he

1:02:42

says to him like, you know, you should

1:02:44

walk away. You've got savings,

1:02:46

you know, you got investments, you got a life outside

1:02:49

this stuff already. You

1:02:51

should not do this because it's going to be fucking dangerous

1:02:53

and it's gonna mess you up.

1:02:55

And I think he's doing it because

1:02:57

ultimately he's saying there's no

1:02:59

way this heist is gonna work unless we are

1:03:01

all in and we are all working, firing

1:03:04

on all cylinders. And one

1:03:06

person not being there, that

1:03:09

just does, that redoes the calculus for him. And he's

1:03:11

like, okay, we walk away. That's it, that's the end of it, doesn't

1:03:13

matter, you know? So

1:03:15

I think in the end, it is all in service of making

1:03:17

sure that the jobs that they are planning to do will

1:03:20

go the exact way they need to go. Because

1:03:22

I think in the end, he would still walk out on any one

1:03:25

of them in 30 seconds flat if it came down

1:03:27

to it.

1:03:31

Yeah.

1:03:33

Though up to a point, right? Because part of

1:03:35

it is also the honor

1:03:37

code thing kicks in. Where there's

1:03:40

the weird dynamic of he

1:03:42

won't leave Schehera-Les behind, but

1:03:45

once Chorito gets mired

1:03:47

on the other side of the street,

1:03:49

you know,

1:03:51

it's every man for himself, good luck,

1:03:54

I'm gonna leave you to your fate. But

1:03:57

ultimately, this is going to hinge on

1:03:59

the fact that somebody did this to his crew and that has

1:04:01

to be avenge. That like he could walk away,

1:04:04

there's money, like his escape is in

1:04:06

place, but he cannot,

1:04:10

he can't let what happened to his crew and

1:04:12

to Trejo, like lie, he

1:04:15

can't let that be and like

1:04:17

take that out. So he has to go

1:04:19

and settle up accounts before

1:04:22

he can escape. And so I think

1:04:24

like, that's

1:04:25

another part of this is,

1:04:30

is Macaulay, you

1:04:34

know, Macaulay gives his statement of

1:04:37

purpose, his sort of statement of his philosophy

1:04:39

in the diner scene. You

1:04:42

know, that's the discipline.

1:04:45

And I wonder if like in a lot of ways, this is

1:04:48

a like portrait of a character who is like,

1:04:50

sort of from beginning to end, kind of kidding himself, that

1:04:53

like

1:04:54

the attachments

1:04:56

are all around him. He just doesn't

1:04:58

know it. He doesn't see the ways

1:05:00

that like

1:05:02

he's already bound

1:05:05

to people and

1:05:07

to values that no longer

1:05:09

likes, that can't be defended

1:05:11

pragmatically. And so

1:05:13

to an extent now he is a guy who is

1:05:17

honoring these values more in

1:05:19

the breach than in

1:05:21

the observance.

1:05:23

Yeah, I think that's true. I think,

1:05:26

but at the same time, like the

1:05:28

whole thing with Edie, the Amy Brenman

1:05:30

character,

1:05:32

is him

1:05:34

testing the waters in a way that he seemingly

1:05:36

has not, at least in his larger

1:05:38

criminal lifespan career, to

1:05:41

see what it would be like if he were

1:05:44

to try and add that element to his life,

1:05:46

whether it makes sense or not. Because I

1:05:48

think in the end, when it comes to his crew,

1:05:51

like he would never roll over on them.

1:05:53

But at the same time, if it felt like, if they had to

1:05:55

split ways and never speak again, they would just

1:05:57

do it, because that is the right thing for them to

1:05:59

do. He can find a way to

1:06:01

detach himself from those kinds of attachments

1:06:04

because in the end it's about the business. That's

1:06:06

how that dynamic works. And you know, when

1:06:08

Shehera was takes off, like

1:06:10

he's a little put off by it, but he's like, whatever,

1:06:12

he can take care of himself. He's an adult, we'll deal. But

1:06:15

the Amy Brenneman thing is where, you know, it kind

1:06:17

of starts, you know, morphing

1:06:19

a little bit. Like the discipline kind

1:06:21

of starts to come unraveled a little bit. And

1:06:24

you know, whether you believe that

1:06:26

relationship

1:06:29

is fully believable or not. I

1:06:31

was gonna ask. So Amy

1:06:33

Brenneman- It's better than LA Take Down. Much better,

1:06:36

much better actress. She is a very

1:06:38

sweet,

1:06:39

comes across a very sweet woman. You can kind of understand

1:06:41

why someone would fall for her. She has a very,

1:06:44

you know,

1:06:46

down home kind of presentation here that I think

1:06:48

is- She's the Appalachian gal that went to Parsons

1:06:50

and then ended up in LA doing

1:06:52

album covers for 4AD

1:06:55

and Sub Pop.

1:06:56

She is

1:06:59

every graphic designer's dream in

1:07:01

that eventually Robert De Niro will

1:07:03

fall in love with you for some reason.

1:07:05

I don't know

1:07:07

that I still buy the

1:07:09

full dynamic, at least as it is portrayed

1:07:12

here. I think they make it work better.

1:07:15

The scene where she kind of pulls away from him at the

1:07:17

end, but then ultimately makes this and is like, fuck

1:07:19

it. Let's just dive into this life

1:07:22

crime. It is a little

1:07:24

harried in a way that is maybe not completely

1:07:27

believable, but at the same time, it's

1:07:30

good setup for what comes after.

1:07:33

The thing that I like about that is she

1:07:36

really does finally just like, the

1:07:39

switch in her head flips and she's all

1:07:42

in on it. And then at the end,

1:07:44

when she's all of the cops

1:07:47

and the ambulance and everything are all going off around her and

1:07:49

she's just standing there at the car door

1:07:52

with her mouth comically

1:07:55

hanging down, just kind of hunched

1:07:57

over, arms at her side. She's like, what's happened

1:07:59

to me?

