BONUS Marc on Movies - Dog Day Afternoon
Guest:So, Dog Day Afternoon.
Guest:Yeah, man.
Guest:You watched it?
Guest:I did.
Guest:I mean, I watched it again after not having seen it for maybe about 20 years.
Guest:I was trying to figure out the last time I watched it.
Guest:I think it was about 20 years ago.
Marc:I couldn't figure out one the last time I watched it.
Marc:But again, not unlike I've been talking about on the show proper that there are these things I'm watching.
Marc:And I realized that there's so much I just didn't pay attention to.
Marc:Like, I couldn't have encapsulated the story of that film prior to seeing it again last week.
Marc:Like, I would have said, yeah, he he had hostages and, you know, but I didn't remember the ending.
Marc:I didn't remember the beginning.
Marc:Like, it just stuck in my head as Pacino.
Marc:you know, doing the thing outside.
Marc:But I couldn't remember, or it never really sunk in, or I didn't pay attention to properly, you know, the nuance of that movie.
Guest:What made you pick it up?
Guest:You just decided, oh, I haven't watched this in a while.
Marc:No, we were in a hotel room, and it was on Turner Classic Movie.
Marc:Oh.
Marc:And, you know, it was just starting.
Marc:So I'm like, fuck it.
Marc:We can't lose with this.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:With Dog Day Afternoon.
Marc:But essentially what's drawing me into it is...
Marc:My belief that Pacino, you know, out of all of that second generation method guys, is probably the best one.
Marc:And also, he's the one that can still kind of do it when he wants to.
Marc:Like, he's willing to take risks with vulnerability.
Marc:I talked to Jessica Chastain about this, I believe, a little bit.
Marc:And...
Marc:But to see him like that, you know, kind of raw and utterly, you know, vulnerable and emotionally erratic, you know, when you compare that to The Godfathers or to Serpico or anything that he was, you know, outside of Injustice for All, which I think he was in the same spectrum, but still more controlled.
Marc:Like this character is...
Marc:is emotionally complicated, and it's never overwrought, given the circumstance.
Marc:And it's so clear that the actors within the bank, and certainly out in front of the bank, he really had run of the place.
Marc:I mean, the blocking was minimal.
Marc:They were shooting it from medium to long shots almost always.
Marc:And I don't know how much of it was necessarily improvised.
Marc:A lot.
Marc:Oh, really?
Guest:Yes.
Guest:As far as I know, the general structure was there.
Guest:It was a full script.
Guest:It was not an improv script, but they were told to be as naturalistic as possible and take it where they wanted.
Marc:And this is 1970... Filmed in 74.
Guest:Right.
Guest:It came out in 75.
Marc:And this is a classic, you know, although somewhat sublime...
Marc:70s movie.
Marc:I mean, this is... Absolutely.
Marc:An antihero, and it doesn't end well.
Guest:It's not just... I would go one further, and it's a classic, transcendent, 70s New York movie.
Guest:Totally.
Guest:It's very specific to New York City.
Marc:And all the players are like guys you know from the movies.
Marc:And yeah, it's definitely New York at the time.
Marc:And I think what...
Marc:In seeing it again, how many of the issues, you know, this is the beginning of gay rights or just shortly after, I don't know when Stonewall was, but it's got to be right around there.
Guest:Shortly after, yeah.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:And, you know, that element, which is almost in passing where the gay rights protesters sort of take him on as a hero, it's a relevant movie still.
Marc:It does not...
Marc:It's not dated in many ways emotionally, but it's dated because of the technology available and that the entire thing would never have played out like that.
Marc:Sure.
Guest:But that's like it's like once you you understand the context of the tools they had.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:The emotions are exactly current.
Guest:Like there's nothing about it that is old.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:And and also what I didn't really realize is how much comedy is in it.
Marc:You know, oddly, it from the get go, it is a comedy.
Marc:Yes.
Marc:That right away, like, and I didn't remember this on first viewing, the third gunman just sort of like, I can't do this.
Guest:And that was real.
Guest:That was what really happened.
Guest:I'm sure.
Guest:They took a thing that was, you know, the actual facts of the case and realized like the, I mean, throughout the movie, they do this.
Guest:They realized the.
Guest:The humor or the absurdity or the human foibles in what was happening for real in the moment.
Marc:But I think that, you know, that's why Pacino is so amazing in it is that, you know, the gunman leaves and there's no money in the bank and he's got like seven women.
Marc:And, you know, and a kind of, you know, impotent security guard and a bank manager.
Marc:So right away, there's there's no winning.
Marc:And it's comedic because the truck already came to get the money.
Marc:And immediately within within 10 minutes, these women know that he's not going to hurt them.
Marc:They don't know about Saul, but they know that Pacino fundamentally is way over his head in every way.
Marc:And given as the movie progresses and you see his relationship with women and his mother and his wife, that he...
Marc:That moment where he goes, who else needs to go to the bathroom?
