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10 out of 11 people found the following comment useful :-
Funniest movie ever!!!, 15 September 1999
10/10
Author: troy-32 from Chicago, Illinois

I'm sure it's my affection for people who don't know that they're being funny, but "Heat" is a hoot! Ok, Joe D'Alessandro is gorgeous, the prototype for all of the male models that we have today. Whether they are aware of it or not, he's it. And his lack of energy makes space for the outrageousness of the three women in this movie. And Sylvia Miles, Pat Ast and Andrea Feldman are the ones who make this movie! The humor in this movie is like nothing you've seen before, and there are many, many people who would think it was boring. "Heat" does have the most plot of any Andy Warhol movie, but it's still pretty slim. I think that the Warhol group cultivated this sensibility of men as desirable sex objects and women as ridiculous and over-the-top. But what comes from that is the male who becomes deadpan and the woman who has learned to be an unashamed exhibitionist and who, deep down, knows that her bizarreness is either funny or entertaining in some way. And I guess it's just the occasional beauty of fate that has brought together these three stunningly unbalanced, but open and expressive, females. I don't really think that much acting is involved here. As the conversations often don't have a point, I think it was just some really, really bright improvisation. Of course, the scenes when any two of the women are together are the best because you know that they're going to try to top each other in having the best mental fit. What's so great is that each of them is so unique in their methods that when they are interacting they just end up genuinely confused, which takes the form of frustrated frustration-aggression. I liked all three of the women - but Andrea Feldman was my least favorite. Yet she is priceless for the ways that the other two react to her. They go around and around with their emotions, and they inevitably end up where they started. Favorite scene: When Sally comes over to Jessica's for the first time. Favorite line: "Stop that splashin' in the pooo!"

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8 out of 8 people found the following comment useful :-
Heat is a Masterpiece, 22 November 2005
10/10
Author: stephenpitkin from United States

Heat is of the best films I have ever seen, and I consider it one of the greatest ever made. Must a great movie be slick, artificially lit and laboriously plotted?

Heat is an honest and hilarious portrayal of dysfunction, ugliness and despair with comedic innocence at its core. It is a visionary look into the souls of the much-less-than-beautiful people in a sun-bleached setting where poverty and suicide lurk just around the corner to glamor (glamor that is only parodied by the impoverishment of the production). At the height of their improbability, the characters are more real, more vivid and enigmatic than 99.9% of Hollywood factory fare. In the moments of their most wooden acting, the fascinations of the real person - whether it be the gapingly numb Joe Dallesandro, the ogrishly preening Pat Ast or the gonzo mystery of Andrea Feldmen, emerges with overexposed brilliance.

Sylvia Miles plays her role with subtlety and iconic ugliness. She is not trying to look "marketable," as so many do, but to play a part as naturally as a spirited animal defecating in a forest. There is rarely an ending so original in a film, too - the impotence of further tragedy in an already so tragic film. Burning through the most awkward of 70s fashion and through its slick rivals with fashion-model actors, Heat is raw psychological meat on an open flame.

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7 out of 8 people found the following comment useful :-
stunning acting, funny and sad, 28 April 2004
8/10
Author: leandros from Istanbul

This is the last of the Flesh-Trash-Heat trilogy, and my favorite among the three, with its plenty one-liners, stunning acting, lots of flesh showing (tamer than the other two though) and quite sad background.

This is quite different from its prequels in acting, script and camera use. Heat actually has a plot, the actors including Joe Dallessandro are very good and the camera moves, instead of being stable.

Loneliness lurks everywhere, in the forgotten old star's delusion of still having loads of fans, in the ex-child star's dreams of settling down honorably, and all the other inmates of the run-down motel.

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5 out of 5 people found the following comment useful :-
Surprisingly touching, seedy comedy, 6 October 1999
7/10
Author: allyjack from toronto

A funny, almost mystically seedy story about the impotent, vacuous end-point of trash culture - the former child star now a passive, blankly available icon of smooth flesh: fame and "art" (if there is such a thing) having become mere hollow commodities on the one hand, and a medium for posturing neediness on the other (Miles). The movie has all the elements of a Sunset Boulevard parody, but without any romantic nostalgia or bittersweetness; its depiction of raw desire and lust and loneliness is surprisingly touching despite the artifice and rough-shaped quality. It's unsettling too in depicting the fragility of its personae - Joe a pitiful application of celebrity, saying he's a musician and hanging out waiting for a deal that may never transpire; Miles' celebrity apparently mainly existing in the eyes of a group of sycophants whose power is in definite doubt; Miles' daughter flirting with lesbianism with a woman who abuses her. The ending is an excellently deadpan final note of impotence.

