I hate the sterile sets with nothing in them. Get some help from Spielberg if you want to see how to decorate a set, Mann. I hate the dumb faces, especially DeNiro's stupid face *in this movie*, I hate the bromance between the cop and the robber, the corny dialog, I hate HER GREAT ASS, I hate Pacino's stupid background story, I hate the bank guy getting a phonecall, I hate them going to the sterile docks so this dude can watch them from the tower - in fact how comes they don't see him? He's ON A TOWER. RIGHT THERE. LOOK. THERE'S A GUY ON THE TOWER WITH A CAMERA. THAT MUST BE HIM.
I hate the ending too. Makes no sense.
Only thing I "like" was Waingro, ironically because I really hate him.
The empty set that is Val Kilmer's house is an homage to the painting "Pacific" by Alex Colville.
I wouldn't call it bromance, so much as professional adversarialness. Watch Point Break for that trope to be pushed to its most extreme bromantic tension.
"HER GREAT ASS" is De Niro at his coked-out finest.
A lot of guys came out of multiple tours in Vietnam as casual killers. I recall that interview with the guy who kept 36 one-sided ears on a shower curtain hook as a keychain, where he said something to the effect of at some point it doesn't feel like there's much any difference between doing right or wrong. I remember that part of the interview in one video played over footage of guys pumping poisonous gas into a tunnel complex, like they were exterminators.
Maybe DeNiro and the tower was between those detectives and the sun. I'd have to rewatch and scrutinize the shadows.
Yeah, if we're talking advantages, Pacino would likely have a kill any time he had ammo for that shotgun, and then with the light of the plane DeNiro had the advantage. Pacino, as an aforementioned marine multiple Vietnam vet, probably was just a more instinctive shooter.
I liked Waingro the most too.
I hated Rollins the most. I hate Rollins in general however for possibly being complicit in his boyfriend's murder though.
Edit: I forgot to mention, Pacino's position with the light coming on and DeNiro coming out is a lot like one specific segment of Rex Applegate's original World War II-era 1911 point-shooting course's live-fire final exam log shoot-house.
Most of the pistol manipulation in Mann's movies (after HEAT, less so for Thief, don't know about Manhunter,) seem somewhat based on Gunsite Academy/Jeff Cooper's pistol training. That last shooting possibly being an homage to Rex Applegate, Fairbairn et al. could be yet another way to depict Pacino's character as an O.G..
Please, ask the animal0mother.
I don't know and didn't come up with that background story.
And I only guessed the Cole murder was meant, cause Rollins was under suspicion to be involved in it.