Marc:It's fucking over, man, for that guy.
Guest:Right.
Guest:Right.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And because of that, that's fairly early in the film.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And it was something I noticed this time watching it, that when you are aware of what's going to happen, when you know how the movie plays out.
Marc:Yeah.
Guest:The pathos of those early scenes are almost unbearable to watch.
Guest:It is so uncomfortable to watch this guy who you know is actually a sensitive soul, who is not a maniac, a lunatic, a bad guy by any means, and watch him try to get out of this terribly stupid situation he's put himself through and do it with an amount of grace and humanity toward the people he's with.
Guest:His desire to be liked.
Guest:By the people around him.
Guest:And to tell that bank manager that he's okay with him.
Guest:His almost childlike yearning for Charles Durning to be nice to him.
Guest:I found myself so sad watching it this time.
Guest:And not because I was in any way...
Guest:not wanting it to end the way it ends.
Guest:It's just knowing how it's going to end.
Guest:This guy, and it's all Pacino, but the vulnerability and fragility of this character were almost too much for me to take.
Marc:But his fragility was sort of innate where John Cazale, um,
Marc:his vulnerability is dangerous, but he's painfully vulnerable.
Marc:But I think what really, and I noticed this in watching Paris, Texas and some of these other 70s movies, is there was no overriding.
Marc:I mean, you know, what unfolds is that, you know, with Pacino is that, you know, he's in a marriage that is a disaster.
Marc:He's got two kids.
Marc:His wife is completely overbearing and panicked.
Marc:His mother is completely overprotective.
Marc:But none of that is really said.
Marc:And, you know, he's playing this thing that this guy, whether he's sexually confused or overwhelmed or whatever, he's had to put together this emotional life that encapsulates all of that.
Marc:And then through his decision to rob this bank, for whatever reason, whether it was to get Leon money for a sex change or just to sort of like, there's always that premise in these bank robbery movies where, you know, it's like, hey, it's not your money.
Marc:It's insured.
Marc:It doesn't matter.
Marc:Why are you going to, you know...
Marc:But I just thought it was sort of amazing, the subtlety of the script.
Marc:And Durning, it's the best he's ever been.
Marc:It's arguably the best.
Marc:He's the greatest in it.
Marc:No, I mean, it's like, and you can tell he's riffing it, and he's out there, and he's sweating, and he's trying to manage his situation, and he's Charles Durning.
Marc:And the two of them going at it out in front of the bank is some of the greatest stuff I've ever seen in movies.
Guest:Well, and it's because there is a sense that no matter what is going on,
Guest:There's a hope.
Guest:There's a there's a kind of optimism in the sense that people can still reach people.
Guest:Right.
Guest:A person can talk to another person.
Guest:And let's just be people for a second here.
Guest:The minute that Charles Durning comes on the phone in the bank.
Guest:When he picks up the phone and the bank manager says, it's for you, and he realizes they're screwed, now all of a sudden somebody knows he's in there.
Guest:And he gets on the phone and you hear Durning's voice.
Guest:It's the first time in the movie that someone actually feels in control.
Guest:Because until then, whether it's the people in the bank, whether it's Pacino, whether it's John Cazale, everyone feels like they're barely holding on.
Guest:And now all of a sudden you get this guy on the phone and he's like...
Guest:What are you even doing in there?
Guest:What's going on in there?
Guest:And he's so calm.
Guest:And that feeling is taken away instantly because basically the entirety of the NYPD shows up to this small block in Brooklyn.
Guest:Like it is crawling.
Guest:Oh, like the fact that even back then in 1975, they were signaling very strongly about how bad over-policing is.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Right.
Guest:And how a delicate moment can be turned into just such a clusterfuck so fast by all of a sudden, boom, this like authoritarian dragnet shows up.
Guest:It's a very annoying movie about how humans under pressure can suddenly just crumble.
Marc:Right.
Marc:And then Durning all throughout the movie is just sort of like, put the guns down.
Guest:Yes.
Marc:He knows that if he could just do this by himself, he would fix it.
Marc:Right.
Marc:And I guess that's true from the get-go, having seen the movie.
Marc:But even if you don't, you kind of know that it's futile.
Marc:Yes.
Marc:From 10 minutes in, it's a lose-lose situation.
Guest:That's right.
Guest:As soon as institution gets involved, whether it's government, whether it's police, whether it's a bank, anything, the institution will stomp out humanity.
Guest:It will end their ability to talk to each other.
Guest:One of the very touching scenes in the movie is Durning talking to Chris Sarandon, who plays a transgender woman.
Marc:Yeah.
Guest:I mean, that was a transgender woman who was being told at the time in the language of the mid 70s.
Guest:Oh, you're a you're a woman trapped in a man's body.
Guest:Right.
Guest:You know, people chuckle at that.
Guest:But that's what we now understand that that is a trans woman who had not transitioned.
Guest:And because of that is the inciting incident of the whole crime.
Marc:Right.
