Dog Day Afternoon

Rating:
Summary: Perhaps Al Pacino's best film role?
Review: Based on a true story of a botched Brooklyn bank robbery heist, "Dog Day Afternoon" is a suspenseful, attention-grabbing account of a young, innocent looking man named Sonny (Pacino), who attempts to rob a bank to pay for his boyfriend/lover's (Chris Sarandon) sex-change operation. One of the film's most chilling scenes occurs at the beginning, where Sonny enters the bank with his two cronies Sal (Jon Cazale) and Sonny's boyfriend (Sarandon) with a large, rectangular gift box, supposedly containing flowers. After presenting the teller with a withdrawal slip, Sonny calmly steps away from the counter, nervously, hurriedly opens the box, pulls out a rifle and shouts "Allright, freeze, nobody move!". His partner Sal also points an automatic gun at the bank manager (Sully Boyar), and the tone of the movie is set. Sonny then lets his boyfriend go when he is unable to go through with Sonny's plans. After what appears to be a clean getaway, someone outside the bank from across the street sees smoke appearing from the bank's ventilator, at which time Sonny attempts to burn up the account ledger. The police and the FBI are informed about the heist, and what follows is a some two-hour hostage of everyone inside the bank. In the meantime, Sonny is attempting to negotiate with the chief of police (Charles Durning) and the head of the FBI (James Broderick) to avoid any kind of possible tragedy regarding the bank's employees. Rather than give the ending of the movie away, I suggest you buy "Dog Day Afternoon" and see for yourself. The VHS version contains added bonus footage of cast and film staff interviews, so you're in for a real treat here!

Rating:
Summary: Classic Pacino
Review: "Dog Day Afternoon" remains the sleeper cult classic of Al Pacino's legendary career, fusing elements of true crime, family turmoil, sexual identity, and human compassion. Pacino delivers one of the best performances of his career (I'd say the best), but is strongly propped by an incredible supporting cast. Chris Sarandon, playing Leon, Pacino's pre-operative transgendered lover, is totally believable and sympathetic as a lost soul persecuted by both police and his lover. Penelope Allen, who plays the head bank teller, expertly portrays the strength, compassion, and fear felt among the hostages of the robbery, and provides glimpses of comic relief in this otherwise heavy crime drama.

Unlike many of Pacino's movies, however, the violence in "Dog Day Afternoon" is minimal, and showcases instead the emotion and strife inherent in the difficult predicaments of the characters.

"Dog Day" sheds light on the complexity of the sexuality of Pacino's and Sarandon's characters in a merely incidental manner, without the sensationalism common, 30 years ago (or today, for that matter). This is one of many examples of the way this film presents its characters unapologetically and without excuses, which ironically garners compassion from the audience, and secures the film's narrative triumph in cinematic objectivism.

Rating:
Summary: You Will Cry!
Review: This B-Movie will make you feel like you are in the production. It has scenes you will never forget, and the film is very susepnseful and makes you wonder what is going to happen next. The director builds up susepnse and lands it out for another dramatic scene. It will break yuor heart and put it back together again. Maybe in just one afternoon.

Rating:
Summary: Truth IS stranger than fiction
Review: Al Pacino plays Sonny, a man who needs money and decides to rob a bank. Not being experienced at this, he fails to make much of a plan and he seems to make things up as he goes along. Soon everything goes wrong and he is suddenly surrounded by legions of police and F.B.I. agents. His partner Sal is not too bright and as Sonny says, "I have to make all the decisions around here". He shows amazing kindness to his hostages while he tries to devise a plan for his escape. He appears in front of the crowd outside while negotiating with the police and suddenly becomes a cult hero when he evokes the Attica situation by chanting "Attica" over and over. The mood of the movie seems to constantly shift from humor to pathos to tension and some of the plot shifts are entirely too strange to come from a fiction writer's pen. The acting is excellent and riveting in this movie, based on a true incident.

