I think Frank shows signs of having a far more volatile personality than someone like De Niro's McCauley anyway. It's true that people tend to think of them as two sides of the same thieves-as-professionals coin that Mann trades in, but (beyond their obvious competency in their chosen field) the way the characters are played by the two actors really makes them quite different.
For one thing, Caan's thief is hot-headed and flashy. He shows his piece to a bouncer at a bar. He punches out a citizen at the least provocation. He peels out into the night in a giant car, almost killing a couple of bystanders. He gets into a shouting match with a government official, attracting the attention of security.
Neil McCauley would balk.
In fact, when I first saw Thief (in the afterglow of my initial romance with Heat), Caan's performance put me off a bit. I was expecting reserve and steely professionalism; what I got was a strange combination of De Niro's quiet furtiveness and Pacino's brash outbursts.
In hindsight, I think Thief is actually a better film than Heat -- maybe the best film of Mann's career, along with The Insider -- because Frank feels like a real human being. He may have started out as an undisciplined hothead, and traces of that remain, but he never allows himself to forget the lessons he learned in prison, not just to do with his new trade, but also to do with the mindset he mentions in the cafe.
But it's clearly a struggle for him, and Caan portrays that beautifully. I particularly like his most vulnerable moments, like when he finds out that Okla has died, or that Leo can get him a kid. The first time it's a sort of non-expression, like he doesn't know what to do with his feelings and doesn't want to show his hand, and the second time there's a childish disbelief, the kind a guy gets when he's not used to getting good news and can hardly fathom what joy feels like.
Hell, I think I'll watch this again tonight.
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