1:07:59

Where are you going? It

1:08:02

is one of the great unspoken how

1:08:04

could you in cinema? It's

1:08:07

great.

1:08:08

And the bit before that too,

1:08:11

like when they're just driving and they're going

1:08:13

through that tunnel and just, you know, like before

1:08:15

De Niro makes the decision that he's going to go get Wayne grow

1:08:18

the wide-eyed sort of innocent

1:08:20

like, oh,

1:08:21

is this my new life now? And

1:08:23

she's looking out the car window. Like it's

1:08:26

it's like a dog that just knows just

1:08:28

got a new home. It is like it

1:08:31

is like it's like it's an excited puppy of like,

1:08:34

oh, am I a criminal now? Is that what

1:08:36

I am? Am I going to my forever crime

1:08:38

life? Like it's it's really

1:08:41

funny even if it's maybe not necessarily meant

1:08:43

to be but it's like again, it's great set

1:08:46

up for what comes after which is that slackjawed.

1:08:48

I can't believe this is fucking happening to

1:08:50

me moment outside the hotel.

1:08:53

I was like, am I

1:08:55

wrong? No, because that

1:08:58

puppy dog quality is what sells

1:09:00

it to. Yes, like it one

1:09:03

it helps that he does not he does not

1:09:05

go as hard in their meet cute

1:09:07

as they do it. I take down for it. So

1:09:10

he does not come off as like immediately like,

1:09:12

oh, you are a violent sociopath. Okay.

1:09:14

Yeah, where he's just he's

1:09:17

a bit of a prick and like she's so obviously

1:09:19

like kind of wounded by that. Yeah. And

1:09:22

for that is Southern style

1:09:25

friendliness like she is not like that is that

1:09:27

is a person who is raised in the South would

1:09:29

totally just try to strike up a conversation

1:09:31

with a person at a diner counter like that

1:09:34

and LA person would like you know routinely

1:09:37

at like, you know, the store that they work at like

1:09:39

yeah, that totally tracks. Yeah,

1:09:42

right and the way that sort of like

1:09:44

shames him a little bit like he feels

1:09:46

guilty. He feel like he's like.

1:09:50

Okay, I'm sorry like let's like

1:09:52

yeah, let's chat

1:09:54

and like the that energy sort of does.

1:09:57

Sustain

1:09:59

the. The thing that has to sell

1:10:01

it is the fact that she has this

1:10:04

sweet puppy dog demeanor,

1:10:10

which at least is a note that just doesn't

1:10:12

exist in Take

1:10:14

Down. It just doesn't, like nothing in Take Down is convincing.

1:10:17

The fact that he's like, we know he's over the moon

1:10:19

about her because he tells us I'm

1:10:21

over the moon about her. He tells his fence, man,

1:10:24

I got something to steal for

1:10:26

now.

1:10:29

But

1:10:29

that woman just mostly comes off as like peevish

1:10:32

throughout LA Take Down. There is not really

1:10:34

a sweetness or an identifiable

1:10:37

characteristic that is like, oh, I can

1:10:39

understand why these two people fell in love.

1:10:41

Like God, no. Here at least, that

1:10:44

kind of down home Southern

1:10:46

friendliness, that warmth that is sort of

1:10:48

completely alien to what a Robert De

1:10:50

Niro character would normally have experienced,

1:10:52

especially going through prison as many times as he

1:10:54

did.

1:10:55

You could see how that would disarm him

1:10:58

from the jump, whether or not they would

1:11:00

go through this whirlwind romance, I don't know.

1:11:03

But like you can at least see like the

1:11:05

nugget, like you can see where the wheels click

1:11:08

and it's like, oh, I could talk to

1:11:10

this person.

1:11:13

Something I often sort of think about in their relationship

1:11:16

too is the way that you almost sort of see

1:11:18

it. I don't know if I'm just reading into this, but

1:11:20

like.

1:11:25

She has a character that is easy to see

1:11:27

as unworldly and in some ways like,

1:11:30

not necessarily

1:11:32

like in need of a relationship,

1:11:35

but like

1:11:36

could benefit from like

1:11:38

someone to protect her,

1:11:41

right? Right.

1:11:43

That's not really necessarily true. Like

1:11:45

she's got a good career. Like

1:11:47

she's lonely, but like she's got a

1:11:49

giant fucking house in 19... 895 terms like

1:11:51

Jesus.

1:11:53

But you

1:11:55

can easily imagine where

1:11:58

like someone like.

1:11:59

De Niro, much like Khan, sort of has

1:12:02

this notion of like, what

1:12:04

does a person like you think is gonna happen

1:12:06

in a world like this without someone like

1:12:08

me?

1:12:10

And the answer is,

1:12:12

nothing nearly as bad as what happened from

1:12:14

getting involved with you. You

1:12:18

are the disaster happening to this woman's life.

1:12:20

Like the bad thing coming true is you, Neil,

1:12:24

you're the thing. You are the thing she will

1:12:26

be spending the next two decades talking about in therapy.

1:12:30

Yeah. Yep.

1:12:32

Yep.

1:12:33

She will never go near whatever that

1:12:35

hotel chain is again in her life because

1:12:38

she is just never going to be able to get over

1:12:40

that.

1:12:41

Yeah.

1:12:45

So

1:12:46

one other part of this like,

1:12:50

confession time, I think

1:12:54

the thing that like won

1:12:56

me over to man though, the thing that won me

1:12:58

over to this film, started me on this, like,

1:13:00

man, I love Michael Mann. Man, I love this

1:13:02

shootout. Like, I love

1:13:04

the bank shootout. Long before I fully

1:13:07

grokked what this whole movie was about and like

1:13:09

the, like

1:13:11

appreciated the various subplots and everything.

1:13:14

I just love the fact that this was the most

1:13:16

balls to the wall like gunfight

1:13:19

I've ever seen. And

1:13:21

like still to this day,

1:13:23

kind of is, which is

1:13:26

weird. Like there've been a lot

1:13:28

of movies that tried to do the heat thing.

