Dog Day Afternoon

Oh my god. Just watched the most arresting hostage movie EVER. Dog Day Afternoon, based on a real Brooklyn bank robbery incident in the 70s. Young Al Pacino is so handsome and talented. Throughout the whole film I was at the edge of my seat, anxious for the robbers and the hostages. Couldn't let my guard down because it felt like the guns were pointed at me too. Amazing directing.

I just read an analysis of the movie from Camera Politica. Ryan and Kellner explores the camera angles and how the effects of horizontal filmage makes the film more politically liberal-oriented rather than conservative. In a conservative movie (with a theme that is politically conservative: like glorification of good v. evil cops/robbers, or the death penalty), camera angles on characters are done in close-ups and vertically (focusing on one good protagonist, or one bad villain up and down). However, in Dog Day Afternoon, the camera is always sweeping about from the hostages to the robbers to the police...everyone is part of the whole situation, showing people's sympathy with each other's situations as well as the human connections that grey-up the good v. bad sides. The shots are made from the robber's point of view, which makes the viewer complicit in the crime as well as sympathetic with them when their life stories and personalities begin to unfold.

The 70s really comes to life in this movie, with the zeitgeist of Vietnam, counter-culture, emerging gay/transgendered activism, Brooklyn realism, and men's tight bellbottoms all swirling onto one street where the scene takes place. Films are the best for me when they transport the viewer completely, sight and sound, into a different place and time. Even better when this whole event was a true story---the real criminal even got 1% of the movie profits!