Why Michael Mann Found Shooting Heat's Bank Robbery 'Terrifying As Hell'

In a 2020 article on RogerEbert.com titled "Why Heat is the Greatest Heist Movie Ever Made," film critic Gerardo Valero describes the bank robbery in "Heat" as both the best and most influential scene of its kind. One likely reason no movie, at least in Valero's eyes, has since matched the spectacle of this big setpiece in "Heat" is that Michael Mann was uniquely committed to filming as real a simulacrum of a bank robbery as he could, evidenced in part by its incorporation of authentic gunshot noises.

Meg Gardiner, who co-wrote "Heat 2," revealed that even when writing a literary sequel to "Heat" with no visual component, Mann maintained this level of investment. "There's a scene in the book where a character is climbing up a rope ladder on the side of a ship that's at sea. I said to Michael, 'I want this to feel real when I'm writing it, and having some trouble getting it right...' And his reply was, 'Hold on, I'll send you some photos of me actually doing it,'" Gardiner told Rolling Stone.

If Mann is still capable of such intense devotion to his work, it's entirely possible that the nearest rival to "Heat" may well end up being the film adaptation of "Heat 2."