Dog Day Afternoon

So sleepy today. Tuesdays and Wednesdays are night where I'm not home until after 9pm, and it's just such a long day. I'm so beat by the time I put my film on, you know? I know a lot of people have seen this movie already, so I'm not going to go too crazy with it. I watched Dog Day Afternoon tonight, directed by the awesome Sidney Lumet in 1975. I actually own this movie on Blu-ray, even though I never saw it until today. It was one of those things where I knew I was going to have to watch it for the project, and I knew that everyone else I knew loved it, so I figured it was probably worth picking up. I'm so glad that I did! It's a really great film.

I love movies like that, that are just full of the best, natural pacing and great acting. I just feel like Lumet knew how to bring out the best in his actors, and it's so cool to see more of his work.

Scarface

I always seem to have the hardest time writing about famous movies. I think it's because I've already read and heard so much about them, that I feel like there's not so much left to say that's new. It's hard to go into a movie as infamous as Brian De Palma's 1983 Scarface and look at it fresh, even if you haven't seen it. You know the movie just because of popular culture, and you take that with you when you watch it.

I can't remember the last time I saw this movie, and I loved watching it again today. It's so over the top and so different than most crime movies. Pacino is so incredible. He has such a great range as an actor that during this movie it almost looks physically impossible that he is the same person who later put on big glasses and a cardigan for You Don't Know Jack (Ebert reminded me of it today on Facebook, as he has just watched it). There are way too many actors who just succeed on playing similar characters, often themselves. It can be funny for a while, but I get sick of it quickly, and it's always so great to see an actor really lose himself in a role like this.

The Godfather

This post, for the record, is only about the first movie in The Godfather trilogy - I have to watch Part II in a few months, but never Part III, which everyone hates. The Godfather is the father of all good mafia movies, directed in 1972 by Francis Ford Coppola. It basically created the style of mafia movies that most of us are so familiar with - where we see the mafia from an insider's perspective, and we feel a lot of sympathy for the characters. Pretty much all mob movies that do this are indebted to Coppola's film. The characters are evil people, but we care for them, somehow. I'm going to assume, perhaps wrongly, that most people have seen this film and know the basis of the plot. If not, head over here to read it.