1:13:30

There's a lot more like several times over.

1:13:32

Yeah. There's a lot of movies that like trying

1:13:34

to embrace the gun porn aspect of it too. And

1:13:37

I don't think they

1:13:38

pull it off. There's something,

1:13:40

is it for me, I'm

1:13:42

trying to figure out like part of it is

1:13:45

Michael Mann,

1:13:49

whoever he works with for like

1:13:50

the attention is on pay to sound is

1:13:53

really striking. Like the fact that like every

1:13:56

single part of the fucking

1:13:58

gunfight is really articulated.

1:13:59

in the mix, like you

1:14:02

hear the brass hitting

1:14:04

the pavement, you

1:14:06

hear the reports sort of echoing along

1:14:09

the

1:14:11

urban canyon walls. It's

1:14:14

incredible stuff, but also the

1:14:16

more I watch it, the more I think...

1:14:21

I'm not sure an actor has ever looked better carrying

1:14:23

an assault rifle than Val Kilmer. You

1:14:26

might be right. I am not sure an actor

1:14:29

has ever done a better job firing

1:14:33

one of those things off in a gunfight

1:14:35

than Val Kilmer. Everyone else

1:14:38

looks like they got some weapons training and

1:14:40

they're like,

1:14:41

you know, they're

1:14:43

acting, right? They're playing their scene.

1:14:46

Pacino actually looks uncomfortable with his gun.

1:14:48

And I think part of that is

1:14:50

unlike Macaulay's gang, he

1:14:53

can't just like open fire wildly

1:14:55

into the crowd, which is what they're doing. You

1:14:58

hear Pacino be like, watch your backdrops. If

1:15:03

there's people behind them, don't shoot at them. Whereas,

1:15:06

you know, Macaulay's crew doesn't have to worry

1:15:08

about that. But yeah, Val Kilmer

1:15:11

looks like a guy who has made it his business

1:15:14

to just mow through an

1:15:16

entire division of LAPD

1:15:19

officers. Well,

1:15:20

it's the blonde ponytail

1:15:23

90s wig that really is what

1:15:25

sells that. Yeah.

1:15:28

God, his hair is majestic in this movie, I

1:15:30

have to say. Even

1:15:33

apart from the gun parts, like just Val Kilmer's

1:15:35

hair. When he loses

1:15:37

at the end, you can feel like a part of him is just gone.

1:15:40

The hair represents Charlene. And

1:15:43

once the hair is gone, she's gone too. God.

1:15:47

Oh man, when they lock eyes, the

1:15:50

end of the film and his power is just lost. Yeah.

1:15:53

Now he's just, now he's just, he might as well be Ralph.

1:15:57

Oh, just a shitty ex. Yeah.

1:16:00

Right. Sorry. Go ahead, D.A. Oh, no. Go ahead.

1:16:02

I was going to say, like, the thing about this scene is,

1:16:05

you know, the obvious quality of it

1:16:07

is the audio. Like, that's this. This

1:16:09

is the movie since the DVD era.

1:16:12

I have always used that scene

1:16:14

to tune whatever speaker set

1:16:16

I am adding to whatever I have at home.

1:16:19

It's that in the opening action scene from Predator.

1:16:22

And, you know, it works every time. They

1:16:25

made the choice to not ADR

1:16:27

much of anything and just use the ambient

1:16:30

audio from when they were shooting. And

1:16:33

that is maybe the single best audio choice

1:16:35

just about any American filmmaker has ever

1:16:37

made, because it is enveloping

1:16:41

and just like incredibly loud

1:16:44

and caustic and just just

1:16:46

unsettling the way it is echoing

1:16:48

off the walls of those those downtown L.A. buildings.

1:16:51

Buildings I've walked by many times as I've

1:16:53

gone to E3 over the years.

1:16:56

And, you

1:16:57

know, it's it's the precision

1:17:00

also with which they just immediately

1:17:02

go into battle tactics mode and

1:17:04

the way that they are willing to just sort of, you

1:17:06

know, like there's you see a little bit of it in the scene when

1:17:09

Van Zant's crew betrays De Niro when he

1:17:11

just starts firing that pistol at the windshield of his

1:17:14

car. Like he does that again

1:17:16

here. He just immediately starts firing the assault

1:17:18

rifle outside the window straight at

1:17:20

the cop cars that he sees in the far, pretty

1:17:22

far in the middle distance, because again,

1:17:25

he does not care. He just wants to make sure that he is

1:17:27

putting down fire and that he is stopping

1:17:29

anyone from advancing upon them.

1:17:31

And just the way they go through the

1:17:33

motions of this stuff,

1:17:35

the way it just, you know, they immediately

1:17:37

like turn like they clearly have rehearsed this dozens

1:17:39

of times, turning back, know

1:17:41

exactly when to turn back and fire behind them.

1:17:44

Like it's so efficient. I

1:17:46

remember on one heat, man, I think they interviewed

1:17:48

some of the coordinators for

1:17:51

the for the scene and some of the editors

1:17:53

and like, you know, one of the things that comes up

1:17:55

is like.

1:17:57

Again, Val Kilmer really was just

1:17:59

that.