Marc:I guess that is the incentive is to get her money for the operation.
Marc:Right.
Marc:And he was so fucking brilliant in it.
Marc:Chris Sarandon.
Marc:Yes.
Guest:Yes.
Marc:Like it was like everyone is so at the top of their game.
Marc:And the other point I wanted to make about, you know, not, you know, over explaining is that it's a very brief moment where you learn two things about Cazale.
Marc:And and Pacino's character is that, you know, you realize at some point that that Pacino's character, one, had worked in a bank that was clear, but he was in the military.
Marc:But we don't know in what capacity at all.
Marc:And this is just post or maybe towards the end of Vietnam.
Marc:Right.
Marc:I mean, it's the actual incident happened in 1972.
Marc:So and then you learn, you know, again, in the same way in passing that Cazale was in prison.
Guest:Yes.
Yes.
Marc:And that, you know, and because of the way those guys acted and the nature of the craft that they were involved in, which is method, you know, they acted the fuck out of that without having exposition behind them.
Marc:You know, the nature of Cazale's hopelessness and his...
Marc:Your willingness, it seemed at some point I love that's one of my favorite moments in the movie, but his willingness to kill.
Guest:Yes.
Marc:Was that it was it was driven by not wanting to go back to prison.
Marc:Right.
Marc:Right.
Marc:And also, you know, when he when his attitudes about women unfold later, you know, he is like that performance is is something transcendent.
Marc:You can't even wrap your brain around it.
Marc:The focus of of of that.
Guest:And Pacino brought him into the film.
Guest:He probably would never have been looked at otherwise because the actual part was supposed to be a much younger man.
Guest:He was supposed to probably be about the age of that other kid who bails, right?
Guest:The one you mentioned, the guy who leaves right away.
Guest:And Pacino, you know, was in theater with John Cazale.
Guest:They were, you know, acting partners for quite a while.
Guest:Then they're in The Godfather together.
Guest:And he said, you know, no, no, this should be the guy.
Guest:And he was absolutely right.
Marc:And also, this is one of those movies where, in a different way than people talk about, like we talked about with that guy who wrote that book.
Marc:What's his name?
Marc:The New York film book?
Marc:Jason Bailey, yeah.
Marc:New York City plays an essential role in this movie.
Guest:Yeah.
Marc:The people of New York in a way that is different than the city architecturally or the city in tone or in restaurant or whatever.
Marc:Those are New Yorkers who are just sort of like, it's hot out.
Guest:What's happening?
Guest:Right.
Guest:Well, I'm interested that you said you turned it on in the hotel room.
Guest:Did you turn it on after the opening sequence?
Guest:Like, did you watch the very opening?
Marc:What happens?
Marc:I think I did.
Marc:Yeah.
Guest:It is just a montage of different things happening in the city.
Guest:And it basically is the that's the credit sequence.
Guest:And you're seeing it's a brilliant short film in and of itself because it's showing everything that was that city at the time, which it really still is in the sense that there were.
Guest:there were massive class distinctions, right?
Guest:You see a shot of like someone on a rooftop pool, like a kid's jumping in a pool that has the city skyline in the background, and then a shot of homeless people, right?
Guest:Or you see people at a nearby park playing tennis, like it looks like a professional tennis camp, right?
Guest:And then you're seeing shots of, you know,
Guest:blue-collar workers, like, trying to do construction.
Guest:And the idea that none of it is underlined or it's not made to make you feel like there's something sinister about it, it's just showing this is where this movie is going to take place, naturalistically, almost documentary style.
Guest:And this is what this place is.
Guest:It's a powder keg.
Guest:It's a pressure cooker.
Guest:And it's hot.
Guest:It is the dog days of summer.
Guest:Like...
Guest:The idea that anything kind of graceful and easy can happen is thrown out the window right away.
Guest:Right when you see, oh, this is how people here have to live.
Guest:It's tough.
Guest:It's not easy.
Marc:Right.
Marc:But also there is that weird zone because having lived in New York for years that in the middle of summer, it's sluggish.
Marc:Yes.
Marc:Right.
Right.
Marc:that it may be a powder keg, but everyone's kind of moving at half kilter.
Marc:You know, there is that weight of that humidity, and you feel it in the way he shot it.
Marc:You know, with the air conditioner issue, but also, you know, darning sweating, everyone's sweating.
Marc:But the great thing about the New York...
Marc:representation in the form of the crowd was that as the movie goes on, you find that there was as many detractors as there were supporters.
Marc:You did have the gay rights people, but some people were mad at Sonny.
Marc:But for the most part, no matter how they felt, while the thing was going on, they're like,
Marc:Hey, look, there he is.
Marc:He's out.
Guest:What's going on?
Guest:You know?
Guest:Well, so to me, that's the most New York part of the movie.
Guest:And it's the most that I relate to from my childhood because that was what I encountered every day.
Guest:Like the TV news, when he does that TV interview.
