Released 21 years ago this December, Michael Mann‘s Heat still stands as a crowning achievement in the crime drama genre, a slick, intense epic which invests in its characters in a way simply absent from most of today’s studio features. Last week, a new restoration of the film — which is said to be arriving on Blu-ray in 2017 — screened at the Samuel Goldwyn Theater in Los Angeles, and afterwards, Christopher Nolan (who was majorly influenced by the film when it comes to the opening of The Dark Knight) moderated a Q&A featuring Mann, Robert De Niro, and Al Pacino, as well as more of the cast and crew.
“Things will be perfect once and they will never be 100% twice. They will only be 100% once and you want that happening in front of the camera,” Mann says. During the talk, Pacino confirms there’s a scene where you see his character do cocaine, but it never made the cut. They also talk about the iconic meeting of the acting titans in the coffee shop scene and when you should rehearse, while cinematographer Dante Spinotti discusses how the digital restoration makes the film better, particularly when it comes to the new depth in the film’s final scene.
Amounting to over 35 minutes, check out all the videos below, half with just Nolan, Mann, De Niro, and Pacino, and remaining half with the rest of the cast and crew.