Heat with Paul McDonald and Britt Mooney
Paul McDonald and Britt Mooney break open the 1995 movie Heat. We recorded this conversation back in October, but wanted to save it to help kick off the new year. As we reflect on the past year, we have the opportunity to look at what we chase and what’s really important to us. Will we live in a comedy, where we realize the truth and live by it, or will we choose tragedy, where we know the truth but decide to live aligned with a lie? What are you attached to? And what can you walk away from? The law and legalism is powerless to transform us, but salvation is offered through relationship. Let’s head to the diner and grab a cup of coffee and discover God’s truth in this movie.
Quotes
We’re safer in God’s story than we appear to be in the adventures we manipulate.
This is a story that is beautifully told, but ultimately broken.
This movie proves what’s really important, even though these men continually choose what’s less important, and their lives suffer loss as a result. It’s important to do movies like these because people live these tragedies every day.
Heat is a character study and a tragedy about the fallacy of what we chase and why we lose what’s really important.
We think that attachment is prison, but the attachment is our salvation.
Our presence matters. It’s very easy to leave the bulk of the meal (and our presence) on the table at work, and all we have left when we get home is the crumbs.
“I spent my whole life climbing up a ladder, but never realized it was leaning against the wrong wall.”
His lack of intimacy with them actually causes the trauma that he’s trying to avoid.
We can’t change who we are in our own power.
People who feel stuck make bad decisions.
Transformation doesn’t occur as fast as we want it to.
Every character is in bondage to the law in some form.
Salvation is offered through relationship.
All the law can do is punish. It can’t redeem anything. It is just a mirror, revealing evil. The gospel is an invitation to a relationship.
“All I am is what I’m going after.”
Themes
This movie is a tragedy. Tragedies and comedies bring us a moral, a theme. Comedies show us where everyone realizes the truth at the end and lives by it. In a tragedy, the characters know the truth, but choose to live according to the lie. Their desires pull them to choices that destroy them.
The characters’ decisions lead them to death and isolation with little to no hope of restoration.
The mirror images of Vincent and Neil.
Both men have choices to change but they don’t take them.
They are both in bondage-“You do what you gotta do. I’m gonna do what I gotta do.”
They don’t want a regular life.
Their attachment to others could have been their salvation, but they don’t let it.
They choose what becomes their downfall.
They are bound by what they are chasing.
They are more intimate with the enemy (each other) than they are with their partners.
They both get the opportunity to see the wake of destruction, the impact of their choices on the ones they care about.
Both have dreams that come true at the end.
Heat=Pressure. The characters experience pressure from the cops, from the victims, from the wife/family, from the job/work, money, from within (pride/loneliness).
“Don’t get attached to anything you can’t walk away from in thirty seconds when the heat is on.” But we are all attached to something.
All the law can do is bring death. Feeling imprisoned, being in bondage to the law.
Vincent tries to save his family from evil and trauma, but actually causes trauma and evil finds them anyway.
Resources
The Rewatchables: Heat with Bill Simmons and Chris Ryan, Aug 2017
The Rewatchables: Re-Heat with Bill Simmons and Chris Ryan, Jan 2020
The Rewatchables: Three-Heat with Bill Simmons, Chris Ryan, and Michael Mann, Nov 2021
Every Moment Holy, Vol 1: https://www.everymomentholy.com/
“To love at all is to be vulnerable. Love anything and your heart will be wrung and possibly broken. If you want to make sure of keeping it intact you must give it to no one, not even an animal. Wrap it carefully round with hobbies and little luxuries; avoid all entanglements. Lock it up safe in the casket or coffin of your selfishness. But in that casket, safe, dark, motionless, airless, it will change. It will not be broken; it will become unbreakable, impenetrable, irredeemable.” - C.S. Lewis in The Four Loves
“Sin used what was good to bring about my condemnation to death. So we can see how terrible sin really is. It uses God’s good commands for its own evil purposes. So the trouble is not with the law, for it is spiritual and good. The trouble is with me, for I am all too human, a slave to sin. I don’t really understand myself, for I want to do what is right, but I don’t do it. Instead, I do what I hate. But if I know that what I am doing is wrong, this shows that I agree that the law is good. So I am not the one doing wrong; it is sin living in me that does it. And I know that nothing good lives in me, that is, in my sinful nature. I want to do what is right, but I can’t. I want to do what is good, but I don’t. I don’t want to do what is wrong, but I do it anyway. But if I do what I don’t want to do, I am not really the one doing wrong; it is sin living in me that does it. I have discovered this principle of life—that when I want to do what is right, I inevitably do what is wrong. I love God’s law with all my heart. But there is another power within me that is at war with my mind. This power makes me a slave to the sin that is still within me.” Romans 7:13-24 (NLT)
“But seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things will be added to you.” Matthew 6:33 (ESV)
Questions
How have you seen tragedies work out in real life? When have you seen others continue to choose what is harmful for themselves?
How have you chosen what is harmful for yourself?
How is the Bible a comedy? How is it a tragedy?
What is your favorite heist movie?
Why do we love heist movies?
What does a regular life look like to you?
What pressure do you feel?
What are you chasing?
Where do you feel like you don’t have a choice?
What are you attached to?
What impact do you have on those closest to you?
Ask your wife (without defending or responding), what impact do I have on your heart?
What’s most important in your life?
Where do you avoid difficult conflict/uncomfortable situations?
Where do you feel imprisoned?
What are your priorities in your life? Is that reflected in time? Attention? Financial?