Dog Day Afternoon Movie - Essay Example

Al Pacino’s performance as Sonny in Dog Day Afternoon (1975) did more than just entertain, it gave a whole new meaning to the way masculinity and certainly the way the “bad guy’ was portrayed in film up to that point. Prior to this era the villain in the film had little or no redeeming qualities and was a victim of her or her own circumstances. Now in the genre of films like Dog Day Afternoon, the villain has turned into a counterculture hero and the leading man has a wider spectrum of characteristics than before. Of course he had some help from the writer of the film Frank Pierson as well as the director Sidney Lumet. Furthermore, he was certainly assisted by the rest of the cast such as John Cazale as the saddest bank robber in the world, Sal and the possibly in one of his most unforgettable performances, the portrayal of Sonny’s “other wife” Leon by Chris Sarandon (Curran 93-4; Daniel, and Jackson 135). And the many others all added to the cavalcade of this consciousness raising experience. However, the nature of Pacino’s performance and the amount of empathy he was able to invoke from the audience was the primary catalyst for their almost subconscious acceptance of an alternate view of the traditional leading man in the cinema. Dog Day Afternoon was made and released in 1975-76 during a time when countercultures and counterrevolutionaries were still on a rise from the sixties. In fact, it was probably even more acceptable now to mainstream audience who by this point had been exposed to the cold war and Fidel Castro and Hippies as well as the social reforms of civil rights movement that occurred throughout the sixties and is still occurring. This expression of a new masculinity challenges the traditional American emphasis on the hard hitting hero with a heart of gold, so to speak. Here in this film ther are certainly notions of some sexual liberation from gender stereotyping. (Powers, Rothman, and Rothman 61) In a sense, most art, film, literature, etc. have a tendency to push the envelope of the cultures mind and gradually expose their audiences to a new attitude and more expansive ideas of what human being are supposed to be and what they can and should be capable of. Dog day Afternoon gives us an alternate viewpoint, a somewhat more blurry line between the criminal and the hero, the leading man and the sensitive male, so that the audience sees how it is possible to cheer for someone who may not be the cowboy with the white hat and cetrtainly not the typical hero of a tale. There are certainly a number of anti-Establishment messages within the film. Prior to movies like this on the character flaws of the criminals were usually blamed on personal tragedies, bad upbringings, but rarely did they blame the causation on social ills as dose Dog Day Afternoon. “In more recent films, the larger society is very likely to be implicated as the cause of misconduct and the criminals are often perceived as tragic victims.” (Powers, Rothman, and Rothman 112) Masculinity and the typical hero as it used to be portrayed now undergoes a substantial change as well. Certainly In the 1960’s there were more and more movies that portrayed the lives of homosexuals. However, most typical of the genre were films such as The Boys in the Band, Sunday, Bloody Sunday, Midnight Cowboy, etc., all had gay men as major characters. (Bronski 106) Prior to this film and this period there was a standard role of male masuclinty in the culture and in films. Know as “heterosexualized masculinity” (Heasley 111). There had been very little intrest, even hesitancy for people to try to find the value or need to experience other way of bing masculine aside from the amch interpretation that had been prevalent. The “tough guy” mentality had roots stretching far back into the past and was seldom assailed. “It is a case of not being able to see the trees due to the assumptions made about the forest as one construction-that all straight males are the same, in terms of gender and their experience of sexuality.” (Heasley 111). Neither Sonny nor Sal are the typical bank robbers that audiences were used to from the days of James Cagney of Humphrey Bogart. These hardboiled and intelligent and very, very macho criminal minds are no where to be found in Dog Day Afternoon. From the beginning they do not seem like excessively violent criminals and feel a certain amount of sympathy for their victims. In fact Sonny has been called the sweetest bank robber in cinematic history, if not the least competent. As the movie unfolds we find that he has one wife who seems bent on destroying him in good company with his mother, yet we understand that the has a fundamental love for his children which the audience can certainly sympathize with. This coupled with his apparent non-violent nature creates a great deal of emotional connection with the character. (Eskridge 2419) Once the audience is hooked, however, the film discloses Sonny’s real motives for committing this crime. “Robbing the bank out of free choice, Sonny makes a world-class bad decision that leads to death for his sad sack partner in crime (John Cazale) and a lengthy prison term for himself.” (Rafter 59) The following is another set up for the audience to help them to stand the idea of preconceived notions and prejudices on their head. During the course of the crime, Sonny releases the bank guard because he is having trouble breathing, possibly because of a heart attack as he is an older gentleman. This act of compassion helps to further align Sonny with the sympathetic audience. However, the Police assume that the security guard has been conspiring with the criminals when he is released. Why do they make this assumption, because he happens to be black! (Powers, Rothman, and Rothman 185) This presumption by the authority figures in the movie rocks the audience’s subconscious prejudices, making them even more willing to accept Sonny and his non-traditional masculinity in the film. Prior to this, "Most American movies continued to treat gay characters as sissy boys and butch women, but other (mostly European) movies depicted more normal gay characters." (Eskridge 2425) Some critics feel that this multi-faceted films many plot twists and turns has a tendency to overwhelm. Between the commission of the crime, the homosexual inferences and overtures, along with the bumbling nature