Full Cast And Crew

In the second of my two-parter on Dog Day Afternoon, we get out of the fictional universe of the film and explore the real people behind the characters shown onscreen.
John Wojtowicz' life proved truly stranger and more depressingly pedestrian than fiction. So much so that he preferred the fictional version of himself and performed that role for the rest of his life after being released from prison in 1978 until his death in 2006.
The LIFE Magazine article that caught the attention of Pacino's producer and manager.
A very good jailhouse interview with John Wojtowicz from the Village Voice's Cliff Jahr.
The excellent documentary Based on a True Story: Dog Day Afternoon by the Dutch filmmaker Walter Stokman.
The documentary that covers more of the end of John's life, The Dog.
Pierre Huyghe's installation video art piece Third Memory, an indispensable part of understanding memory, film, and the roles we perform.
I didn't get to this in the podcast but here's an unpublished essay John wrote to the NY Times reviewing the film.
1978 Washington Post profile of John, freshly out of prison.

Sidney Lumet's 1975 masterpiece of naturalistic filmmaking is many things: a bank robbery procedural, a time capsule of 1970's NYC political and economic movements, a groundbreaking cinematic portrayal of a leading gay character, and maybe the most Brooklyn film of all time.
In Episode 1 of my two-parter, I do the usual deep dive into the hows and whys of the ways in which the film still lands emotionally and experientially for viewers today.
In Part 2, I'll delve into fact vs fiction, digging into the real Sonny and Sal as well as exploring some of how the real-life protagonist of the robbery began to live the version of events shown onscreen...and even came to embellish the facts far beyond the realm of plausibility.
It's an incredible true story that makes you wonder what's stranger: fact or the fiction spun from it?

[the week's collected thoughts]
Climbing Docs I recommend:
The Dark Wizard (HBO)
Assault on El Capitan (Prime)
Fine Lines (Prime)
The Alpinist (Prime)
Valley Uprising (Prime)
The Summit (Prime)
Meru (Prime)
The White Mountain (Prime)

In the second of my infrequently recurring series, Sacred Cows, I'm taking a look anew at Star Wars, The Empire Strikes Back, and Return of the Jedi.

Wrapping up the South Beach sojurn into the world of Miami Vice (at least until the Michael B Jordan/Austin Butler film 'Miami Vice 85' comes out next year) with a revisit of Michael Mann's 2006 film. Mann started from a place of "what if we did Miami Vice for real"...real grimy drug-dealing procedurals, real violence and treachery, the real cost of undercover work. And what if we filmed it during the summer in Miami, during Hurricane Season?  All that and more went into the vibes.
The pleasures of those vibes are refreshingly present in the film when viewed through today's lens.