Rating:
Summary: If you like Scarface
Review: You will immediatly fall in love with this flick. Pacino is not a poor Cuban struggling to become a crime boss in Miami in this film, but he is a regular guy, trying to make ends meet by robbing a bank(in broad daylight). However, things go terribly wrong right from the get-go. And so the story goes on.

This is one of Pacino's finest acting performances. He consistnetly makes you feel both the stress and fear that "sonny" feels during the entire "waiting" period. The way he displays "sonny's" emotions is really uamazing. He is always on the edge of breaking, but always manages to keep his cool. Pacino is so good at both facial expressions and mannerisms that he does not even need to speak for the audience to know what it is he is feeling.

I believe that this movie will be with us for a long, long time and that any Pacino, bank-robber, or just plain out maovie fan absolutly cannot pass on this film!

---one more thing I love about this film, is the setting. Mid-seventies, city block----i love it!!

Rating:
Summary: A "Sexy" Dog Day Movie Night
Review: I was not one of those people who would've catagorized Al Pacino as someone sexy.
In fact, I don't know if there are that many people out there who would find this movie sexy. But I have to say - after watching this movie, I became so enamored with his energy that I have fallen completely in love with Mr Pacino (in a bizarre one-way sort of way).
The way he portrays himself as this "man-on-the-edge" was so "closet-realistic" in the at-times-bluntly-mundane society that even though he was techinically performing a crimial act, it was simply impossible to not cheer for the bad guy.
What can be more sexier than that??

Rating:
Summary: Attica! Attica!
Review: Don't let the mild mannered Beatles' album-esque cover of this movie fool you. This is a sweaty, gritty, true crime vehicle for the genius that is Al Pacino. It just might be the best piece in the bank heist/standoff genre.
The basic premise is a straight and simple bank robbery goes awry from the start, and plummets to disaster when the cops enter the picture. Now the would be robbers turned kidnappers are trapped in the bank with some friendly hostages inside and a fleet of officers outside, all under the fervent eye of the press.
Even if it wasn't a true story, Dog Day is crafted with such realism, and stocked with such quality acting that it reads entirely believable and likely. No deus ex machina here. And sometimes fact IS much stranger than fiction- like Pacino's character "Sonny's" two "wives".
This film is packed with raw moments of absolute human emotion, theres no need to glamorize any of the characters, nor to demonize them. Director Sidney Lumet portrays his characters in all of their flawed and touching glory. Like Pacion's reaction to seeing "Leon" and then discovering he doesn't want to speak to him. Or the powerful cries of "Attica! Attica!" referring to the prison debauchle in 1971*.
A strange and nearly foreign feature of the film itself is the absence of music. The silence weighs heavy on the screen, forcing the actors themselves to create the tension and dramatic climaxes that music so often does for them.
I can't say enough about this film. It is one of the greats.


*In 1971, 1,300 prisoners rebelled against their guards and took over the Attica Prison facility in Western New York State. They held forty guards hostage. They had a list of demands for better living conditions including showers, education and vocational training.
After seven days of negotiations between the prisoners and government authorities, the national guard and state police seized the prison, killing forty-three people, incuding ten hostages.
The Medical Examiner's reports contradicted the statements of prison officials regarding the alleged atrocities committed against hostages. Autopsies revealed that hostages did not die from having their throats slashed by their captors, as had first been suggested by prison officials, but from the troops' deadly fire. (...)

Rating:
Summary: THIS SHOULD'VE WON THE OSCAR FOR BEST PICTURE
Review: A DOWN ON HIS LUCK LOSER [AL PACINO] ROBS A NYC BANK WITH HIS SLOW-WITTED PARTNER [JOHN CAZALES]. AL PACINO WAS ROBBED AT THE OSCARS FOR THIS ONE! AL PACINO'S MESMERIZING PERFORMANCE SURELY DESERVED AN OSCAR FOR BEST ACTOR [WHICH DID AT LEAST GET A NOMINATION]. THIS FILM IS VERY FASCINATING AND ONCE YOU BEGIN TO GET INTO IT [WHICH SHOULDN'T TAKE YOU LONG], YOU'LL NEVER WANNA STOP WATCHING IT. A MUST FOR ANYONE WHO LIKES THE GREAT AL PACINO. BASED ON A TRUE STORY.