Guest:with the guy, you know, the guy calls into the bank and it's a live shot on TV.
Guest:He can see himself on TV because they're filming from outside.
Guest:So he's getting excited about being on TV.
Guest:And like, that was what I was raised on.
Guest:Like channel four news and live at five and they would have some New York City folk hero who did, like whether it was like a guy who did something amazing or some total psychopath like Bernie Getz.
Guest:This was what got into the bloodstream of New York because of so much time in the 70s of the city being on the brink.
Guest:Right.
Guest:So there was always this pull of like, well, this city is owned by the people.
Guest:The people are going to control this.
Guest:Like Gerald Ford may say drop dead to us, but we're going to survive like the end.
Guest:And they're going to do it at their own hand.
Guest:And so like to have a guy like this on the TV with his like feral street smarts coming through where he's immediately justifying why this is an OK thing to do, how hard it is to live on the salary of like a non-union job.
Guest:And like the news anchors got no real answer for it.
Guest:Like that's how New York City heroes were made.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:That's how like Donald Trump was allowed to survive despite being like, you know, a rich real estate scumbag because he had that kind of New York street grit that people were like, yeah, guys, one of us.
Guest:Yeah, I get it.
Guest:You know?
Marc:It's weird.
Marc:It cuts both ways that that vibe, you know, like, you know, there's a toughness to it, but not like like what you're saying about New York.
Marc:We're going to New Yorkers are going to handle New York.
Marc:But they also took care of people, too.
Marc:There was a sort of a consideration, a politeness, a very quick reflex to help somebody to get into the action for better or for worse.
Marc:But I find my experience there was more for the better.
Marc:No one in New York is going to let somebody do something shitty on the street without somebody stepping in.
Marc:But I mean, you told me that your dad was there?
Guest:Yes, he was there because he was the English teacher at the nearby high school.
Guest:You can actually see the high school in some shots in the background.
Guest:It's right at the end of that street.
Guest:And he was the English teacher who ran the drama department.
Guest:And so they came to the school and said, can you provide extras?
Guest:And so, yes, I'm sure he could point out certain kids in the crowd scenes, you know, teenagers that were his students.
Guest:I'm not sure that his physical background.
Guest:Bobby is on the screen at any given time.
Guest:But yes, he was one of the extras in the background.
Guest:And yeah, that I mean, that neighborhood is still intact.
Guest:I mean, the bank was never a bank.
Guest:It was a it was an abandoned laundromat that they turned into a bank for the film.
Guest:And it's now condos right there on the street.
Guest:But the street still, it's still, you know, kind of neighborhood like that.
Guest:Like if the same type of thing happened today right there, it would start to look exactly the same with the barricades and with people gawking.
Guest:And yeah, it was real.
Guest:It hits home.
Marc:So as the plot, you know, kind of unfolds, you know, these act points, which are kind of fascinating because everything, like you said, is done.
Marc:Lumet kind of was aware of,
Marc:Of maintaining this documentary vibe and to really let the city infuse the thing and to let there was always a bit of chaos on the periphery just because of the nature of the crowd, which I imagine were all those people were playing themselves to some degree.
Marc:But these plot points where you realize it becomes hopeless.
Marc:When Cazale, his character is sort of like, I'm ride or die here.
Marc:And Sonny Pacino's character realizes that there's probably no real way out.
Marc:So the demands of that era were always around, we need a plane, which never pans out.
Marc:There's never been a situation in any movie
Marc:where a guy demands a plane and that works out.
Marc:You know what I mean?
Marc:There's just, there's too many, it's just, but it was the only option.
Marc:And then you, like, at the same time where they realize it's hopeless and you realize that, that Cazale,
Marc:will kill people and that Sonny is now lost and he's making these demands, you know, they play along, you know, Durning as the cop plays along.
Marc:And then there's always that thing where, you know, you've got the detectives with the guns and you've got the regular officers with their guns.
Marc:And then there's always the FBI shows up and he's like, yeah, this is my, this is my game.
Marc:You let me handle this, you know, until he doesn't.
Marc:Right.
Marc:And,
Marc:And when that FBI officer, James Broderick, who is a 70s guy, you see him a lot of movies.
Guest:Yeah, Matthew Broderick's dad.
Guest:Oh, is it?
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:Yeah, he's great.
Marc:And also, I didn't realize that, and I learned two things this morning, that that was Dominic Ternay's, right?
Marc:Yeah, Uncle June.
Marc:Yeah, he plays Sonny's dad.
Marc:I only picked him out because of his voice.
Marc:Yeah, but dude, I didn't know he was Johnny Ola.
Guest:Oh, right, right.
Guest:Yes, yes.
Marc:In The Godfather 2, I mean, like, I always knew that guy as an actor, but I didn't make the connection that that was Uncle June.
Guest:Yeah.
Marc:Like, he was one of those New York 70s actors.
Marc:Yes.
Marc:He's in a few movies.
Marc:Same with the bank manager.
