Ferrari- the Movie

A friend of mine from high school and someone whom I had recommended as a bouncer in a club that I was DJing in was one of the North Hollywood bank robbers, and I can absolutely assure you that the robbery was not inspired by “Heat”. In fact, that was the third robbery that Emil and his partner committed.

 

I imagine that it would have taken a lot of film time and real-world money to include story of Scala’s reaction. Not only that, it would have taken time away from the story being about Enzo. Also, it wouldn’t have allowed Enzo to make the comment about Castellotti being distracted.

 

I always thought that the North Hollywood robbery is what inspired Heat.

 

I read that too somewhere, but Heat was released in 1995. The robbery was in 1997, but Emil and Larry Phillips robbed an armored car in Colorado in 1993, using the same homemade body armor. That robbery wasn’t as spectacular and didn’t get any publicity, so the writers of Heat aren’t likely to have known about it. I think it was just creative screenwriting and a coincidence that there were similarities. There have been a lot of spectacular bank robberies on the big screen.

 

There is an obscure Spanish pulp novel written in the 70s or 80s with a similar robbery to Heat's armored car heist. I suppose it was a coincidence.