1:17:59

guy. The technical advisors

1:18:02

were just like so proud of him for

1:18:04

that magazine switch he does in the middle

1:18:06

cut, which is like it's it

1:18:09

is

1:18:10

up there with Tom Cruise

1:18:12

in collateral taking out those two like

1:18:14

thugs that show up in the alley. It

1:18:17

is up there in terms of like rehearsed

1:18:20

mechanical automatic precision

1:18:23

all in one cut. And

1:18:27

it's like, wow, that was incredibly smooth

1:18:29

and fast like this extremely violent that was extremely

1:18:31

graceful. It is it's

1:18:35

it's a hell of a sequence. And

1:18:37

I think it benefits from the fact that like, I think

1:18:40

a lot of movies that that sort of

1:18:42

crib from heat embrace

1:18:44

the gun porn thing and completely

1:18:47

like it

1:18:48

is the fact that like,

1:18:50

the gunfight has this context, right

1:18:52

that we care

1:18:53

a lot about how this heist goes about

1:18:55

like what the fallout from it is

1:18:58

going to be. I was thinking like

1:19:01

I can't remember the fucking dogshit Gerard

1:19:03

Butler movie I got like pushed

1:19:05

into watching that somebody was like, it's

1:19:07

a lot like heat. It ends

1:19:09

with a huge gunfight on the highway.

1:19:11

Okay, I don't know. I've seen a lot of dogshit

1:19:13

Gerard Butler movies over the years. I can't remember

1:19:15

which one. Most of the oeuvre. Yeah.

1:19:18

But like, but there it was like, no,

1:19:21

this is just a guns and ammo like

1:19:24

porn scene basically. And

1:19:27

like

1:19:29

you you're using a highway because you can get you

1:19:31

can get an empty strip of highway, right? Like it's

1:19:33

an easy set to like dress and use.

1:19:37

There's no there's nothing visually

1:19:39

interesting happened. There's no sense of place. It is basically

1:19:42

just like, look at these macho

1:19:44

dudes run around with

1:19:46

like $2,000 assault

1:19:49

rifles with like attachments

1:19:52

and shit. Yeah. And

1:19:55

and and so I do think in

1:19:57

some ways like

1:19:58

this is one of the

1:19:59

all-time great gun battles and movies

1:20:02

also

1:20:04

inspired like just

1:20:07

a raft of dogshit imitators who like

1:20:10

lock in on the gun

1:20:12

porn part of it and basically

1:20:14

missed that like well they built a pretty good

1:20:16

movie around it too. Yes well

1:20:18

that's the thing is that like yes they're

1:20:20

using incredibly intense hardware and

1:20:23

you know they're utilizing these very

1:20:25

specific battle tactics. The reason

1:20:27

this scene works over other things that have tried to ape

1:20:29

it is that like it's terrifying.

1:20:32

Like the feeling of watching that scene

1:20:34

is not one of like elation

1:20:37

or titillation or excitement the way

1:20:39

that you would in like say like you know some cheesy

1:20:42

cat 3 Hong Kong action movie where it's literally

1:20:44

just 80% people shooting guns. Like

1:20:47

it's straight up like

1:20:49

you if you were in that scene

1:20:51

you would be the most afraid you've ever been in your life

1:20:53

and

1:20:54

it doesn't

1:20:55

sorry go ahead. Oh I'd say like yeah like

1:20:57

to that point like I actually had to look up when

1:21:00

was the North Hollywood or the North Hollywood shootout

1:21:02

yeah because I was like convinced I'm like oh

1:21:04

my this is giving me like

1:21:06

watching the North Hollywood shootout on like you know

1:21:08

CNN vibes. Yeah totally

1:21:10

and like no I was like oh shit this came out two

1:21:12

years before that happened fuck yeah

1:21:16

but like you know it really captures like the terror

1:21:18

of like people who are extremely

1:21:20

proficient at killing people

1:21:23

with

1:21:24

you know hardware that's not like

1:21:26

stylish and splashy but just

1:21:29

designed to effectively kill other people

1:21:31

to put bullets in bodies and just going

1:21:34

at it and then filmed as

1:21:36

like you know kind of cinema verite as possible.

1:21:39

Yeah

1:21:39

it puts you in the thick of what happens when a militarized

1:21:42

police department meets an incredibly well armed

1:21:44

you know criminal and every anyone else

1:21:47

is just caught in between. Well I think

1:21:49

it really and I think

1:21:50

I think this scene would be I think

1:21:53

it land really

1:21:55

differently if it doesn't transition to the grocery

1:21:58

store parking lot because I think that is where it

1:21:59

fully like hits you

1:22:02

with like shades of like Samuel Fuller,

1:22:05

like realism where it's like, oh Christ.

1:22:08

Like, and here's where I'm at

1:22:10

in this story. I'm not one of the people running

1:22:12

around looking fucking awesome with the assault

1:22:14

rifle.

1:22:16

I'm like one of the people just lying dead in the grocery

1:22:19

store parking lot because like these guys came

1:22:21

through. Yeah. And it's like a natural disaster

1:22:23

just sweeping through. And like in

1:22:25

the wake of that scene, there are so many

1:22:27

people just like strewn in the background.

1:22:30

And this comes to like,

1:22:33

it's easy to be seduced by the idea of

1:22:35

like

1:22:37

Macaulay's character and

1:22:39

like, man, you know, it's

1:22:41

almost so tragic. These two guys

1:22:43

even had to like come into this conflict. You kind of wish you

1:22:45

could get away with it. But at the same time you see the

1:22:47

scene and it's like, this is also why you gotta like,

1:22:50

why guys like this do have to be put down

1:22:53

is because when you have people who do flip

1:22:55

into that mode of like

1:22:56

anyone between me and my goal,

1:22:59

if I get my goal without killing anybody, it's fine.

1:23:01

But if it is, if people are

1:23:03

between me and my goal, then they're just dead.

1:23:06

And I will not think twice about it. And

1:23:09

like that scene sort of drives that home.

1:23:11

And like, and it's doubly driven home by

1:23:13

the fact that like Chirito as in

1:23:15

LA State Town, like doubly damns himself

1:23:18

by once he gets cut off, you

1:23:21

know,

1:23:22

he's sort of rat in a cage moment. He

1:23:24

grabs the thing he thinks is going to be his ticket

1:23:27

out of here, which is

1:23:28

he can run around with a kid as

1:23:31

a hostage and stay mobile and try

1:23:33

to, try to make a break for it. And you

1:23:36

do sort of realize that all the family man's

1:23:38

shit, all the tight crew, all the like their normal

1:23:40

guys, whose job is like violence. Yeah,

1:23:43

but their job is violence.