Marc:You see him playing a sweaty guy off that guy, Sully Boyer, and Carol Kane's there.
Guest:Yeah, Carol Kane, it's the same year she's nominated for an Oscar for Hester Street.
Marc:But anyway, there's a moment where things break down to the point where Durning has to surrender some control.
Marc:And James Broderick, as the FBI agent, comes in, right, unarmed, to make sure the hostages are okay.
Marc:And there's a moment there that I cannot forget, where he talks to Sonny, and then he looks at Cazale, and he says, Sol, you know, and there's a moment there where he clocks as an actor, without saying anything, that this guy can kill people.
Guest:Yes.
Yes.
Marc:And I think it's after that where he says, we'll take care of Saul.
Marc:Right.
Marc:To Pacino.
Marc:But that acting in that moment where what happens there, you know, how you doing, Saul, or whatever, where he's just sort of like, all right, this is a real problem.
Guest:This guy.
Guest:You've talked about that before of like the idea of being in front, like you personally being around someone who you know has killed someone.
Guest:You're like, oh, the energy is automatically different.
Guest:And what you're identifying there is an actor having to communicate, picking up on that vibe from another person who's just playing a killer, but to communicate that like, oh, I have figured it out in this silent moment that this guy can kill people.
Marc:You saw it, right?
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Yeah, oh, sure.
Guest:It's the whole reason why he thinks for that moment, the FBI agent, James Broderick, thinks, I can maybe convince Sonny to give up.
Marc:To throw this guy under the bus, too.
Guest:Yes, yes.
Guest:Because if I could just tell him that I'm on the same page knowing that that guy's a psychopath...
Guest:and maybe I can tip him.
Guest:And then Pacino gets mad and says, you think I'd sell him out?
Guest:But he still thinks about it for a second.
Marc:Right, but there's no indication that he would.
Marc:And it doesn't play that way.
Marc:But also the interesting thing is, now, by that point in the movie, most of the women who are hostages are kind of concerned about Sonny and concerned about the other women.
Marc:There's a real sort of...
Marc:community happening in that bank you know around these women like they're all sort of they yeah very quickly they all realize like oh we're you know these guys yeah we're in control still you know what i mean yes yeah they're you know like uh you know uh sonny's teaching them how to do the gun thing and you know it's it's all crazy but you know the slow burn of kazale
Marc:You know, just sitting there and you realize that all he's locked into as the type of actor he is, is that he's not going back to jail.
Marc:Right.
Marc:And you don't really know anything about that guy other than this is his last ride.
Guest:Right.
Guest:Well, and I do love that moment.
Guest:I think you were alluding to it where, you know, there's a point when the cops kind of first show up and Sonny's getting all panicky.
Guest:And he says, you know, if you don't back off, I'm going to start throwing bodies out the door.
Guest:Right.
Guest:It's just bluster.
Yeah.
Guest:And, and, and then Sal gets him to the side at one point.
Guest:And he says, you know, the, the thing you said about the throwing the bodies out, out the door, are you, did you mean that?
Guest:And, you know, Sonny says like, well, you know, you gotta, you know, gotta let these guys know, you know, we, we, we mean business.
Guest:And he says, cause, cause I'm ready to do it.
Marc:Yeah.
Guest:Meaning like he's ready to kill these people if he wants.
Guest:And you see that, that in that moment,
Guest:And Pacino does this amazing thing where he realizes that he is like the den mother now.
Guest:And he's got to do... And there's a point where he's actually even complaining about it to the bank manager.
Guest:Like all these things that he's got to do that he's like, you know, I got the air conditioning not working.
Guest:Now they need me to go out there and get the food for you guys.
Guest:And it's like...
Guest:It's this thing that keeps coming up in this motif in crime movies, whether it's about the mafia or whether it's just about low level criminals like this.
Guest:Like the work that is involved is so laborious.
Guest:And like he he's as much a working stiff in this movie as anybody else.
Guest:And he realizes it in different degrees.
Guest:Like in this degree, it's like, OK, all right.
Guest:Now I'm going to have to figure out how to make sure that my friend here doesn't murder everyone.
Marc:Yeah.
Guest:Okay.
Guest:And he's like, you see it churning in his head.
Guest:Okay.
Guest:All right.
Guest:I'm going to have to take care of this part.
Guest:Now I also have to go take care that they need to go to the bathroom.
Guest:All right.
Guest:I'll be right back.
Guest:Yeah.
Marc:And that they're coming around the back.
Marc:He's got to get the bank manager to move the thing.
Marc:And I, you know, because I didn't remember the ending, you know, it was all that the pace of the ending was very jarring to me and very surprising.
Marc:But the way he clocks the original driver, you know, as a cop.
Marc:Yes.
Marc:Was kind of great.
Marc:I mean, obviously he was going to be a cop.
Guest:Yes.
Marc:So he's going to drive all eight of these women and Saul, seven or eight, however many, and get Lance Hendrickson, who's always kind of a robotic creep.
