Can I be sacrilegious for a second? Sure, sure it’s my column.
… I think Heat is just OK. Fun as all get out… but just OK as a movie. Maybe even “really good.” But not “great.”
Maybe it’s that I find the wishy-washy approach to character-building — one minute they’re bastards with hearts of gold, next minute, they’re misunderstood softies with narcissistic streaks — a bit uneven or that too much of the film’s narrative pulse relies on Al Pacino getting coked out of his skis and freaking the hell out on camera.
But there’s something about Heat that doesn’t compel me to come back all the time, especially with the frequency of some men (mostly white) my age.
That being said, there’s something about watching Heat that feels compulsory. Like you couldn’t stop watching even if you tried. I’ve already mentioned the very cocaine-driven energy coming off of Al Pacino, but there’s obviously the bank heists, shootouts and chase scenes that have inspired some of the great films of the past 20 years. And that’s before you get to the live wire performances of Val Kilmer, Danny Trejo and the always immaculate Robert De Niro matching Pacino’s electricity with his own gravitational potential energy. Say, maybe that’s the word we’re looking for here: gravity. Heat has a sort of gravity to it that sucks you in even when you’re thinking, “Yeah, I get it, they reeeeeally just want to rob banks because they’ve got nothing better to do.”
It’s that kind of dynamic — the energetic pull building a facade matching true greatness — that I feel might be coming (historically speaking) for this year’s entry into the storied history of the Border War, a game that seems to have entered the halls of “Instant Classic” for many a Mizzou fan. And don’t get me wrong, I can understand why. The revival of the Border War is an extremely important event in its own right, and the trappings of Saturday’s extremely satisfying victory make for a game that will live long in the memory of fans. Maybe he wasn’t snooting a toot before the game, but Mizzou Wheelchair Basketball legend Carter Avery’s now-national field goal antics certainly carry the same zany weight as Al Pacino screaming, “SHE’S GOT A GREAT ASS,” at a very scared-looking Hank Azaria. I got every bit as emotional watching Brett Norfleet waltz into the end zone for the game-winning score as I did watching Neil leave Eady at the car… probably more so!
But just like when I re-engage with Michael Mann’s popular classic, I read all of this glowing praise for the game in the days afterward… and I can’t help but feel a little like I’m missing something? It’s not that I’m cold toward the game. Far from it! I’ve watched the highlight package quite a few times, even before I put together this afternoon’s Disrespectful Play Index. And I don’t want to give too much weight to that miserable first quarter. But for all the narrative talk of Mizzou staging a big comeback — which it unquestionably was — I find myself thinking, “Well… yeah.”
Like Nate mentioned in the Five Takeaways piece, kansas is a good team, whether or not we want to acknowledge it. And after one quarter of playing sloppy and, somehow simultaneously, uptight, Mizzou found their gear and spent the next two hours beating the jayhawks with the fervor, intensity and glee of… well, most other Mizzou teams smacking kU around in the “recent” history of this rivalry. It was utter domination from start to finish, the kind of performance you’d expect from a school like Mizzou, which has spent the past two years elevating itself to a new level of national prominence.
Maybe Eli Drinkwitz is to blame for my ambivalence, too. After the game, Drink played down much of the hype around this win, saying things like, “we’re not crowning ourselves yet,” and, “it’s just week two,” or, “I’m Donald Duck,” wait he didn’t say that, sorry, I’m getting my wires crossed here. Those Pacino-Coke lines are pretty sticky in the ole noggin.
Where was I? Oh yeah, the way the staff and team cast this one off in a quick fashion that doesn’t really match fan sentiment. Even Beau Pribula, who was masterful for the vast majority of the game, barely addressed the significance of the rivalry in the performance. Only Brett Norfleet — when spurred on by Nate Edwards himself — betrayed any hint of emotionality in the post-game pressers. You got the feeling that Mizzou expected to win this game, so much so that the opponent was secondary to the mission. It’s not who you’re playing, it’s what you’re walking away with.
Or, you know, the action is the juice.
Here’s the thing: I’ve spent a lot of time in this Revue dogging on this game. And to do so without recognizing it for what it was — a tremendously fun way to revive Mizzou’s oldest and most malicious rivalry — would be a travesty. So let’s call out what was fun!
- It was great fun to watch all the sad kansas fans heading for the exits after Daylan Carnell dragged his foot on the game-sealing pick. Don’t stick around too long, beakers, you’ve got a miserable three-hour drive (whoops, forgot the traffic, make it five or six) through nowhere to get to!
- It was a thing of beauty watching Jalon Daniels — announcers’ favorite QB to gas up despite him never winning anything of significance in his college career — and his teammates do that stupid little pinching celebration all game only to shut the hell up when their one quarter of good fortune got upturned. Nice celebration, nerds, maybe you’ll get to break it out in your next blood donor game.
- I was tickled watching Lance Leipold, a coach I actually hold quite a bit of respect for, fill several diapers complaining about Damon Wilson’s batting the ball toward Mizzou’s end zone. Maybe don’t put the ball on the turf and we won’t be forced to break out the cheeky tactics there, Lance.
- While I have no reason to believe they give a shit, thinking about the Braun family absolutely fuming somewhere watching this game gave me goosebumps. I hope they all had cold wings and warm beer to top it off.
Clearly my revelry in the misery of kansas is enough to fill a few paragraphs without even mentioning all the good things the Tigers did in this game. And yes, there were plenty of reasons to get really excited about the performance, mistakes and the first quarter notwithstanding.
It’s just my professional — whew, that word is doing some heavy lifting, huh — opinion that we don’t need to burden what was a fun, exciting, memorable rivalry game with the mantle of “greatness” to make it special. And who knows, maybe as time goes on, I’ll look back on this one more fondly for reasons that haven’t yet been revealed. But for now, I think it’s OK to take the same tact as the team and move onto the next one. After all, there’s heat around the corner, and we can’t get too attached.
For a good-not-great win over a bad-wait-no-terrible opponent, Mizzou gets four out of five gold Hot Fuss records. You can take “Mr. Brightside,” by the way, I’ll take “All These Things I’ve Done,” every day of the week and twice on Sunday.