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7 out of 9 people found the following comment useful :-
PAT AST!, 26 February 2000
9/10
Author: michael.will (michael.will@sympatico.ca) from Montreal

One of my first "art" films after, as a total hick, I fled to the "big city", Vancouver, where I attended its 1973 Canadian premier. I laughed till I cried: Pat Ast, the control freak with the southern accent, inflicting herself on anyone who crosses her path. Wonderful moment: Sylvia Miles on her way out of the motel just after a big fight with Jesse (Andrea Feldman) and there's Lydia-Pat, leaning against the wall in her platforms, shaking her head disparagingly as Sylvia walks by. I mean, she doesn't even KNOW this woman, yet she's passing judgement on sight alone. What a splendidly awful person! Check out the moment when Pat, having bribed Joe into a sexual encounter, starts obsessing on crazy poor Andrea is and how she "just can't" have people like that around her anymore. As if she has any claims to class. Oh, and that scene between her and Sylvia, where she taunts about her sexual conquest of Joe and breaks into psychotic laughter as Sylvia flees in ego-deflated confusion. I love this movie as a whole, but Pat Ast made it total magic. Why isn't she a comedy star?

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5 out of 6 people found the following comment useful :-
Endearingly Trashy, 14 November 2006
8/10
Author: gonzaga ext from Philippines and United States

The perennially struggling actor, the withering diva, the junkie daughter, and the sleazy motel owner are the main clowns in Paul Morrissey's trash fest, "Heat", famously produced by Andy Warhol. Most are already familiar with the film's plot and the "Sunset Boulevard" connection, as well as the infamous cast including Pat Ast, Andrea Feldman, Sylvia Miles, and, of course, Joe Dallesandro.

The memorable opening theme, the mostly eccentric characters, and the retro vibe of the film are major reasons why "Heat" is so entertaining. Dallesandro helps set the tone right from the beginning in one of my favorite opening scenes on celluloid. I'm not the type to go gaga over theme songs but I can still hear the film's very retro-kitsch opening music. The 70's California vibe is so palpable it's almost a character unto itself. It could be as simple as a pony-tailed Dallesandro lazing around the pool but a lot of the scenes are somehow so definitive there's no mistaking time and place. Opportunistic, predatory, needy, or just plain deranged, these characters form a hodge-podge of amusing characters that would make Jerry Springer proud. There's a lot of sex and fighting going on and they all center on the Dionysian male sex object and Warhol muse, Dallesandro. The film was made certainly just to have an excuse to ogle him on screen for 90 minutes.

"Heat" is among the trashiest films I have seen and my favorite, the most palatable in the famous Warhol trilogy (with "Trash" and "Flesh"), and the quintessential 70's "art"/trash film. There are no grandiose aspirations here, just a sunny, lackadaisical brand of California nostalgia punctuated by one of the era's most prominent male sex symbols.

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3 out of 3 people found the following comment useful :-
Low-budget avant-garde that rocks the house, 17 March 2007
9/10
Author: Chris Docker (eyeforfilm) from Scotland, United Kingdom

The area of Hollywood LA - a strange place to the uninitiated. It was in my younger days: a cheap hotel on my drive south. Not far from Sunset Boulevard. The swimming pool reassures me the joint is 'respectable'. I don't lock my room door. In walks a girl. "Hey - I saw you and thought we could have some fun," she says, peeling her top off. Strangely, I don't feel attracted. "Of course," she purrs, edging forward and thrusting her ample assets closer, "you know I'm a man . . ." . Prurient or inexperienced - or let's say 'discerning' - I beat a hasty retreat. Warhol-Morrissey's film, Heat, uses the themes from Billy Wilder's famous Sunset Boulevard movie, but by stripping it of prurience and distractingly high production values, makes the moral dilemmas more accessible.

In place of opening credits, an intertitle asserts: "In 1971 another film studio, the Fox Lot on Sunset Boulevard was torn down." Cut to an attractive young man standing on a demolition site.

Several strands are immediately established. The historical development of Hollywood as a geographical area, former nexus of the film industry. A metaphor for the re-working of the Billy Wilder classic. A scene of empty desolation as a metaphor of Warhol minimalism. And the emptiness into which our protagonist will seek to re-enter his former glory.

