Part 5

    The Actual Southern California Locations where
    1995's "Heat" was filmed.

    [ Click here for an interactive MAP of all "Heat" locations with aerial photos! ]


    * Warning: due to the gritty nature of "Heat", some of its filming locations are found in urban areas
    that may have a high crime rate, and could be dangerous to visit. Exercise reasonable caution.


    Before each scene description, you will see a number (for example: 00:07:05);
    this is the time of the movie (on the DVD) when the scene appears.








    1:51:27: As the gun battle rages, and DeNiro tries to drag the wounded Val Kilmer to safety,
    the battle spills into what appears to be the parking lot of a
    "Zack's" supermarket.
    There really is no Zack's in L.A.  It's a fake.  They simply took a downtown parking lot
    (and its parking structure), and (with the help of a few shopping carts and some signs)
     turned it into a false storefront.

    But figuring out the exact location of "Zack's" a decade later, was somewhat challenging.
    The former parking lot is now gone. But by identifying the buildings in the background,
    I was able to pinpoint the location. For instance, in the photo above, the square,
    cube-shaped glass building behind DeNiro is the Bullocks Building at 600 S. Hope.

    The Library Tower (the tallest building on the West Coast) can be seen on the left side of
    the photo below. While the large brown building (with lots of windows) on the right side of
    both photos is the Sky lofts at 801 E. Grand Ave. In both photos, you are looking northeast.

    So where was "Zack's"?  On the west side of Hope Street, between 8th & 9th Streets.
    The former empty parking lot was
    bounded by Hope Street on the East,
    by W. 9th Street on the south
    , and by S. Flower Street on the west.
    A small street called
    Pembrook Lane cuts through the property.

    That once-empty lot is now under construction, a project called "South Village" is being built
    there and will soon contain the "Market Lofts" condos, which will sit six stories above a new
    retail development featuring, ironically, an actual supermarket (Ralph's, not Zack's).








    1:52:55: During the running gun battle, Tom Sizemore takes a young child as a hostage.
    In this scene, Sizemore is shot & killed by Al Pacino, in a shallow reflecting pool.

    This scene was filmed in an outdoor plaza located on the rooftop of a 2-story parking structure,
    directly north of the
    Union Bank Plaza skyscraper - at 445 South Figueroa Street.

    The plaza is bounded by 4th Street on the north, and by Figueroa Street on the east.
    The pool is one of a series of interlinked reflecting pools & fountains featured in the plaza.

    It's across the street from (west of) the Bonaventure Hotel. The hotel and the plaza
    are linked by a pedestrian bridge spanning Figueroa Street (just north of 5th St.)

    Alternatively, you get to the plaza by taking the escalators (seen in this screencap)
    up from Figureoa St., which lead up to a Starbucks. Turn right at the top of the escaltors.

    (Thanks to David for this tip!)








2:13:01: Planning his escape after the botched bank robbery, Robert De Niro and 'Eady'
talk in a park overlooking the ocean, where he tells her that he needs her to make his
life worthwhile, and asks her to come with him.

I originally thought this twilight scene was filmed at Palisades Park, narrow strip of grassy
park land that runs for a mile along the cliffs on the west side of Ocean Avenue

in Santa Monica, from the Santa Monica Pier north to the Palisades.

But instead, it turned out to be about a mile north of the end of that long park,
with a small canyon dividing the two spots.

The exact address is difficult to map, but it is across the street from
15515 and
15527 Via de las Olas, in Pacific Palisades.
( The GPS coordinates are 34.035598, -118.531674 )

The camera is looking south, back towards Santa Monica.

Here is a Google StreetView of the spot.






02:14:42: The police take Val Kilmer's wife & child into custody, and stakeout their
beach apartment
, setting a trap to catch Kilmer when he comes to visit his family.

This apartment house is in Venice, California, and is located right on the beach
on Ocean Front Walk, just north/northwest of Navy Street
.

In both photos of the stakeout street (above and below), we are looking east/northeast
up Navy Street, from Ocean Front Walk
(to Pacific Avenue). The stop sign we see in
the photo below marks
The Speedway, a narrow alley that runs parallel to Ocean Front Walk.

[ I originally had a hard time pinpointing this one, but an actual LAPD cop who works
the area emailed me in 2006 to let me know the exact location. Thanks, friend! ]
.






02:22:08: In the photo above, Al Pacino is standing on the balcony of his hotel, looking
down at the 405 freeway and Sunset Blvd. A moment later, he finds his step-daughter,
'Lauren' (
Natalie Portman) unconscious in a bathtub, following a suicide attempt.
He lifts her out of the tub and bandages her arms and legs to stop the bleeding.

This was shot at the Holiday Inn Brentwood-BelAir, which is located above Sunset Blvd,
next to (west of) the 405 Freeway
, just below the Getty Center. Its round tower can
easily be seen from the northbound 405 freeway. The address is
170 N. Church Lane.





02:23:56: Al Pacino carries his unconscious stepdaughter into a hospital.
This scene was shot at the same hospital where (earlier in the film) De Niro
stole an ambulance for the heist. It's
St. Mary Medical Center, located at
1050 Linden Ave., in Long Beach, CA (30 miles away from the Holiday Inn).







* Locations marked with an asterisk may be located in high-crime areas. Exercise reasonable caution.


More Heat Locations!
(Just click the arrows)

            

Some of the photos on this page are stills from the DVD of "Heat"
(which you can buy by clicking here) and are copyright Warner Bros.

The rest of the page is Copyright © 1999-2024-Gary Wayne / Seeing-Stars.com