Shedding light on Heat, one minute at a time

Director Michael Mann appears in the finale of a 177-episode podcast that examines his 1995 epic crime drama, one minute at a time.

Director Michael Mann (left) with Al Pacino and Robert De Niro during filming of Heat.

When Sydney film journalist Blake Howard started his podcast, One Heat Minute, two years ago, it was an act of extended devotion, a deep dive into the world of a single film.

The project examined Michael Mann’s 1995 epic crime drama Heat, one minute at a time. And 177 episodes later — a tally that includes a live broadcast and several supplementary episodes — it has come to an end in a way he could have scarcely dared imagine.

For each instalment, Howard invited a guest to discuss a single minute of the movie, proceeding in chronological order. The episode could last up to an hour: despite the tight focus, the conversation could take off in any direction.

Heat, the first screen pairing of Robert De Niro and Al Pacino, is based on a true story. De Niro plays a career criminal, Pacino a robbery-homicide detective with the Los Angeles Police Department. It’s intricate, epic, domestic, poetic, a tale of obsessive perfectionism, heists, love, violence, unsettling parallels and start contrasts.

For One Heat Minute participants, it provided endless topics of conversation: from detailed analysis of a gesture to a theory about characters who say the name of the film to an appreciation of lighting and framing to parallels between Heat and 18th-century novels.

It all began with a marathon session in which Howard and several friends, critics and film fanatics recorded the first 14 episodes in a day, “to see if the premise could stand the test”. He then sought out more guests, including filmmakers, actors, writers — even an investigator of organised crime in Australia.

They didn’t have to be Heat tragics, though some had expert knowledge of the film or actual involvement in it. Others might be new to the movie, or might see it from a fresh perspective. He started to draw on overseas guests, ranging from director Joe Lynch and New York Times critic Manohla Dargis to Heat cinematographer Dante Spinotti, a regular Mann collaborator. Inevitably, he says, a guest suggested further names, and a network of connections started to build. Before long, people were approaching him.

Guests would often ask Howard if Mann knew about the podcast, if he would appear on it and, if he did, what minute should he discuss? Howard had no idea about the first two questions, but he was sure about the last one. His answer: “He has to do the final minute — to me it’s the greatest moment in the film, and the only one he could do, and the only way I knew the show should end for all the fans. I kept saying it and saying it, and thinking, what if he doesn’t?”

Finally, Bilge Ebiri, Vulture critic and recurring guest, provided the crucial link. He told Mann about the podcast and urged him to be part of it. Last weekend, One Heat Minute’s finale was released: an hour-long episode, part two of an examination of the final minute of the film. And it features Howard in conversation with the writer-director, a genial guest who learned about One Heat Minute four or five months ago and thought “it sounded completely insane in a totally wonderful way”. He tells stories, dispels rumours, discusses improvisations, locations, the music of the final minute, cinematic philosophy and the nature of time.

What underpins One Heat Minute, says Howard, is that in a masterpiece, “literally every minute should matter. It should be an invaluable part of the construction.” Mann echoes this, telling Howard “as audiences, as human beings, we just take in everything, and so everything has meaning … I believe, as a director, in the work that I do anyway, that everything should talk. Sometimes very quietly. But everything should talk.”

Now, after two years of Heat, and the high of the finale, Howard has new projects on the horizon. He’ll be producing a six-episode podcast about Josie and the Pussycats. He is also working on a collaboration that he can’t go into too much detail about but it involves an overseas partnership and a cult TV series.

Mann, on the other hand, is returning to the world of Heat, 25 years on. As he says during the final stages of the podcast, he is co-writing a Heat novel, a book that deals with things that take place before and after the events of the film. It will be published next year.

Philippa Hawker was a guest of One Heat Minute.