Joey, the youngster on the empty lot, is a former star child actor, now struggling to make a living. He rents a room at Lydia's motel. A respectable place. Especially now there's a 'star' staying there. Joey needs to keep overheads down so isn't averse to advances from fat, middle-aged Lydia. But through a chance meeting with another resident, Joey meets the very well-heeled Sally Todd (Sylvia Miles). Sally is middle-aged but well-preserved. She disapproves of the pervs at Lydia's motel, including the brothers who earn a living by having sex on stage, and her own daughter Jessica who is going through a lesbian 'phase'. Joey latches on to Sally. She buys him expensive gifts, and tries to get him back into movies. Sally has all the trappings of success, although we sense that her 'stardom' days were maybe slightly more modest than she lets on. If Joey plays his cards close to his chest, Jessica is completely up-front about her relationship with 'Mom', openly claiming she's only interested in her money.

Morrissey uses Warhol's distancing techniques to establish Brechtian analysis on the part of the audience. Much of the acting and editing is amateurish, as if the characters are mere ciphers for the themes they represent. The sexually charged sequences make this apparent at gut-level. When Joey lets Lydia seduce him, the palpable sexual excitement is in stark contrast to the blandness of much of what has gone before. As bored Joey gropes her under her dress, the unashamed lust on the face of this less-than-attractive, sexually frustrated, middle-aged woman is like something off a reality show. The control-freak has scored and lets herself loose. It has neither the manufactured, over-acted look of pornography nor the air-brushed unbelievability of the 'erotic' scenes from mainstream movies.

When Sally enters the story, things progress to a more traditionally dramatic level (Sylvia Miles went on to become twice Oscar-nominated for later films). Her craziness is of the blind sort that often goes with sexual obsession focused on a much younger partner. Her wealth, success and social standing have blinded her and made her intolerant, denying even the possibility that her daughter could be lesbian. Sally's hypocrisy is exposed when Jessica later makes a jealous play for Joey.

The moral ambiguity is developed by making the younger characters sympathetic. They are open-minded, decent people in many ways. Sally's traditional morality is exposed not only as bigoted but (more importantly to anyone who sympathises with ultra-conservative values) self-deluding and sexually controlling. This makes us reconsider the morality of the youngsters, who are using their good looks simply to survive. They are also, by comparison, in control of their sexuality, whereas the older characters are enslaved by it.

In Wilder's Sunset Boulevard, we can now question the ethics of all the characters, including the clean-cut Betty Schaefer. Like Jessica, she is just doing the job for the money, and has no qualms about renouncing her engagement when she gets a more lubricious offer. Boulevard's Joe Gillis, like the Joey of Heat, really has no faithfulness to anyone. He rejects the younger, more attractive girl rather than blow his material fortune. Like it or not, the crazy Sally Todd (Sylvia Miles) / Norma Desmond (Gloria Swanson), has her feelings protected by society.

Morrissey takes bare Warhol aesthetic and makes it accessible. To Warhol, cinema was a visual perception-event, an art experience to challenge how we observe. Morrissey uses the trappings of narrative, pulling us into the experience by associating the familiarity of a conventional movie. Many of his films appeal to minority audiences. Heat, although containing themes that some might still find offensive, can appeal to most thinking audiences. Character-for-character comparisons with Sunset Boulevard instantly raise it above the "unsavoury piece of work laced with sex, lesbianism, self-abuse and perversion" with which one tabloid equated it.

Heat's sheer comic inventiveness will keep you glued to your seat wondering what surprise turn will hit you next. As an unassuming introduction to the work of Morrissey (and his mentor Warhol) it is possibly unsurpassed. Filmed in LA over a two-week period, for a budget of $50,000, it is a remarkable accomplishment in arresting film technique, improvisation, and stark observation of contrasting social mores. It throws new light on an old classic (which should be viewed first) and is also an acute commentary on the weird and wonderful world of 70's LA. Heat is an insightful film for the discerning; and a fresh, unpredictable romp for the liberated.

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6 out of 9 people found the following comment useful :-
Deadpan, 30 August 2004
Author: vivalarsx from Portland, Oregon

For fans of the utterly deadpan only. Those looking for more conventional laughs might choose to look elsewhere. Not as overtly funny as "Trash," this one requires a little more patience--or, in the case of suffering through Andrea Feldman's TERRIBLE "acting," a LOT of patience. It's basically a one-joke affair, with all the mundane (though slyly hysterical) chatter leading up to the funny last few seconds. Paul Morrisey's camera typically meanders around, catching whatever it can on the fly, but for one classic moment: Sylvia Miles walking into frame and interrupting a twisted little encounter between Joe Dallesandro and Feldman; the camera stays stock still, but the timing of the movements of the actors is a stitch! Dallesandro is his typically passive self--but this is probably the most gorgeous he has ever looked on camera. There are times the camera just stares at him with awe. He isn't quite as bad an actor as his reputation makes him out to be--he's actually quite subtle and kind of funny when he dumps Miles at the end--but one look at him and you know why he's in this movie.

