Heat 2: Al Pacino would be up for ‘going younger’ using de-ageing tech for Michael Mann film prequel

Michael Mann’s follow-up to Heat brings back characters made famous by Al Pacino and Robert De Niro.

The book, titled Heat 2, is the filmmaker’s debut novel, and is a prequel to the 1995 film in which the actors play detective Vincent Hanna and criminal Neil McCauley, respectively.

Mann has already said he plans to make the book into a film, which has led many to wonder who would play the younger versions of the characters.

While Pacino recently namechecked Timothée Chalamet as a possible star to play his character, back in 2019, he actually suggested he’d be up for using Irishman-style de-aging technology to reprise the role himself.

During an interview with The Independent, when asked if he’d be up for using the same tech for Heat 2, Pacino, not realising the novel was a prequel, said: “You’d have to ask Michael Mann, but we wouldn’t have Bob.”

De Niro, whose character is killed off at the end of the film, interjected, telling Pacino the novel was going to be set before the events of the 1995 film. To this, Pacino replied: “You mean go younger? That I would do for sure.”

Laughing at the prospect, De Niro added: ‘Well, you never know.”

Pacino was a big fan of the de-aging technology used by Martin Scorsese in his Netflix gangster film The Irishman.

He said during the interview: “It’s odd because, when you’re making a film, it’s all about accepting whatever’s going on. You’ll do anything for the context of the film, whether you put a bonnet on or whatever.

“We had little dots on us, which I got to like after a while. Putting them on became a form of preparation. It was my makeup.”

Heat 2 is out now.