Guest:Yeah.
Marc:The other FBI agent, he demands that he drives him.
Marc:And then because of the way it unfolds, you realize, well, that must have been their plan the whole time unless that other dude was going to do what Lance did.
Marc:Like they just were both...
Guest:Yeah, they had a double plan, right?
Guest:And what they were hoping was the kind of reverse psychology of it would make Sonny think, oh, they never wanted this laced up FBI agent to go.
Guest:They wanted this badass undercover cop to go.
Guest:And so it made Sonny think, well, I'm smart.
Guest:I figured this out.
Guest:Now the FBI agent is in there with him and that guy is a sharpshooter and he winds up ending everything very quickly.
Yeah.
Marc:It was all, like, but the fact that, and I think they do do this, but I don't know, but the fact that they, you know, they had to call Kennedy Airport.
Marc:They had to get everything in place.
Marc:They had the plane in place.
Marc:Everything was set up the way it was supposed to go, even with the FBI knowing, unless it was a conversation with the cops, you know, or whatever, we got to give him what he wants.
Marc:But everything was set up as it was supposed to be set up.
Marc:To what end, I don't know.
Marc:I guess it was really about...
Marc:You know, relaxing the hostages and making the criminals feel like they were in the homestretch.
Guest:I actually thought the whole point of it was it was like it's like a magician, you know, like a magician who's trying to do like a sleight of hand or something.
Guest:They'll do something several times innocuously and kind of get your guard down about it.
Guest:So then when they do it at the point where it actually turns the trick, you're not paying attention.
Guest:Lance Hendrickson, the FBI agent, does that with Sal by constantly telling him as they're driving, put the gun up so that if I hit a bump, you don't kill someone.
Guest:Right.
Guest:And so that way it's been it's been it's repetitive.
Guest:It's happened over and over again.
Guest:And then finally, at the moment where they're going to spring the trap, he says, all right, we're going to get out of here.
Guest:But Sal, can you point the gun in the air?
Guest:And as soon as the gun goes in the air, that's when they're able to grab the gun from Pacino.
Guest:And this agent is able to turn around and shoot Sal in the head.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:Point blank.
Guest:Yeah.
Marc:And from the secret compartment, because Pacino checked the car.
Guest:Right, right.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:And, and it also, it was also, you know, Cazale again, you know, the adjustment to being outside and being vulnerable on all sides, the way he played that, like he was re and also he had never flown before.
Marc:I mean, the vulnerability of that character at that juncture where like, you know, theoretically he couldn't have been more terrified about, you know, not about killing people, but about everything else.
Guest:Well, that's that amazing moment where one of the hostages gives him her rosary.
Guest:And it's like, Sal, I don't want you to be scared on your first plane ride.
Guest:That is crazy detail, dude.
Marc:I mean, I've never seen a movie in a way where you completely forget about the script of this movie.
Yes.
Guest:Well, OK, so I think there's here's here's the thing we haven't spoken about so far.
Guest:And this is the big reason why you forget about the script.
Guest:And it's one of the unspoken treasures of American cinema in the in the 70s was the vibrant and challenging and boundary pushing New York City theater scene.
Guest:that birthed almost everyone you see in this movie.
Guest:The woman who plays Sonny's mom, she was a major avant-garde theater actor in New York City.
Guest:The guy we just mentioned, the undercover cop who shows up in the limo.
Guest:He was a theater actor.
Guest:I mean, the woman who is the bank teller chief, she was an acting coach.
Guest:Like, that vibrant community was so important for these New York City movies especially, but just generally all the movies of the 70s and getting that, like, naturalistic style of acting that made you believe, okay, I'm watching people.
Guest:I'm watching a thing actually happen immediately.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:It's so important.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:And it was like, I was, it was so jarring the end because it was one of those, those seventies movies that, you know, easy riders and easy one, but even five easy pieces when he gets on that truck, you know, like there, you know, this one was more graphically, uh, uh, tragic and hopeless, uh,
Marc:But, you know, Sonny lives, and all the hostages get out of the car.
Marc:And they spared us, like, the trauma of being in that car when someone's brains are blown out.
Marc:You know, they, you know, that, I'm not sure, like, you know, they really kind of pass on that nuance when people are shot, just how much blood there is and how messy it is.
Guest:Yes.
Marc:But so, you know, it's tempered that, you know, you know Sonny lives and he's going to have to live with everybody he's going to live with.
Marc:And I think, you know, also the back and forth with Sonny's wife and Sonny's married and Leon and his mother.
Marc:And then, like, when they're at the airport and they're pulling...
Marc:You know, Saul's body out covered up and all the hostages are are are are are worked up, but they're all hugging and the sort of the community still exists and sunny.
Marc:There is the tragedy is tempered somehow.
Marc:And I think that was the nature of the 70s.
Guest:Well, and also it's very telling that they allow that movie a good, I didn't time it exactly, but it feels like maybe three to four minutes of like almost a sigh of relief that it's all over, right?
