©Courtesy of Warner Brothers/The Dark Knight Rises
Actor Christian Bale will be starring alongside Leonardo DiCaprio in Heat 2, directed by Michael Mann, a sequel to the iconic 1995 movie starring Al Pacino and Robert De Niro. The news was broken by entertainment journalist Jake Hamilton, who was told by Bale, “I’ll be back in Chicago soon for HEAT 2”. Bale had earlier appeared in Public Enemies, another picture directed by Mann.
Based on a 2022 novel by Michael Mann and Meg Gardiner, the upcoming film has been described as a “prequel-sequel hybrid” that focuses on the back stories of the major characters. Heat 2 will be partly shot in Chicago and partly in California, where it will receive some $37,2 million in tax credits, The total production budget will amount to $150 million.
Besides Bale and DiCaprio, it’s being rumored that Emmy-winner Stephen Graham is in talks to play the role of Neil McCauley, the bank robber who was played by Robert De Niro in the 1995 original. Other actors rumored to appear in Heat 2 include Bradley Cooper, Adam Driver, and Austin Butler.
In December of 2025, DiCaprio was quoted as saying: “This is very much its own movie. We’re still working on it, we’re a ways away from production. It tips its hat to Heat, but it’s an homage, and it picks up the story from there. The book is already out there, so there are no big secrets that I’m divulging. It’s set in the future, and the past, from that pivotal moment in what I think is the great crime noir film of my lifetime. It’s one of those films that just keeps resonating, that we keep talking about, that has been imitated so many times and influenced so many different movies. So, we’re working on it. But it’s certainly exciting, and I think I look at it as its own silo, in a sense. We can’t duplicate what Heat was, so it’s paying homage to that film, but giving it its own unique entity.”
Heat 2 will be produced by Scott Stuber and Jerry Bruckheimer for United Artists. It had earlier been attached to Warner Bros., which was reportedly unwilling to commit to the $170 million budget that Mann wanted, instead offering him $150 million with the stipulation he commit to doing a third film for them.
United Artists has not confirmed a release date for Heat 2, though it’s likely that it will debut sometime in 2027.
Check out other articles by Edward Moran.