1:23:44

This is like when the chimps are down, this is who they are.

1:23:47

It's Tom

1:23:49

fucking Sizemore holding a gun to a toddler's head.

1:23:55

Yeah. And

1:23:56

you know, like the part in the

1:23:58

diner scene when

1:23:59

you know, Al

1:24:01

Pacino is like, between

1:24:02

you and the cop, you know,

1:24:06

you're make a widow out of his wife,

1:24:08

brother,

1:24:09

you are going down. Like in that

1:24:11

moment, you're like, oh, but I don't want

1:24:13

it to be that way. You guys clearly have

1:24:15

something here. I want the bromance to blossom.

1:24:18

I want you guys to find a way through this

1:24:20

somehow. You completely

1:24:22

lose that by the time you get to that grocery

1:24:24

store scene. And it's just like, oh, you're just

1:24:26

mowing down innocence at this point. That is

1:24:29

the moment when the movie finally flips completely

1:24:31

over to it's not just

1:24:34

two sides of the same coin. It's like, no, literally

1:24:36

say what you will about cops. In this case,

1:24:39

the cops are the ones that are not going to indiscriminately

1:24:41

mow down innocence. And so you

1:24:43

have no choice but to kind of side with

1:24:46

Pacino, who is in

1:24:48

in the ultimate grand scheme of what the story they are telling

1:24:50

here is the one who has been in

1:24:52

the right more or less all along.

1:24:57

Yeah, I think

1:25:00

that's like no true Scotsman this. Like,

1:25:04

I think. Generally,

1:25:06

man's films are pretty skeptical of cops,

1:25:08

but he likes detectives. Yes, is the

1:25:11

he likes people who solve things. Yeah.

1:25:14

Which is which is the line that a lot of

1:25:16

good like detective fiction like ends

1:25:18

up walking where it's like, yes, as

1:25:20

an institution.

1:25:22

A lot of concerns about the cops, but

1:25:25

we all love a good purpose driven,

1:25:28

hyper competent like Crusader,

1:25:31

who like does solve the crimes and like

1:25:34

and gives a shit about this stuff. And

1:25:36

that is and Pacino is

1:25:39

operating that in that mode, though

1:25:41

I often do think about.

1:25:44

It is so laughable,

1:25:46

the idea these guys are allowed to do any more cop

1:25:48

shit after that shootout, seriously,

1:25:51

like

1:25:52

it's like, no, everybody here is

1:25:54

like

1:25:55

it's guns and badges time.

1:25:57

Like go wait on suspension.

1:25:59

can publicly disgrace you in six

1:26:02

months at a trial. Because

1:26:04

the minute it emerges,

1:26:06

you could have arrested these guys, breaking

1:26:09

into a safe two

1:26:11

weeks earlier, and you didn't,

1:26:13

because you didn't like the charge you'd be able

1:26:15

to get them on, so you waited to catch

1:26:18

them on something bigger.

1:26:19

And now 35 people are dead?

1:26:22

Yeah, it is

1:26:25

the most, you know, Hannah's

1:26:28

still like, we're gonna find these guys. And

1:26:30

it's like, nope, Hannah's

1:26:32

going to basically be under house arrest at this point,

1:26:35

like under a gag order from the chief.

1:26:37

I mean, the police union will eventually help get him off,

1:26:39

but it's gonna take a while. And

1:26:42

yeah, like again, I think the thing

1:26:44

here is that they portray,

1:26:47

I don't, I imagine this is not particularly accurate,

1:26:49

but they portray the major crimes unit as almost

1:26:51

sort of like being its own satellite

1:26:53

thing that just sort of operates completely

1:26:56

free of the restrictions

1:26:59

of other police divisions.

1:27:03

They never get into the politics

1:27:05

of that at all. It is very much just like, no, these

1:27:08

are the elite of the elite, and that's all you need

1:27:10

to fucking know. And

1:27:12

so when you get to this, it's just kind of like, you

1:27:14

just kind of have to accept that these guys are effectively

1:27:17

above the law, whether that's realistic or not.

1:27:21

So I want

1:27:23

to talk about the ending. In

1:27:26

particular, so

1:27:28

one,

1:27:30

never see something like this filmed again. They're never

1:27:32

gonna let a film crew onto, like

1:27:35

they're never gonna let people be running around on

1:27:38

a working runway at LAX with

1:27:41

guns and shit. Again,

1:27:43

that's not gonna happen. So

1:27:46

we get this and bullet, and

1:27:48

we'll just have to huddle around that

1:27:50

to keep us warm.

1:27:53

But what do we

1:27:55

make of the denouement

1:27:58

here? And in particular,

1:27:59

the musical

1:28:02

choices made in this

1:28:04

day and a while.

1:28:06

Hmm.

1:28:10

Well, I just want to say before we get to that, Michael

1:28:13

Mann is a coward for not allowing this

1:28:15

movie to also end with Wayne

1:28:17

Grove getting karate kicked out a window. That

1:28:20

is, that was one of the best

1:28:22

artistic choices he ever made and how dare he abandon

1:28:24

that. But that

1:28:26

said, again,

1:28:28

Michael Mann is a guy who

1:28:31

I think is a lot like a lot of other dads

1:28:33

I knew growing up, which is that he finds music

1:28:35

randomly and with absolutely no

1:28:38

real intention toward doing so. And

1:28:41

I have to imagine someone passed him a Moby

1:28:43

CD at some point. And for a couple

1:28:45

of sweaty years, that was

1:28:48

the thing he listened to exclusively

1:28:50

before he found what the next thing was. And

1:28:52

you're all familiar with the fact that there was, a

1:28:56

different composition for this, right?

