Nearly five decades after its release, Al Pacino’s 1975 crime drama Dog Day Afternoon continues to stand among the most respected heist films in movie history.
The Sidney Lumet-directed film was recently ranked No. 2 among the greatest heist movies of all time by Collider, putting the classic alongside other major films in the genre.
Unlike many heist movies that focus on carefully planned crimes and successful escapes, Dog Day Afternoon centers on a robbery that quickly falls apart. The film turns a failed bank robbery into a tense hostage situation involving police, the media and a growing crowd outside the bank.
John Cazale as Sal and Al Pacino as the bank robber ringleader Sonny converse about their situation in the 1975 based on real-life movie, ‘Dog Day Afternoon,’directed by Sidney Lumet and shot on location in Brooklyn, New York.Photo by John Springer Collection/Getty Images
Pacino stars as Sonny Wortzik, a first-time bank robber whose desperate plan takes an unexpected turn. John Cazale plays his accomplice, Sal Naturile. The cast also includes Charles Durning, Chris Sarandon, Penelope Allen, Carol Kane, James Broderick and Lance Henriksen.
The film was directed by Lumet and written by Frank Pierson. Its story was based on the Life magazine article “The Boys in the Bank” by P. F. Kluge and Thomas Moore, per El Pais. The article covered the real 1972 robbery and hostage situation involving John Wojtowicz and Salvatore Naturile at a Chase Manhattan bank branch in Brooklyn.
Al Pacino Leads a Real-Life Bank Heist Story
Dog Day Afternoon follows Sonny and Sal as they attempt to rob a Brooklyn bank. Their plan goes wrong almost immediately. A third person involved in the robbery leaves, and Sonny discovers that the bank has already had its daily cash pickup.
With little money available, Sonny takes travelers’ checks and burns a register in a trash can. The smoke draws attention, and police soon surround the building. Sonny and Sal then find themselves trapped inside with the bank employees.
What begins as a simple robbery becomes a hostage standoff.
Police Detective Sergeant Eugene Moretti, played by Durning, tries to communicate with Sonny. The situation grows more complicated as television cameras arrive and crowds gather outside the bank.
One of the film’s best-known moments comes when Sonny shouts “Attica!” to the crowd. The reference connects the story to the Attica prison riot and adds another layer to Sonny’s conflict with authority.
The media attention becomes an important part of the story. As the crowd watches the events unfold, Sonny begins to attract public attention. The robbery becomes more than a crime scene. It becomes a live spectacle.
Roger Ebert’s review of the film also focused on this unusual relationship between criminals, hostages, police and television coverage. The presence of cameras changes how people behave, making the hostage situation feel like a public event.
At the center of it all is Sonny, a complicated character who does not fit the usual image of a movie criminal.
His reason for committing the robbery is eventually revealed. Sonny wants the money to help pay for his lover Leon’s gender reassignment surgery. At the same time, he is married to Angie and has children, creating a difficult personal situation behind the robbery.
That emotional conflict helped make Pacino’s performance one of the film’s defining strengths.
The movie’s reputation goes far beyond its 1975 release. Dog Day Afternoon was a major critical and box-office success and received multiple award nominations.
At the Academy Awards, the film received six nominations and won Best Original Screenplay for Frank Pierson. It also received seven Golden Globe nominations and six BAFTA nominations, with Pacino winning BAFTA’s Best Actor award and the film winning Best Editing.
Pacino’s performance as Sonny became one of the most celebrated parts of the movie. In 2006, Premiere ranked his performance as the fourth-greatest performance of all time.
The film itself also earned recognition from the American Film Institute. It ranked No. 70 on AFI’s 100 Years…100 Thrills list.
In 2009, Dog Day Afternoon received one of its highest honors when the Library of Congress deemed it culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant and selected it for preservation in the National Film Registry.
The film has also remained highly regarded by modern audiences and critics. Rotten Tomatoes lists a 94% Tomatometer score from 125 critic reviews, along with a 90% Popcornmeter score based on more than 100,000 ratings.
Its lasting reputation is also tied to the way it handles its characters. Rather than presenting the robbery as a stylish criminal operation, the film focuses on mistakes, pressure and the people caught in the middle.
That approach separates Dog Day Afternoon from the traditional heist formula. There is no perfectly executed plan. Instead, the story follows what happens when an inexperienced criminal makes one bad decision after another and becomes trapped by the situation he created.
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