15 Essential Movies For LGBT* Pride Month

Sidney Lumet's Dog Day Afternoon is perhaps the director's most brash and energetic film. Inspired by real life events, it recounts Sonny Wortzik's attempted bank robbery in order to pay for his transgender partner's gender-confirmation surgery.

Starring Al Pacino, following on from his star-making turn in The Godfather Part 1 and 2, it consolidated his status as one of the best actors of his generation in a role which critic Roger Ebert described as "one of the most interesting modern movie characters". Lumet effortlessly balances farcical elements with serious drama, with an anti-establishment subtext woven into the narrative.

While Sidney Lumet's movies are often tightly scripted, with Dog Day Afternoon he afforded the actors more breathing room to improvise their dialogue and insisted on shooting the film on location rather than constructing sets. Just as the heavily structured approach to Lumet's debut, 12 Angry Men, was entirely appropriate, the more freewheeling approach for Dog Day Afternoon lends the film its vitality.