1:28:58

No, it wasn't. Okay, so

1:29:00

let's pause and

1:29:03

watch this with Elliot Goldenthal's like

1:29:08

score for the scene that

1:29:10

was cast aside for

1:29:12

God moving over the face of the waters. If you want to know

1:29:14

what that's like, if you watch the film or

1:29:17

you can easily find the Moby

1:29:19

ending to heat

1:29:21

if you like, let's all take and

1:29:24

kind of maybe you can pipe in this

1:29:27

composition as well. Let's

1:29:30

take a couple of minutes and watch how the scene plays

1:29:33

with the orchestral soundtrack. Okay.

1:29:36

Okay. Okay. Okay. Okay.

1:29:39

Okay. Okay. Okay.

1:29:41

Okay. Okay. Okay.

1:29:44

Okay. Okay. Okay.

1:29:46

Okay. Okay. Okay.

1:29:49

Okay. Okay. Okay. Okay.

1:29:52

Okay. I

1:30:32

told you I was going

1:30:35

back. I

1:31:03

told you I was going back. I

1:31:27

told you I was going back. Huh.

1:32:01

I can't believe I'm in support of Moby

1:32:03

being superior at anything. I

1:32:06

can't either. Like I'm kind of mad.

1:32:10

It's interesting because

1:32:13

in the composition

1:32:15

you could almost imagine

1:32:17

Michael Mann coming to Elliot

1:32:19

Golden Tall with that song and saying,

1:32:22

can you do something like this?

1:32:26

No, you definitely can. It's really

1:32:28

uncanny how much...

1:32:30

I'm picturing Michael Mann driving

1:32:33

him around in his car, just around...

1:32:36

He can see it, right? If

1:32:38

you do this, do this... There's something here.

1:32:43

But then in the end he goes with the Moby song

1:32:45

and I think it actually is better for it.

1:32:50

I would agree. I think it is... I

1:32:55

think it serves him as well as

1:32:57

Prague ends up serving him in

1:32:59

Miami Vice. This

1:33:02

is...

1:33:03

It really all went bad once he got on the audio slave.

1:33:06

He

1:33:09

got that hit of audio slave

1:33:11

and it was done. But

1:33:14

I do think the...

1:33:17

I think the Moby song...

1:33:20

I mean this is always one of the... There's a lot of

1:33:22

issues with Moby and there's a lot of knocks on Moby.

1:33:25

But one of them is always that he

1:33:27

did have a really almost

1:33:31

coyingly cinematic sensibility

1:33:34

to his music.

1:33:36

But here it's a perfect

1:33:39

match between

1:33:40

his sensibilities and the

1:33:43

frankly operatic register

1:33:46

that man is operating

1:33:50

within here. Yeah.

1:33:52

Yeah, it's a good... I think in the

1:33:54

end it is actually a good choice. It's a better

1:33:56

one than the rocking Moby

1:33:59

song they use. when he's chasing him down

1:34:01

the highway.

1:34:02

But yeah,

1:34:04

like,

1:34:06

I think it ties that scene together in

1:34:08

a way that this

1:34:10

music does not.

1:34:13

I just I don't know, like, I love that whole final

1:34:15

sequence. I love them tracking each other through the

1:34:17

airport. I love the way the lights of the runway

1:34:20

are used to kind of sort of indicate

1:34:22

kind of the big kind

1:34:24

of just, you know, sort of dramatic beats of

1:34:27

that scene. And I can't

1:34:30

I honestly, the only reason I have a Moby

1:34:32

or ever had a Moby CD was because of this

1:34:34

movie and that song like, and that was what

1:34:37

made me investigate what the hell Moby was,

1:34:39

which I guess maybe I should be blaming more for

1:34:42

than than praising, but it does

1:34:44

work here.

1:34:48

I mean, I just think we should have brought back I interest

1:34:50

any new button for the ending personally. Mm.

1:34:59

Which is like the soundtrack for this one, like the

1:35:01

the pieces that Michael Mann apparently

1:35:03

just like had, like in his like CD binder.

1:35:06

Yeah, just. Well,

1:35:08

what? And as we know,

1:35:11

some sometimes Mrs. Mann would

1:35:13

hear stuff on the radio and be

1:35:15

like, I really like the song. You should maybe, you

1:35:18

know, put it in your movie, put that in your little movie. Just

1:35:20

handing him a copy of like The Mirror

1:35:22

Pool by Lisa Gerard.

1:35:26

And

1:35:29

then I think, you know, we talked a little bit about

1:35:31

the visual styling of the film, you

1:35:33

know, up front, but. A

1:35:37

lot is, you know, the final shot

1:35:39

of this movie, I guess, discussed

1:35:42

a lot, and I'm curious, do you. Uh.

1:35:47

Two on the nose or

1:35:50

transcendent? So

1:35:55

to be to describe it, it is

1:35:58

the final shot of the film.

1:35:59

where you have a multiple

1:36:03

chest-rooted dead De Niro

1:36:06

lying on the left-hand side of a wide

1:36:08

screen, of a very

1:36:11

wide format image, with

1:36:13

the runway lights ascending up

1:36:16

the left side of the frame, and

1:36:19

then on the darker half of the frame,

1:36:22

clasping De Niro's dead hand is Pacino,

1:36:25

with his back to the camera staring into

1:36:27

the darkness

1:36:29

of

1:36:29

the night.

1:36:33

Yeah, I don't know. Like,

1:36:37

it

1:36:41

certainly does put its meaning all

1:36:43

the way out there.

1:36:45

Yeah, it

1:36:47

just feels

1:36:49

a little cloying, honestly.

1:36:55

It's one of those shots that, like,

1:37:00

you know, before the advent of one perfect

1:37:02

shot,

1:37:03

like, this is like the thing that,

1:37:05

like, someone thought, someone, like, it was like, this

1:37:08

could be so perfect, man, so we're gonna have this

1:37:10

one shot, it's gonna be so good. And

1:37:13

really, it's just like,

1:37:16

you know, the string of lights that, like,

1:37:18

literally descend down into De Niro's

1:37:21

body, like, it's

1:37:23

just,

1:37:25

someone spent a lot of time figuring out this shot,

1:37:27

too.

