You can clearly see how the visual language of this film lays the groundwork for movies like the _The Dark Knight_ and _The Town_ (dark & blue hues, naturalistic lighting, lots of medium shots, no glossy or fancy camera movement, camera continuously stays with the characters). In my mind this film is kinda similar to _Sicario_. We have this script that’s fairly straightforward and slightly generic, but it gets elevated by the directing and acting. De Niro, Kilmer and Pacino are all great in it, though I don’t like these cartoony outbursts that Pacino sometimes tends to have, even when we assume this character is meant to be on cocaine he still goes a little overboard with the performance. It’s the kind of problem that appears in a lot of Mann films, for example one could argue that the opening scene feels more in line with the tone from _Point Break_, not this serious, gritty crime epic that’s being attempted here. I also don’t think it justifies its runtime, this should’ve been 2 hours at most, as it takes a little too long to build up its characters in the first half. I’m assuming Mann thinks he’s making a statement about having family in the crime business by presenting such extensive character development, but none of that stuff reaches a level of depth for me where it pushes beyond being just a genre film with great characters. Still, the second half is pretty spectacular. The entire heist feels like GTA V without the satire, really loved the sound design of that entire shootout in particular. Overall, definitely worthy of its status as one of the defining crime thrillers of the 90s, despite not having aged perfectly.

7.5/10