Most Helpful Customer Reviews
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12 of 13 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
A good example of psychological/midnight (pre-sleep) genre, January 21, 2001
By A Customer
The main atmosphere of the film reminds me of a theatre play. This piece is neither a typical high budget American movie nor a totally underground one.(but a hybrid one) As i indicated above, the director seems to focus on the characters' personalities (like a theatre play) to give some personal messages to the viewer/observer. Whenever i watch the movie, i feel that i'm a doctor in a mental hospital and observing people. All the characters in the movie have some weaknesses in their personalities as it is in real life. And, in my opinion, the impressive presentation of the weaknesses of the different personalities is the underlying factor of the Heat's above - average success. For example, the performance of Sylvia Miles was really haunting. Her acting made me play this DVD three times last week. This role matches her perfectly. i can say the same for other movie characters. it seems like all the people are acting themselves not the roles. Therefore, one can,easily, feel the voyeuristic delight of observing people's daily private life (which is so trendy on today's television programmes) while watching the Heat. As for the subject guy, Joe Dallesandro, in terms of acting, he brings no striking or notable performance to the movie. However, to me, again, i may say that he plays himself. He's destined to act this role. Of course, there's no need to say that he's so young, beautiful and sexy in the HEAT. Being a fan of him can be only reason to watch this movie. However i should warn you that if your intent is to observe Joe's body and sexuality, this movie may not give you enough of his flesh. So, you'd better try 'The Flesh' from the famous Paul Morrissey trilogy. As a bottom line, this is not a brilliant, first class, unforgettable or masterpiece movie example at all. However, if you are into theather play-like, low-budgeted, psychological/midnight(pre-sleep) genre movies featuring a beautiful, long-haired, sexy guy with a swimwear(not showing his flesh excessively), this one is definetly for you! PS: The DVD version of this movie contains an extra material about the intentionally chosen dialogues of a few movie characters taken from the movie sequences. So this helps us more to understand the characters' personalities and their driving forces.
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8 of 8 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Mad Camp Spoof of 'Sunset Boulevard', June 17, 1999
By A Customer
HEAT is a riot - aging game show hostess vies with lesbian daughter for the affections of sexually ambiguous has been TV cowboy. The lines are eminently quotable ("Do you want your son to grow up to be a lesbian??") and the acting has elements that make cinema verite look like fantasyland. I know people (not ME, of course!) who've seen this thing 50, 60 times - and still can't get enough.
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6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:
3.0 out of 5 stars
Underground Classic, June 27, 2006
This is the most coherent in the Flesh/Trash/Heat trilogy and certainly more watchable than Andy Warhol's films that he personally "directed" (anyone for 8 hours of the Empire State Building?). John Waters was certainly influenced by Andy Warhol (who returned the favor in Andy Warhol's Bad) but his films were a lot more fun to watch. Though, just as in Andy Warhol, early John Waters had the characters basically play themselves, Pink Flamingoes and Female Trouble are shockingly hilarious, whereas Heat has a creepy sense of exploitation. This update on Sunset Boulevard (a far better movie by far) has the characters repeating what seem like monologues. The storyline revolves around the characters using each other sexually and otherwise and even though the "acting" is certainly lacking, the characters seem like real people who lived in the countercultural version of skid row at the time with the explicit scenes verging on pornographic without being at all arousing. The reason I called Heat a "classic" is that underground films at the time could be tedious, random images, political diatrebes, or experiments with film (the same shot over and over). This was way before underground films morphed into independent films where with the right connections, you could actually make a profit as well as before the vcr, when seeing an underground movie was an experience in itself. That world has now disappeared and "Heat" is a fragment of that time.
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