My readers are learning a lot more about which classics have eluded me all these years as I continue to fill the pre-Oscar nominee period with Oscar nominees I had never seen. Of course, this is a biggie. It’s usually on lists of the best films ever made, and I’m positive is on an AFI list of some kind. Sidney Lumet, making his second appearance in this timeframe, directs Al Pacino in an electric performance about a bank robbery gone wrong.

Of course, they didn’t count on being up against One Flew Over The Cuckoo’s Nest. But, with multiple Oscar nominations, including for Pacino, this should have been viewed by me much earlier. Would it help if I said I’ve seen One Flew Over The Cuckoo’s Nest more than once?No?

Pacino is still in this early part of his career before he really developed that specific accent that he can’t shake anymore. He’s still clay that is being molded, and Lumet takes all that fire and passion and really makes something out of it. I guess, I have to talk about Chris Sarandon’s performance, since he managed a Supporting Actor nomination. Often, my goal is to discuss films from a blind perspective, but I’m also a member of the LGBT alphabet army and I can’t help but think Sarandon’s portrayal of a transgender man through Lumet’s vision just doesn’t hold up in 2024. The audio description on his character was OK, but the choices in portraying him, and how the characters react to him aren’t great. It doesn’t help that they have to pluck him out of a mental hospital either, which he actually wants to go back to.

It’s these choices, these odd choices that left a bad taste for me, that give my 2024 sensibilities an ounce of pause. Kind of like how some people believe Gone With The Wind perhaps isn’t quite the classic it seems to be. I think the same case could be made here for Dog Day Afternoon, which is basically a gay man cheating on his wife, whose lover then identifies as a “woman trapped in a man’s body”, and Pacino has to rob a bank so his side piece can get their sex change operation. Oh, and there’s another guy here. Why? Who knows.

Lumet goes out of his way to justify Pacino, but kinda leaves John Carney out to dry as the second bank robber, and we never learn much about him. Sure, this is based on a true story (based, being the operative word), but Lumet can make some choices. It’s a mostly exciting heist film that struggles against its runtime only because there is a runtime. The robbery almost opens the whole film, meaning we are pretty much in the bank the whole time. It is one of those films that isn’t long, but just feels like it’s always about to end. I didn’t have a problem really with the runtime, but there were so many times I thought we were setting up the finale and then the movie kept going. All those little fake outs just made me notice the film had a lot more to give, even if it runs only about two hours.

Mostly, I’m trying to put on my time travel hat, and not be too wrapped up in how we view 2024 films in 2024 and then applying that to a movie made 50 years ago.It just doesn’t have the same vibe, and none of the films from this period would.

With a strong script and cast, and decent audio description, I recommend Dog Day Afternoon sight unseen.

Final Grade: A-