Rating:
Summary: R.I.P John Cazale
Review: Dog Day Afternoon is my favourite film. But what makes it stand out? A few things. Firstly, there's the acting.

Al Pacino is brilliant - obviously - and he makes Sonny seem really believable. Then there's the *sob* late John Cazale (who tragically died a year or two after Dog Day Afternoon was made,
from bone cancer) who is one of the most underrated actors ever. Then there's Chris Sarandon who is fantastic as Leon. Dog Day Afternoon isn't exactly meant to be a comedy, but I can't help but laugh at the bit when you first see him, and while Sonny is standing outside the bank, smiling and waving and shouting "Leon!", Leon is looking very confused and bewildered and then faints. It shouldn't really be funny, but it is... The rest of the cast are superb as well.

Something else that's good about Dog Day Afternoon is the lack of soundtrack (except for the cheesy Elton John song that plays at the start). The good thing about not having a soundtrack, is that it doesn't ruin the suprise. For example, when something scary is about to happen you don't know (unless, like me, you have rewatched Dog Day Afternoon a million times) because there is no creepy music playing, which it makes it all more exciting and shocking when it does happen.

The fact that Dog Day Afternoon is based on a true story also helps, because it adds another dimension to the film. At the end, in the airport scene (which is the only scene in a film that has ever made my cry), you see text at the bottom of the screen, telling you what happened to all the characters afterwards. I walked away thinking to myself "I'd love to meet the real Sonny..." Of course, I would probably be very disappointed - not all bank robbers look like Al Pacino.

The final thing that is great about Dog Day Afternoon is that it's very emotional, especially at the end but it's also funny in some places. Just looking at Sal makes me laugh (and cry when I think about what happens to him later) and there are some funny lines as well "Sal, Wyoming's not a country."

Please, please, please buy this film. You won't regret it.

Rating:
Summary: "Sal, Wyoming's not a country."
Review: Sidney Lumet's "Dog Day Afternoon" reminds us that films once upon a time made it a point to properly develop the individuals within their stories. Younger filmgoers who grew up in later eras may not realize it, but cinematic works from decades past actually were inhabited by characters and not caricatures.

Sonny Wortzik (Al Pacino), Sal (John Cazale) and Stevie (Gary Springer) attempt to rob a Brooklyn bank just before closing time. The robbery turns into a debacle as Stevie immediately flees the scene and Sonny and Sal discover that the bank virtually has no money at its location. The police arrive to arrest the would-be robbers but Sonny soon starts to gain the support of the bystanders outside and uses the press at the scene to make the most of his time in the spotlight. Just when it appears matters cannot get any more odd, Sonny's new "wife" (Chris Sarandon) is brought to the scene and the reason for the bank robbery is revealed.

"Dog Day Afternoon" is in a class of its own when one is talking about bank robbery films. There are so many unconventional elements to the story - from the clumsily-planned heist to the amusing rapport between the robbers and the hostages to the role Leon Shermer plays in the proceedings - that it truly stands alone when compared to other entries in the genre. One might think that it would be easy to lose sight of the fine performances in "Dog Day Afternoon" with all of these elements vying for your attention but the efforts turned in by Pacino, Cazale, Sarandon, Charles Durning, and the rest of the cast is so good that their characters will not promptly fade from memory. Lumet also does an amazing job of creating a specific time and place with his directing. He infuses "Dog Day Afternoon" with such realism that you can literally feel the heat rising from sidewalks. Take out your scorecard and mark down this jewel as one of the essential films of the Seventies.