Guest:Like it does not rush you away from the hood of that car where Sonny has just been handcuffed.
Guest:It lets you just kind of stay there with him as he surveys everything that's happening on that tarmac.
Guest:And you see the kind of resignation in his eyes.
Guest:And 90% of that is just Pacino, right?
Guest:Doesn't he cry a little?
Guest:It's interesting.
Guest:Yeah, I can't say that he does or doesn't.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:In my mind's eye, I think it makes sense for both.
Guest:And I can't tell you one way or the other whether he did or not.
Guest:I know that he leaves it in a way where you are pretty sure that nothing's ever going to be easy for this guy.
Guest:And he knows it.
Guest:And he's going to live with that.
Marc:Well, yeah.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:Apparently the real guy, you know, did live with it and they tried to, apparently there was an attempt on his life because the inmates thought he threw Saul under the bus.
Guest:But yeah, I don't think that guy lived a very happy life.
Guest:I think he died like impoverished and somewhere in Brooklyn, I think.
Marc:Yeah, I think so, with his mother.
Marc:But, yeah, I mean, that space, like, I've been watching a lot of Mike Lee, very early Mike Lee stuff on the BBC, and the allowance for space around action is a real humanizer.
Marc:It's a real trick.
Marc:And I think it does take a certain type of actor to allow it to happen, and obviously more so a director.
Guest:Yes.
Guest:Well, and you have with Lumet being as good as he was and they'd worked together on Serpico.
Guest:Right.
Guest:So so, you know, they had a pattern down already.
Guest:But like the the the gift from heaven above to have an actor like Al Pacino handle that scene when he gets off the phone, first getting off the phone with Leon and then getting off the phone with his wife, these two completely different emotional levels.
Guest:that he's on where he's essentially saying goodbye to both of them, but in different ways.
Guest:And then it's, you know, I don't know, 90 seconds of virtual silence of Pacino just sitting there and having to register Sonny's utter defeat, just being totally pummeled down by the world and not getting what he wants and having to move on with that, move on knowing the next step's not going to be pleasant,
Guest:But, like, what am I going to do, put a gun to my head right now and pull the trigger?
Guest:He's not going to do that either.
Marc:And also, yeah, and also it speaks to this amazing kind of fragile, I don't know if I would say confused, but, you know, chaotically vulnerable violence.
Marc:male character, which you're never going to see that, that, you know, without, without over dramatizing that this guy, you know, whether he loved his wife or not, he was responsible to it.
Marc:It was clear that he loved his kids and whatever his relationship was with his mother, that was some other love.
Marc:And then the true love he had for this, for this trans person for Leon was something new and, and something he didn't understand or was overwhelmed by.
Marc:But he wasn't questioning it, you know, not in the context of the film, but to carry that emotional burden and to be at the edge of that kind of emotional chaos is an astounding character.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:as I said, there are, were, you know, the New York city theater scene contributed immensely to having a pool of actors who could, who you could reliably put in roles like this.
Guest:And, you know, John Cazale is a perfect example of what was, it's the famous like five for five, right?
Guest:Like he, he only had five movie roles and they're all amazing.
Guest:And his performances are great, but there is something about Al Pacino in this that was noticeable within the first time
Guest:two minutes of him being on screen that he is simultaneously a schlub and a movie star.
Guest:And there's just no, there's no explaining it.
Guest:Like it is, you can't, you can't just, uh, uh, train someone to be that and have that kind of charisma.
Guest:You can do all the method acting you want, but you're not going to come across as both, uh, a totally broken, uh, you know, uh,
Guest:barely respectable person.
Guest:And at the same time, feel the magnetism of being a star and he's able to do it.
Marc:That was his thing.
Marc:And I, and I think like, cause I think about this when I think about these guys and I've talked about it before that, you know, that as some of these method actors get older, they can really kind of rest on their sort of ticks and quirks and habits that,
Marc:that identify them as emotional expressionists.
Marc:But, you know, Pacino later in life, like I always go back to that Kevorkian biopic on HBO.
Marc:I mean, like he can really, you know, take the emotional risks, you know, in a very real way still if he wants to.
Marc:Or else he's just going to be like, hey, Harry, what are we at?
Marc:Yes!
Marc:Hoo-ha!
Marc:You know?
Guest:Yeah.
Marc:He can, he can hoo-ha his way through an entire movie now.
Guest:Well, it's almost like the, the, that he got, uh, it's like, it was like bad behavior that was rewarded.
Guest:Right.
Guest:Like, you know, like when he started doing that in, in the, in, you know, I think it was like.
Guest:Scent of a woman.
Guest:Well, Scarface was like the first one that really like tipped it off.
Guest:Right.
Guest:And then it's like he was Scarface and then he was in the Dick Tracy movie and he got like an Oscar nomination for that.
Guest:It's ridiculous.
