Dog Day Afternoon (1975)

If Spike Lee's 2006 Inside Man is the perfect bank robbery, then Sidney Lumet's Dog Day Afternoon has to be the worst. Al Pacino (as Sonny) and John Cazale (as Sal) lead the cast and the heist, which goes askew in almost every way possible.

For starters, Sonny doesn't disable the security cameras for about two minutes in the robbery. Furthermore, the intended third robber runs away from the bank, too nervous to point a gun at the security guard. A burning bank register alerts the insurance salesman across the street, and within minutes the place is surrounded by cops.

And it's downhill from there for poor Sonny and Sal.

Fans of The Godfather will love seeing Michael and Fredo Corleone reunite here a year after The Godfather, Part II was released. In many respects, Dog Day Afternoon allows both actors to play polar opposites of the roles that made them famous. Sonny, who bumbles his way through the robbery so that he can buy his lover a---er, I won't spoil the surprise. And Sal couldn't be farther removed from Fredo; where Fredo was the bumbler, Sal is cold and prepared to throw bodies at the police, while taking the time to worry about a smoker's immortal soul.

Lumet's direction, with which I've been peripherally familiar through his work in Network and Murder on the Orient Express, does a great job of injecting humor into the almost pitiful display the botched robbery elicits, also successfully capturing the scope of the media circus that revolves around Sonny - a true master of the media without even knowing it. My only complaint with Lumet is that the film drags a bit in two scenes that should have been more powerful - one where Sonny talks with his lover on the phone and the other where Sonny, fearing he will not live through the night, draws up his last will and testament. Though Pacino's acting is stellar in both scenes, some long takes and grinding-to-a-halt of the plot hurt the film.

But these are small details, and the viewer won't come away remembering those two scenes as the most memorable scenes. No, the moment where Sonny chants "Attica!" in response to police brutality has become the stuff of film legend; the interplay between despair and friendship between the hostages and robbers also set the film apart from similar heist movies.

By the film's end, Sonny and Sal aren't villains. They're anti-heroes at best, people driven to desperate measures by similarly desperate times. They're human, flawlessly characterized and impeccably sympathetic. Without ruining the movie, I will only say that I come away from it - as I imagine most viewers will - with the nagging query of, "What would I do?"

Isn't that the mark of a good film? Shouldn't it leave you wondering, empathizing, and recalling? Dog Day Afternoon certainly does.

And did I mention it's a true story?