A few words about...™ Heat -- in Blu-ray

Originally Posted by Cameron Yee 

This kind of actor blocking would have been pretty intense...

Originally Posted by Michael Reuben 



That kind of died down after the 2005 special edition DVD, which had a featurette on the conversation scene (also on the Blu-ray) including interviews with Mann, Pacino, De Niro and even one of the employees at the restaurant where they filmed the scene, who says that the most frequent question she gets is whether both actors were there at the same time.

It also didn't help the conspiracy theorists that Righteous Kill (whatever one may think of the movie) exploded their root assumption: namely, that De Niro and Pacino are such egomaniacs that they wouldn't show up on the set together. (Yes, there's digital trickery, but now we're into aluminum hat territory.)



Suppose you had. How would the diner scene have played? You have this intense one-on-one conversation with these two adversaries staring each other down. If you shoot it with the faces of both guys visible in the frame, where do you put the camera? What will the audience see? Think about it for a minute.

In the featurette I mention above, Mann talks about his shooting methodology and why he adopted it. As you listen to him, you realize that he was doing what a good director is supposed to do: serve the story. Now, I know that a lot of people may react by saying, "Yeah, but that's not what I wanted to see." Well, that's the kind of thinking that studio executives worry about night and day, and it's what prompts them to interfere with directors and screw up a lot of movies.

Originally Posted by TonyD 



I understand your point Michael, but i don't believe just because Michael Mann shot it that way it is indisputably the best way.
The scene would have been much more satisfying to me if I saw a shot like that still I posted before.

No reason a shot with a moving camera could'nt have been used in the film.
I felt like Mann was making a statement of some sort that He has these two guys in a movie together for the first time and I'm going to shoot the scene like I did just because I can and too bad if you don't like it.

It was a tease.
the movie isn't lessened(sp?) by it but it wouldn't have hurt the shot to have a camera show them both visible at the same time. not just the back of one guys head.
This was the first time they were on screen together and you don't really get to see it.

 

Originally Posted by Michael Reuben 




Isn't it interesting how it's all about respecting the director's intent -- that is, until the bastard does something you don't like.

Your argument is no different from that of someone who dislikes having black bars on his screen and complains because directors use 2:35:1 "because I can and too bad if you don't like it". After all, such a person might say, "I don't believe just because [director so-and-so] shot it that way it is indisputably the best way. The scene would have been much more satisfying to me if" it had filled my entire screen.

"No reason a shot [with greater height] could haven't been used in the film."

If your reasoning is valid, then so is this. And this ain't.

Originally Posted by Carlo Medina 

Here's where I will be fine if we agree to disagree.

I think the resulting facial shots (with the other actor "over the shoulder") is the best way because both of these actors are so skilled, so nuanced in their features, that looking at them from the side like in the shot you posted would have resulted in being able to see very little of their facial expressions, especially from a profile view where you can only see half of their face.

And a moving camera back and forth between two static figures? That sort of motion could be very distracting (esp. those 180 or 360 shots that Michael Bay is so in love with). Again, you have two of the best actors in the biz, in a "square off" moment across a table, I think Mann shot it about the only way he could while still being able to give the viewer full appreciation of the actors' facial expressions.

Just my opinion.

EDIT - Just thought of this: one of the best shot face-offs in cinema is with Starling and Lecter in Silence of the Lambs when she interviews him in his cell. Lots of over the shoulder or face closeups in that one, which conveyed the strength of both Foster's and Hopkins' facial expressions. The only time you get to see both in those scenes is via a well-done reflection of Lecter in the glass while Starling is talking, but Mann didn't have the luxury of glass between Pacino and Deniro.
 

Originally Posted by TonyD 

Wow Really.
I guess Mann can just do whatever he wants and I can't offer my opinion on what he did in a movie. ok.

 

Originally Posted by cafink 

Where do you draw the line between that legitimate criticism of the direction of a film, and "disrespecting the director's intent"?
 

Originally Posted by TonyD 



I don't go that far but I was annoyed that you don't actually see them on screen, both of their faces at the same time.
All you get is a couple of over the shoulder pov shots of the other guy in the diner then a long shot near the end of one guy holding a gun at the other.

The movie is great, but there was some hype that this was their first on screen film together and you really didn't get it.

 

Originally Posted by TonyD 


I understand your point Michael, but i don't believe just because Michael Mann shot it that way it is indisputably the best way.
The scene would have been much more satisfying to me if I saw a shot like that still I posted before.

No reason a shot with a moving camera could'nt have been used in the film.
I felt like Mann was making a statement of some sort that He has these two guys in a movie together for the first time and I'm going to shoot the scene like I did just because I can and too bad if you don't like it.

It was a tease.
the movie isn't lessened(sp?) by it but it wouldn't have hurt the shot to have a camera show them both visible at the same time. not just the back of one guys head.
This was the first time they were on screen together and you don't really get to see it.

Even the guy who shot Righteous Kill took a little poke at this by saying in one of the supplements that at least this time you actually get to really see them both on screen together. I'm sure he was tongue in cheek but he still said it.


 

Originally Posted by Felix Martinez 



There's some buzz about a change in brightness in certain spots, including chapter 17 between 00:54:32 and 00:54:33.  I don't have the disc yet so I can't confirm.