An action movie to be listened to

Rating: 8/10 (5 July 2000)

Most action movies subsist primarily on eye candy: lots of explosions, frenetically-edited chases, and big-budget special effects. The soundtrack -- both music and dialog -- does little more than add a nauseatingly heavy dose of auditory sweetener to string all this together. But Heat is a movie you can just listen to: not only are the dialog and line delivery excellent, but the music is one of the best of the action genre. Most action movies have scores by staple genre composers such as Hans Zimmer (MI2, The Rock, Crimson Tide, Broken Arrow) that are so relentless and overbearing that they become tiresome by the last quarter of the movie. The first thing that ought to tip you off that Heat's music is different is the exclusive use of extant music and the inclusion of works by some of the best electronic ambient artists around: Brian Eno ("Force Marker"), Moby (the amazingly beautiful "God Moving Over The Face Of The Waters"), and William Orbit ("The Last Lagoon"). Like the other elements of the film, the soundtrack is very reserved and thus more powerful because it is not overwhelming and balanced well with the rest of the movie. And when all the other elements are this good, you have the makings of an excellent film.