Rating: 8.5/10
Genre : Crime, Drama, Thriller
Dog Day Afternoon (DDA) is an excellent movie based on a real incident that happened in Brooklyn on August 22, 1972. It is one of those movies which is claimed to be closest to the real life incident it is based upon (although this has been challenged by the real-life protagonist).
The movie is based on an incident which started out as a 10-minute bank robbery, turned into a drama, and ended on a _____ note. (The space has been left blank intentionally so that this post does not act as a spoiler.) All of this happened in about 14 hours and the director Sidney Lumet has done a tremendous job of capturing the whole of it in just about 2 hours without leaving out (m)any details. Also worth mentioning, is the job of Al Pacino (Sonny Wortzik) and Chris Sarandon (Leon Shermer). I was disapponted to find Chris' name absent from the list of characters on IMDb.
What I liked most about the movie was how the protagonist managed to gather crowd support by shouting "Attica! Attica!" against the police. The details of the "Attica" incident are here.
Some of the quotes from the movie will last in the viewer's mind for a very long time:
Sonny: Attica! Attica!
Sonny: It's your job, right? You know, the guy who kills me, I hope he does it 'cause he hates my guts. Not 'cause it's his job.
Sonny: Kiss me.
Moretti: What?
Sonny: Kiss me. When I'm being fucked, I like to get kissed a lot.
Sonny: [talking to Sal, waiting for his wife to answer the phone] You know I can call anybody, they'd put it on the phone? The Pope, an astronaut, the wisest of the wise...
Too much for the movie. Now about the real incident and the men involved.
The man involved in the real bank robbery attempt is John Wojtowicz. He was sentenced 20 years of imprisonment but was released after 7 years. He was offered $7500 + 1% of the net profits of the movie, for his permission to make a movie on this incident. Here is a must read letter from the man where he explains his side of the story and also talks about what the movie did not capture, intentionally or otherwise.
I would recommend you to watch this movie soon.
[IMDb page]; [Crazy4Cinema review]; [Movie script];
[Attica incident]; [John Wojtowicz's letter];
