DOG DAY AFTERNOON [1975] review

I’ve been waiting for an afternoon with ample free time and also a certain terse mood to watch DOG DAY AFTERNOON. I suddenly realized that the conditions were just right this very afternoon, it was raining, I had no lessons, and I had the time. So I settled in knowing the film would be about a bank robbery gone wrong. I was expecting it to be a bigger scope for some reason, maybe something more like HEAT, but instead it was quite intimate, and casual.

I was very surprised by the role of the media in the film. … A very, very young looking Al Pacino appears calm for only the very first few minutes of the movie. As soon as it’s time, he rips open a box of flowers that actually contains a rifle, but it was the struggle to simple just open the box itself I think was foreshadowing to the trouble to come.

…I couldn’t believe the things they did, liking talking face-to-face OUTSIDE the bank in the middle of the street! But Al Pacino’s character is very smart, the more the movie progresses the smarter you realize he is, not simply a mini-ball of fitfull spastic energy.

…The biggest would be how the media played a part in the perpetuating of the crime. … How much people just wanted to be a part of what was happening, so they could say they were a celebrity. Nowadays, this wouldn’t surprise me at all as so many have found so many ways to grab a few moments of fame.

…The hostages weren’t secured at all, but allowed to roam freely, make phone calls, even flirt. And there were absolutely no heroes among them, as it would have been almost effortless to thwart the hostage situation from the inside.

…I mentioned the movie felt intimate, lending to this was the total absence of any musical score. No false drama created by music, only by the well-written script and the way Pacino can deliver dialogue. … Save this movie for the right afternoon, and you’ll feel like you’re right in the bank too.

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