Sidney Lumet, director of 12 Angry Men, Dog Day Afternoon, Serpico, Network, The Verdict, and Before The Devil Knows You’re Dead, passed away today. He was 86 years old, and died in New York City, the place he defined over his film career.
I’m embarrassed to admit it, but I first heard of Lumet not through his films but through his book, Making Movies, which I was assigned in my first film class as a college freshman. I had heard of Lumet‘s impressive resume, but had not seen a Lumet film. Though we weren’t required to, I read Making Movies from cover to cover. Still today whenever someone asks me what book I would recommend for a beginner film student, I will tell them Making Movies. I even passed my battered, dog-eared copy on to my cousin, who is interested in attending film school next year.
After reading his book — in which Lumet used his own experiences to delve into the process of making his legendary films — I tackled viewing his entire body of work in short order. Hundreds of films are released a year, but I doubt that you will ever find more than a handful as good as Lumet‘s best. 12 Angry Men tackled prejudice when it was totally ingrained in American culture, and he made Dog Day Afternoon when it was unheard of to make a film about homosexuals, particularly in a sympathetic light. Perhaps his most influential film, however, is Network, which is a chillingly accurate portrayal of the television news industry that was shockingly ahead of its time.
Lumet‘s output slowed toward the end of his life, but his final film is among his best: 2007’s Before The Devil Knows You’re Dead explores the effects greed and drug addiction have on a family and the lengths with marvelous performances by Philip Seymour Hoffman, Ethan Hawke, Albert Finney, and Marisa Tomei. Like many Lumet‘s films, it was named to numerous critics’ top ten lists.
Lumet joins the unfortunately long list of amazing directors who never received an Academy Award for Best Director. Lumet was nominated four times (for 12 Angry Men, Dog Day Afternoon, Network, and The Verdict) but never won, like Alfred Hitchcock, Robert Altman, Cecil B. DeMille, Stanley Kubrick, Howard Hawks, and Arthur Penn (among others). He received an honorary award instead, which he received in 2005 from Al Pacino, pictured above. Lumet directed Pacino in Dog Day Afternoon and the real-life story of New York City police corruption, Serpico.
Hopefully, Lumet‘s death will bring a new surge of interest in his body of work, which is often overlooked in comparison to his fellow New York filmmakers Martin Scorsese, Woody Allen, and Spike Lee. If you haven’t caught up the man’s films, take some time tomorrow to view one or two. You won’t regret it.
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