The Town has been out for a while, so it isn't being advertised much at this point, but the ad campaign to promote it struck me as very odd. At least one of them openly compared it to Heat, which a couple other movies have done recently. Now, I really like Heat, but it came out 15 years ago. A lot of younger moviegoers have never seen it, and many others have probably forgotten it.
But I was particularly confused after seeing The Town, because that movie has a little too much in common with Heat. Like Heat, The Town follows a 4-man crew who rob armored cars, banks and the like. The leading men in both meet a regular woman, who initially is unaware of their criminal activities. Their crews gear up for one last big job, which will allow the leading men to leave for greener pastures.
In both cases, the job is compromised and a shoot-out results. In Heat, 2 of the 4 are killed, while in The Town all three of Affleck's pals die. The FBI gets to Affleck's girlfriend in the hopes of nabbing him, while in Heat the same happens with (De Niro buddy) Val Kilmer's wife. In both cases, the women use a signal to indicate there is a trap, though in the Town Affleck already knows.
I know I should use their character names, but I don't remember them all and am too lazy to look it up. Anyway, the similarities are pretty significant and go beyond the ones I describe above. That doesn't mean The Town is without merit- I enjoyed it. But to advertise it as being 'the new Heat' seems strange as that is arguably the most obvious criticism of The Town: it draws excessively from Heat.
Most of the differences stem from Heat being much longer, though The Town is pretty lengthy itself. The extra screen time allows for a lot of additional character development; Dennis Haysbert (aka President Palmer) gets several scenes despite having an extremely minimal role in the actual plot. The law enforcement antagonist in Heat (Al Pacino) is basically a co-lead with De Niro, with a lot of screen time devoted to his personal life. His counterpart in The Town (an actor from Mad Men- which I don't watch even though everyone raves over it) is completely flat.
In comparison to what is playing in movie theatres these days, The Town comes off very well. Viewers who prefer brevity may even like it more than Heat. Still, the similarities are a bit jarring at times.