Guest:But like it's encouraging all his like worst traits to the point where even a great movie like Heat, like the volume is turned up so loud on his performance in Heat.
Guest:It's almost comical.
Guest:Like it rides right to the line of being too much.
Marc:Yeah, well, that's what's interesting when you see him bring it down, you know, like, and like, I, you know, I think that, you know, De Niro can do it.
Marc:But like, I wonder, like, for me, and I've said it before, that the most...
Marc:you know, soft and vulnerable performance De Niro's had in the last 20 years is in that fucking movie, The Intern.
Marc:And I'll stand by that.
Marc:You know, it's not like I don't mind watching De Niro, but like he really, you know, he really found an emotional zone there that was sympathetic.
Marc:That's the other thing about Dog Day Afternoon is that everyone is sympathetic.
Marc:You know, they never go over, there's no, there's no villains in
Marc:And there, you know, the evil is is slippery.
Guest:To me, it's like the evil is pressure, the pressures of life.
Guest:Like that's there's and there's no getting around that.
Guest:That's just an ever present force that everybody's going to have to deal with.
Marc:Yeah, it was great watching it again.
Guest:Oh, well, I'm glad you suggested to watch it because I don't know.
Guest:It's like one of those movies that you think, well, yeah, I've seen it.
Guest:It's great.
Guest:I love it.
Guest:But it's really worth watching and kind of luxuriating in it over again.
Marc:We've got to watch things as a grown-up.
Marc:There's no way when you're 20 or whatever, you just have to watch it as a grown-up because your emotional spectrum has expanded to a point that it's fully formed.
Guest:well and a movie like this is so good i was thinking this in the first like 15 minutes of it is that if it wound up being a movie just about a bank robbery that was botched yeah it would be great yeah like it's so like the the details of actually like this screwed up robbery and how good it is and how like the the the tension of it and how well directed it is and the placement of people the the decision to shoot it on location is so brilliant
Guest:to basically eliminate any kind of barrier between the street and the bank, only the glass that they keep locking.
Guest:And, you know, if they had shot it in a studio, like shot the internal scenes in a studio and then cut to just like, okay, now we have external scenes where they're at the front.
Guest:No, you needed that camera inside the bank to be shooting out on the street so you could see that stuff and you feel like it's a unity and it's all one spot.
Guest:And if you're just watching it on that level, the basic level of like, this is a bank robbery movie, it's still fucking great.
Marc:Yeah, totally.
Marc:But what I'm noticing about a lot of these movies with this community you're talking about and with the Method guys is that, and the 70s in general, these are character studies.
Marc:They're character studies.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:the characters in these films are are equal to if not greater than the the storytelling you know that right that there's a premium put on the depth of these characters which i don't think you see anymore well and it's very that's very rooted in theatrical drama right there's a the the classical stage is a conduit of that yeah and
Guest:And, you know, that's why a lot of these people were from that that type of school.
Guest:And I think just for myself, like as I get older and, you know, tropes are tropes and you've seen things and you things kind of get patterns get repeated in that.
Guest:But, you know, it's never the same one person's reaction to something.
Guest:Right.
Guest:Like.
Guest:The way one person reacts to something is going to be different than the way another person reacts to it.
Guest:And so ultimately, like, that's what I care about when I'm watching something.
Guest:Like, how's a human being responding to this?
Guest:Like, what's the personal edge that I can take away from this?
Guest:Right.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And it's rich with that.
Guest:Well, you know, sometimes we talk about these things and you go, oh, I wonder what was actually popular at that time.
Guest:Did a classic movie like this get ignored for something that wasn't as good?
Guest:The five movies nominated for Best Picture that year, this is insane.
Guest:So it's Dog Day Afternoon.
Guest:Barry Lyndon, Jaws, Nashville, and the winner, One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest.
Guest:Good year.
Marc:That's crazy.
Marc:What a year.
Marc:Great.
Marc:Every movie great in its own way.
Marc:And some of them pretty classic.
Marc:constructed movies, but just done a little more.
Marc:And again, even Jaws is a character study, dude.
Marc:Absolutely.
Guest:Jaws is the most traditional Hollywood movie on that list.
Guest:And it still relies on the characters.
Guest:Yep.
Guest:All right, man.
Guest:Good job.
Guest:Well, good suggestion.
Guest:We should rely more on, you know, your hotel room viewing choices.
Guest:Hopefully they don't gut Turner classic movies by the next time you're doing that.
Marc:Yeah, I will.
Marc:Well, I'm in this zone where I'm doing I'm rewatching things so we can definitely find more of these.
Guest:Yes, let's find more of those.
Guest:And then next time you talk about movies, you'll be talking about them with Kit.
Guest:And I think you have one picked out, right?
Marc:Suspiria.
Marc:We watched it.
Marc:And I liked it as a horror movie more than I liked the other one so far.
Marc:All right.
Marc:Well, we'll find out why.
Marc:That's going to come up soon.
Marc:Okay, good.