1:37:28

I mean, like, that's the thing, like, one of

1:37:30

the things that I really like about this movie is that, one,

1:37:35

it's just really nice seeing a movie that actually

1:37:38

has, like, rich blacks, and,

1:37:41

like, makes advantage of them,

1:37:44

and then, like, you know,

1:37:46

also has, like,

1:37:47

you know, it

1:37:50

wasn't shot in fucking log,

1:37:52

and then, like, you know, color added

1:37:54

later after the fact with horrible digital

1:37:56

color grading,

1:37:57

like, every movie these days.

1:37:59

So, like, you do get, like, the shootout scene,

1:38:02

you know, the

1:38:07

heist is very, like, dusty,

1:38:09

and it's very muted, and it's

1:38:12

like those very low contrast.

1:38:14

And then when we get, like, this shot, it's all contrast.

1:38:17

Like, the shadows are completely blocked

1:38:19

up. It's like zone one and zone

1:38:22

nine, and that's it. There's nothing in between,

1:38:24

and that's really, really good.

1:38:27

So, like, I wish, like, there's,

1:38:30

like, these kind of, you know,

1:38:32

these moments throughout it where it's just, like, it's a

1:38:34

kind of scene, and you go, yeah, okay, you thought that would be

1:38:36

a good shot. Uh-huh, yeah, I get it. I

1:38:39

see why you did that. And then the kind of the ending shot is

1:38:41

similar for me, where it's just, like, you

1:38:44

did so well with

1:38:47

what everything else going up to this. This just

1:38:49

feels kind of cheap

1:38:51

to me. Yeah, I...

1:38:54

It's a little, it's just so on the nose.

1:38:56

It is on the nose. It's extremely on the nose.

1:39:01

I'll just let you get something else, too.

1:39:03

No, I didn't. I think Dio

1:39:05

said most of what I wanted to say there, just other than

1:39:07

I, as much, I do love

1:39:09

this shot, but I also recognize that

1:39:12

it is, while it may be the thing

1:39:14

this movie has been building toward the entire

1:39:16

time, it is also kinda corny.

1:39:19

It is a little bit on the cheesy side.

1:39:23

And I think in part of it

1:39:25

is because, like, I think the

1:39:27

opening shot is a better shot, for one thing, I

1:39:29

just, I think it's a more

1:39:31

effective shot. It's true to the film. I

1:39:34

think maybe that's the thing is,

1:39:36

it's a beautiful shot. I love the ending of

1:39:38

this film. I have a soft spot

1:39:40

for this shot, but I will say,

1:39:45

what in this film has

1:39:48

laid the groundwork for the redemption of the

1:39:50

soul of Neil McCauley,

1:39:53

or the fact that a soul has a place

1:39:55

to ascend to. I think part of this is,

1:39:59

There is a...

1:40:02

There's a very pointed religious

1:40:05

overtone to this image and

1:40:07

sort of a... like...

1:40:11

Redemptive or sanctifying

1:40:14

quality to the image. I mean, it

1:40:16

has so much... I have read a lot of the painting quality to it. I was gonna say,

1:40:18

this is one of those things where if you give me like,

1:40:20

you know, an hour and a half with like my

1:40:22

art history books, I could probably find the

1:40:24

actual painting this is based on. Mm-hmm.

1:40:26

Like...

1:40:28

It definitely... And I think... It feels

1:40:31

that way. And so much of this film is like, you

1:40:33

know, and you'd certainly make the case that

1:40:35

like,

1:40:36

what maybe the image draws so much power from

1:40:38

this sort of contrast, but so much of this film is like,

1:40:41

we are alone down here. Like

1:40:44

that... Like, and you know, that's certainly

1:40:46

where the nearest half of the image,

1:40:48

you know, comes into play, but I think there's

1:40:50

something here about like, the

1:40:52

sort of implied like,

1:40:55

departure of

1:40:57

the spirit of Neil

1:40:59

McCauley

1:41:02

when so

1:41:04

much of the film seems

1:41:07

colder than that and grimmer than

1:41:10

that. And like, I appreciate

1:41:12

we get this image at the end of

1:41:14

the picture, but I'm not entirely

1:41:16

sure it is the thematically...

1:41:17

I'm not sure this is

1:41:19

the last shot of heat. You know what I mean? Like,

1:41:22

it feels like it is... It's a great shot.

1:41:25

In terms of the story we've told, I'm

1:41:27

not sure it is the one that encapsulates

1:41:30

the movie we've seen or the

1:41:33

worldview that it's brought to the

1:41:35

story. I always interpreted it less

1:41:38

as redemptive and more

1:41:40

as... I'm trying

1:41:43

to think the right word for it, but like...

1:41:46

I mean, the real thing is that these two characters

1:41:49

have a deep, abiding respect for one another,

1:41:51

even with the realization that the

1:41:53

trajectories they are on will inevitably

1:41:56

lead to one or the other dying.

1:41:59

Like the one will be...

1:41:59

killed by the other unless they

1:42:02

completely separate themselves from what

1:42:04

they are currently doing, which was never going to happen. And,

1:42:07

you know, the thing that I think the movie plays

1:42:10

with, it doesn't always, you know, completely

1:42:12

get there. But I think I think especially in like the diner

1:42:14

scene, and kind of when, you know, John

1:42:17

Voight's Nate, we've

1:42:19

not talked about it all, by the way, which is

1:42:21

fine, fuck John Voight, but his Eddie Bunker

1:42:23

impression is at least pretty good. I'll give him that.

1:42:27

But when you know, Nate is talking about like, you know, he

1:42:29

says, Look how sharp he is. Look how sharp you know, look

1:42:31

how sharp he was to see that. Like they both

1:42:33

kind of enjoy the fact that they have found a

1:42:36

kindred spirit in one another, even

1:42:38

if they are from completely different sides of

1:42:40

the moral spectrum, at least as far as where they,

1:42:42

you know, their vocations are concerned.

