Dog Day Afternoon..(Warning..Spoilers Ahead)

I watched Dog Day Afternoon yesterday. It blew my mind. During the film I was completely engrossed and at the end I was completely amazed by it . I understood it’s a classic but for a while I couldn’t quite put my finger on what made it a classic, on why I it blew my mind . At first, it seemed like a simple bank heist film, with the regular hostages and negotiations with the police, nothing I haven’t seen before. And then I realized that it was because everything about the film is so brilliant that it is difficult to say exactly what its highlight is. It is partly the complex, compulsive paranoid hero of the film, Sonny who is just presented as is, without explanations and played by Al Pacino to such perfection and and with such neuroticism that it is impossible to look past the character, at the brilliant actor portraying him.

I was also impressed by the satirical but honest portrayal of urban existence in New York city- the media circus that is created outside the bank within minutes, the ineptitude of the authorities, the creepy caller who urges the robbers to kill the hostages, the pizza delivery guy who thinks he’s become a star because he came into contact with the robber, the man of the moment - in the eyes of the crowds and the media bank teller who refuses an offer to escape the hostage situation, saying her place is with her girls when the place she really means is in the center of a live TV coverage.

I was also intrigued by strange relationship that develops between the robbers and the hostages. The robber seems to deeply care for his hostages and understands that they have nothing to do in the situation. The hostages too begin praying for his success by the end of the film.

Sonny as a character is also immensely fascinating. The bisexual bank robber has an excessively protective mother, a large, shrill wife with two kids and a gay male wife. It is to pay for the sex change operation of this beloved wife that he decides to rob a bank. The film captures his unraveling with beautiful details. And the most spectacular thing of all is that all of this is based on a true story!