Dog Day Afternoon (1975)

Al Pacino plays a ferocious and fed-up bank robber in Lumet's classic film DOG DAY AFTERNOON. Balancing suspense, violence, and humor, the film's depiction of a grand-scale media event craftily dives from the political to the personal, evoking a piercing portrait of a man and his devastating downward tumble as seen through the media circus that Lumet made a career of chronicling. Pacino is heartbreakingly real as Sonny, a smart yet self-destructive Brooklyn tough whose plan to rob the local bank to fund his male lover's (Chris Sarandon) sex change goes absurdly wrong. Accompanied only by his doltish accomplice, Sal (John Cazale), Sonny resorts to kidnapping a handful of bank employees when he realizes that all the money had been removed before his arrival. As the lengthy August day drags on, Sonny and hordes of local police, led by Sergeant Moretti (Charles Durning), make little progress, and eventually Sonny's wife and lover are brought to the scene. The crowd's sympathy is immediately captured by the charismatic Sonny, whose antagonism with the police is played out before an audience of millions, leading to an inevitably tragic finish.

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Cast

Al Pacino The Godfather, The Godfather: Part II, Heat Carol Kane The Princess Bride, Annie Hall, Scrooged Lance Henriksen Aliens, The Terminator, AVP: Alien vs. Predator John Cazale The Godfather, The Godfather: Part II, The Deer Hunter Charles Durning O Brother, Where Art Thou?, The Sting, Tootsie James Broderick The Taking of Pelham One Two Three, Alice's Restaurant, The Group Beulah Garrick [more]

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