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3 out of 4 people found the following comment useful :-
HEAT (Paul Morrissey, 1972) **1/2, 6 September 2007
6/10
Author: MARIO GAUCI (marrod@melita.com) from Naxxar, Malta

As I had been anticipating, the third and last of Paul Morrissey's trilogy of films with Joe Dallesandro as the (willing) object of desire of practically the entire cast irrespective of gender, is the best made and most accessible. With no full-frontal nudity this time around, the services of an Oscar-nominated actress in Sylvia Miles, a narrative which obviously (and not unamusingly) parodies Billy Wilder's SUNSET BOULEVARD (1950) and a generally more disciplined approach, Morrissey was clearly striving towards the mainstream here…although HEAT is still full of offbeat, individual touches and the dubious ingredients associated with this type of film.

Dallesandro is now a minor ex-star of Western TV series who's keen on kickstarting a singing career and Miles a fading character actress who likes to think she still has influence in the business and promises her support in return for certain favors. After a stint at a dingy Hollywood resort (the scene has shifted from New York to Los Angeles as per Joe's ambitions) – where he submits to the wiles of the obese and frizzy-haired female owner played by Pat Ast – Joe is soon shacked up in Miles' old-style mansion as a kept man. Here, however, he also attracts the unwelcome attention of Miles' mixed-up daughter (whom he actually met at the resort, where she was staying with her possessive girlfriend and baby in tow); appearing in this role is Andrea Feldman – the girl in search of a trip in TRASH (1970) – who seems to have been troubled in real-life as well, seeing how she committed suicide before this film had even opened!

Unlike the previous films in the trilogy, here Dallesandro is pretty much the observer – or, rather, the catalyst for the histrionics of the three women (Miles, Feldman and the acid-tongued Ast); two other notable characters (also residing in the run-down motel) are siblings involved in an incestuous stage act(!), one of whom is a dimwit who wears female clothes and has an embarrassing penchant for public manifestations of masturbation!!

While the plot only really parallels that of SUNSET BOULEVARD on the surface, the ending of the film sees Miles attempting to shoot Dallesandro as he leaves her for good – just as Gloria Swanson did to William Holden in the unforgettable climax of the Wilder classic – with, admittedly, hilarious results! Ex-Velvet Underground founder John Cale's "score" is good but, disappointingly, only plays over the opening and closing credits and was not even written specifically for the film but taken from his then-current album, "The Academy In Peril".

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2 out of 3 people found the following comment useful :-
Joe Dallesandro is my hero, 5 January 2007
8/10
Author: The_Naked_Kiss from Dunedin, New Zealand

If you want to see movies in the style of John Waters without the theatrics, you are guaranteed to love any Paul Morrissey movie. Heat revolves around a few characters, a hag who runs a motel, an aging actress, brothers who have sex on stage in a nightclub act, a young lesbian who isn't quite sure if she is a lesbian, and yes girls..Joe Dallesandro.

Joey is a struggling child actor, who has come back from a stint in the army and hopes to get back into acting. He meets an aging actress, has sex with her and her attempts fail to get him any acting gigs. There really are no major plots or twists or even morals in any of Morrissey's movies even more so in heat. Half an hour into the film and you ask yourself.. what has happened? Well nothing..and boy is nothing interesting. The fact that a director can make movies based on real life exploits of real life people and make it interesting makes him a brilliant director.

This movie is ugly, sexual, amusing and obscure, the fact that nothing really happens shouldn't put you off, you will be entertained and amused by the actors, if you really get bored you could pick out the flaws such as- Why does everyone have a New York accent when they live in LA, or is that a man or a woman? But for us girls Morrissey delivers us another film in which we can drool over Dallesandro, sadly he doesn't spend nearly half the amount of time naked as he did in flesh. You might also notice the little homage to midnight cowboy in the movie; he comes in the form of a gay man named Harold. (Pat Ast is actually in Midnight Cowboy) For fans of trivia ..Heat is essentially an unofficial remake of Billy Wilder's Sunset Boulevard with Dallesandro playing William Holden's part.

I feel Paul Morrissey is a highly underrated director, every film I have seen of his has left me wanting more, left me shocked, disturbed, in hysterics and leaves me raving about how simplistic yet fantastic they are. His movies make you want to go find your trashiest friends and make movies about them.

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