1:42:45

And at the end, I kind of, I always

1:42:47

interpreted that scene less as this is the

1:42:49

redemption of Neil Macaulay, and more

1:42:51

the realization that like, this was our inevitable

1:42:53

path.

1:42:55

You are going to die now.

1:42:57

You have no one left here. I

1:42:59

am outstretching my hand, not because I

1:43:01

think you have, you know, redeemed yourself, but

1:43:03

because everyone

1:43:06

I think deserves, especially, you know, two people

1:43:08

who are so intertwined like this, I am

1:43:11

simply giving you a last human

1:43:13

connection before you're dead.

1:43:15

That's it. You you and I,

1:43:17

we have crossed paths, we have had this life, we

1:43:19

have had this experience together, I will

1:43:21

probably never meet another person as attuned

1:43:23

to my specific, you know, specific psychology.

1:43:27

As I do you, I am recognizing

1:43:30

this fact, and I'm giving you one last

1:43:32

moment of human contact before you

1:43:34

bleed out. And that is that is how I've

1:43:37

always kind of chosen to interpret it.

1:43:41

No, that's very, very out. I think redemption

1:43:44

is definitely the wrong word. I think more like grace is

1:43:47

what it's getting across, but I think is it deserving

1:43:49

of that?

1:43:50

Yeah. Or is it like the

1:43:52

the film is offering a comforting,

1:43:54

like portrayal here of

1:43:57

death. Like I think the film's been colder

1:43:59

than, but I think I like

1:44:01

your unpacking of it a

1:44:03

lot, especially because I

1:44:06

think the habits image I

1:44:08

do like is that

1:44:10

Hannah is in the darkness.

1:44:12

And in a lot of ways, like

1:44:16

it's not just that he's not gonna meet someone as attuned

1:44:19

as like Macaulay is, but like also we

1:44:21

do know his

1:44:23

life's never gonna have anyone in it as

1:44:25

far as we can tell. Like it's pretty clear,

1:44:28

unlike in Only Takedown,

1:44:30

he and Justine don't

1:44:32

have really any pretense that it's gonna work out.

1:44:35

Right, because there aren't 20 more episodes of this coming

1:44:37

right after the fact. Right, so yeah,

1:44:40

so it's cooked.

1:44:45

One of his closest friends is killed in the shootout and

1:44:49

then this, but like yeah, I mean Hannah's

1:44:51

definitely somebody that

1:44:54

at the end of this he can sort of feel the

1:44:57

weight of all that loneliness that's coming. I'm

1:45:00

having his way, which because all he is, all

1:45:03

he is is what he's going after and he's

1:45:05

gone after this person, he's got him.

1:45:07

And now all that's in front of him is just like, what's

1:45:09

the next thing? Am I ever gonna have someone

1:45:13

like this to pursue again?

1:45:15

Well, that's the thing, like if you watch like this, the

1:45:18

scene where like, you know,

1:45:19

he's not making eye contact

1:45:22

with Macaulay, he's

1:45:24

scanning this empty field.

1:45:27

And like, you know, when we get the

1:45:29

wide shot of it, you know,

1:45:31

it's just black and there's a line

1:45:33

of lights on the like, you know, horizon, but

1:45:36

mostly he's just standing in absolute darkness

1:45:39

and kind of looking around and going, well shit, I'm

1:45:41

surrounded by darkness.

1:45:43

That's all I got now. All

1:45:45

that is there is the void. I

1:45:49

am.

1:45:50

That's the Werner Herzog

1:45:53

version of this movie. It is him staring into the

1:45:55

literal void.

1:45:57

I'm not convinced

1:45:59

that. A Herds

1:46:01

dog is not an elaborate disguise that Michael Mann

1:46:03

adopts or vice versa. Uh, sometimes.

1:46:07

I mean Pacino is coming close

1:46:09

to channeling Kinski in this, so. Got it.

1:46:13

Uh,

1:46:15

and that's a hell of a place to leave these characters,

1:46:17

but of course we do have He Too to look forward to. Oh

1:46:20

god, do we ever.

1:46:21

Um, so we will, we

1:46:23

will keep an eye out to learn more about

1:46:25

the backstory of- It's such

1:46:28

a choice to turn that into a novel and

1:46:30

to not try and turn that into a movie. Like I'm

1:46:32

sure there's a reason for it, but I'm

1:46:34

left wondering why exactly. I

1:46:37

am. And like- Because it doesn't cost 60 million

1:46:39

dollars to write a book. That's fair. Yeah.

1:46:42

Yeah. I am. I

1:46:45

am so curious about what that, what

1:46:47

that thing is going to be. Oh.

1:46:51

When I was writing

1:46:52

the film, it was imperative for me to create

1:46:54

complete life stories about all the characters and know

1:46:56

everything about them. Man told deadline,

1:46:59

including Neil McCauley's early institutionalized

1:47:01

years when he lost track of his brother

1:47:04

before he parachuted into the streets. Young,

1:47:06

angry, and dangerous.

1:47:09

Like there's something there. There's something to that.

1:47:12

I don't know that I would have, I could have gone the rest of my life

1:47:14

not experiencing that and just being just

1:47:16

fine,

1:47:17

but I'm interested.

1:47:20

Finally, we're getting Michael man's a thief's end.

1:47:23

Maybe we'll finally get heat the video game too. Maybe

1:47:25

finally Randy Pitchford will get his dream

1:47:27

and he can make that game.

1:47:31

I.

1:47:35

Probably nobody's like Randy Pitchford near that. Yeah. I

1:47:38

hate to say it. I hate to say it. Give

1:47:44

the drugman. God damn it. Give

1:47:46

it the drugman.

1:47:48

You might be right.

1:47:51

Or someone new. I'm mad at this podcast now. I