Dog Day Afternoon (1975) and Public Existence

That's all they're interested in - it's a freak show to them.

It is scary how quickly you're turned into an idea or a concept by the public eye upon being thrust into public perception. How quickly they latch onto and reduce you to your basest parts. Sonny does not achieve great personal change at all across the duration of the film, himself remaining in stasis both physically (being stuck in the bank) and developmentally.

Yet the fickle mob of spectators waiting outside change their tune with every new piece of information they learn about Sonny. They whisper and mill around, waiting for a spectacle or thing they can attach a label (and then afterwards, an agenda) to. Sonny is subject to homophobic taunts and becomes a rallying figure for the queer community all at once through nothing but his own initial impulse to rob the bank in the first place. The mob is faceless and volatile, bouncing from one echoed public perception to the next, holding no personal values of their own. We see flashes of greed and bemusement, as a collective rather than as people.

Even the police are subject to the same public scrutiny, being stirred by the chants the mob echoes and by what would generally be considered morally right.

How quickly we cheer and then gawk at spectacle, mob sensationalism reduces people into points of interest. It is only upon leaving the periphery of the mob that man is free to do as he pleases.

Originally posted on Letterboxd on 17th March 2024