The Story Archive

Dog Day Afternoon

Sidney Lumet · 1975 CE · Film · Modern / American · Contemporary

Two men walk into a Brooklyn branch bank on an August afternoon to take the vault and find it nearly empty, and within an hour the street is closed, the building is surrounded and the hostages are sending out for food. The louder of the two works the crowd from the doorway and turns the siege into television. Lumet used no score and shot in sequence, from a robbery that had drawn the same crowds.

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Attributes

Genre
Crime / NoirTragicomedy
Theme
Individual vs SocietyFame & GloryLove
Archetype (Jung / Campbell)
Anti-HeroEverymanScapegoat
Plot structure
Siege / Last StandSingle Day
Symbol / motif
The CityThe Screen
Conflict
vs Societyvs Person
Mode / tone
RealistIronic
Culture / tradition
Modern / American

Closest analogues