Dog Day Afternoon

Sidney Lumet's 1975 Dog Day Afternoon provides a number of tremendous performances from the various actors, most notably a startlingly unwrinkled Al Pacino and the perhaps under-appreciated Chris Sarandon. One of the more moving moments in the film is exemplified by the look on Pacino's face and the proceeding change of general countenance when what Leon's saying - that he's terrified of Sonny, and doesn't want to be with him, and will become a woman without him - finally penetrates Sonny's wall of tension and violence and reaches understanding, and heartbreak. 

Afternoon refuses to make itself easily consumable for the viewer. What was Sonny's life like, how could he have maintained these two marriages and exploded into bank robbery, how and when did he discover his own homosexuality, how did the war effect him? What about Sal - clearly a product of Vietnam and a lacking education, why did the FBI kill him so immediately, so cleanly and easily, yet preserve Sonny? Why didn't Sonny and Sal commit suicide, when Sonny could clearly see what awaited him at the terminal? The film is two hours long, and takes place over a single afternoon and evening, yet it seems like the sped-up implosion of the little universe surrounding one man torn between his own various selves. Tragic.