of the police force and the media frenzy which involves the no only the crowd around the bank but the TV reporters as well, are all to much and possible even cancel each other out. (Jameson 847) Yet enough members of the audience seem compelled to take it all in and understand and sympathize with Sonny throughout most of the film. Identifying with something more than just those varying parts and somehow create a whole defined character that somehow appear to be reasonable and reacting in some coherent manner amidst all the insanity of the production. However, some critics have felt that Dog Day Afternoon is quite an important diversion from the norm and holds a special place in the changing annals of film. “Dog Day Afternoon provides the ideal transition from Thunderbolt and Lightfoot to the gay-themed movies of the 80’s, combining as it does dropout bank robbers with explicitly gay characters. " (Wood 209) Although this movie certainly is not without some prejudicial flaws, after all Sonny is still a criminal and this still reconfirms the notion for some that homosexuality is a deviant behavior that spawns more deviant behavior. Here the audience has to balance in their minds Sonny’s first heterosexual marriage and his other homosexual marriage which seems irresolvable in their minds. Yet Pacino’s portrayal of a more open and wide ranging masculinity wins out through most of the film. This “deviant” behavior has also been portrayed in such films as Midnight Cowboy (1969), M*A*S*H (1970), and Carnal Knowledge (1972) where misogyny was perhaps as deviant as homosexuality, yet more socially accepted. Keeping perhaps their own feeling of confused masculinity below the surface and expressing itself in more violent or debasing attitude towards women. “Even Dog Day Afternoon’s (1975) sympathetic bisexual protagonist is delimited by his criminal status.” (Cohan, and Hark 196) There also some changes in the sympathies that occur between the crowd surrounding the bank and with the film audience as well, when Sonny’s true intentions for the robbery are finally revealed. When it is exposed that Sonny is trying to get money for a sex change operation for his other wife Leon, and Leon is then introduced into the scene, things change. In a sense it turns the event from a sympathetic, anti-establishment romp with the crowd chanting “Attica, Attica, Attica,” along with Sonny to a crowd with very detached emotional state. Turning it into what some feel was a freak show, a spectacle and loosing some of its powerful momentum. Audiences seeing the film when first released are reported by critics to have cooled greatly when this was revealed (Wood 209) In fact, by keeping Sonny and Leon apart throughout the entire film this spares the yet to be liberated views of the spectator by not having them actually see any close contact between the two lovers. In a sense the filmmaker seem to actually desxuali9ze the characters in this way by using distance to objectify the experience for the audience. This then goes to further redefine the role of masculinity as possibly being sexless in this aspect. (Wood 210) This was done to perpetuate the sympathy of the characters. However, today’s audience might still hold onto the sympathy now. The role of the male as provider is also given and interesting twist in this film. Sonny not only tries to provide for his children, but also for his other wife Leon in the form of getting him the operation he so greatly desires. One of the more interesting items about this film is that it was based on a true event. After reading an article in Life magazine entitled, “The Boys in the Bank” which retell the story of John Wojtowicz along with an accomplice, really named Sal, both attempted to rob the Chase Manhattan bank in Brooklyn, NY in 1972. Wojtowicz served 14 years of a 20 year sentence for the crime, his partner Sal, as in the film, was killed during the robbery. The photo on the next Page certainly makes the choice of Al Pacino for the part even more of an obvious choice. (Kluge & Moore 12) Photo #1 : John Wojtowicz Dog Day Afternoon did win the Academy Award that year for best screenplay and was nominated for Best Picture, Best Director, Best Actor, Best Supporting Actor (Sarandon) and Best Editing. It also won the Writers guild Award (WGA) for best Drama written directly for the screen. (Curran 93-4) This film has helped to increase the range of both masculinity and femininity that is portrayals on the screen. It has help to remove restriction on type and create better rounded and certainly more interesting portrayal of heroes and villains as well. Works Cited Bronski, Michael. Culture Clash: The Making of Gay Sensibility. Boston: South End Press, 1984. Cohan, Steven, and Ina Rae Hark. Screening the Male: Exploring Masculinities in Hollywood Cinema. London: Routledge, 1993. Curran, Daniel. Guide to American Cinema, 1965-1995. Westport, CT: Greenwood Press, 1998. Daniel, Lisa, and Claire Jackson. The Bent Lens: A World Guide to Gay & Lesbian Film. Crows Nest, N.S.W.: Allen & Unwin, 2003. Eskridge, William N. "A Jurisprudence of "Coming Out": Religion, Homosexuality, and Collisions of Liberty and Equality in American Public Law." Yale Law Journal 106.8 (1997): 2411-2474 Heasley, Robert. "Chapter 5 Crossing the Borders of Gendered Sexuality: Queer Masculinities of Straight Men." Thinking Straight: The Promise, the Power, and the Paradox of Heterosexuality. Ed. Chrys Ingraham. New York: Routledge, 2004. 109-129. Jameson, Fredric Class and Allegory in Contemporary Mass Culture: Dog Day Afternoon as a Political Film. Mass Culture, Political Consciousness and English Studies National Council of Teachers of English. 38.8, (Apr., 1977), pp. 843-859 Kluge, P.F. and Thomas Moore. "The Boys in the Bank." Life. (September 22, 1972). 73.12. Powers, Stephen, David J. Rothman, and Stanley Rothman. Hollywood's America: Social and Political Themes in Motion Pictures. Boulder, CO: Westview Press, 1996. Rafter, Nicole. Shots in the Mirror: Crime Films and Society. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2000. "Sarandon's 'Law'." The Washington Times 10 Nov. 2004: B06. Ingraham, Chrys, ed. Thinking Straight: The Promise, the Power, and the Paradox of Heterosexuality. New York: Routledge, 2004. Wood, Robin. Hollywood from Vietnam to Reagan-- and Beyond. Expanded ed. New York: Columbia University Press, 2003. Read More