CD-Charts Position 1
Average Rating:

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Twelve Angry Men [1957]

starring: Henry Fonda, Lee J. Cobb, Martin Balsam, John Fiedler, E.G. Marshall
directed by: Sidney Lumet

Release Date March 19, 2001
I'd love to rate it five star as everyone else has done but it was just "too" contrived, although it was the object of the film. The mix of jurors was excellent and the way the characters interacted was superb but I felt that i) it wouldn't happen as conveniently as that in reality..ii) Lee J.Cobb capitulated too easily...iii) Fonda actually thought that the boy could've committed the murder...iv) the absence of any other suspect..
...v) if everybody's testament was flawed then not even Fonda's argument/reasoning was perfect? That said, it did enthral and showed how prejudiced our beliefs can be..but, by his analysis of human nature he could've acquitted Jack the Ripper....All in all a typical(though not at that time) lawyeristic case ... Read More:

CD-Charts Position 2
Average Rating:

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Paul Newman - Butch Cassidy And The Sundance Kid / The Hustler / The Verdict [1961]

starring: Paul Newman, Robert Redford, Jackie Gleason, Charlotte Rampling, Katharine Ross
directed by: George Roy Hill, Robert Rossen, Sidney Lumet

Release Date November 04, 2002
I'd love to rate it five star as everyone else has done but it was just "too" contrived, although it was the object of the film. The mix of jurors was excellent and the way the characters interacted was superb but I felt that i) it wouldn't happen as conveniently as that in reality..ii) Lee J.Cobb capitulated too easily...iii) Fonda actually thought that the boy could've committed the murder...iv) the absence of any other suspect..
...v) if everybody's testament was flawed then not even Fonda's argument/reasoning was perfect? That said, it did enthral and showed how prejudiced our beliefs can be..but, by his analysis of human nature he could've acquitted Jack the Ripper....All in all a typical(though not at that time) lawyeristic case ... Read More:

CD-Charts Position 3
Average Rating:

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Network [1976]

starring: Faye Dunaway, William Holden, Peter Finch, Robert Duvall, Wesley Addy
directed by: Sidney Lumet

Release Date March 17, 2003
It could have been a great film. It had all it needed to be a masterpiece. It debunked the old traditional boring television of our great grand parents, that television that was speaking all the time in order to bring us the truth, to teach us the true truth, to make us believe every word they said was absolutely inspiring and we had to be thankful and grateful for this new medium to be so effective in teaching us, in lifting us out of our ignorance. They treated television as a super book, an encyclopedia and they had not understood the slightest smallest element of what this medium was. They had not read Marshall McLuhan and when they had heard of him they thought he was trite, insignificant and purely ranting and raving. And they were going to learn ... Read More:

CD-Charts Position 4
Average Rating:

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Dog Day Afternoon - Special Edition [1975]

starring: Al Pacino, Charles Durning, James Broderick, John Cazale, Carol Kane
directed by: Sidney Lumet

Release Date February 13, 2006
Other reviewers have rightly singled out Pacino's performance as a career best, as Sonny, the twitchy eternal optimist ("We're going to make it, right?"), and also John Casale's haunting and haunted performance as Sal, the sad loner with a dog-like devotion to Sonny.

The essence of Pacino's performance is the brilliant balancing act between comedy and pathos, because he always plays the emotional truth of the moment, and lets the reaction come out of that. Improvisation is at the heart of his playing, and thirty years on it seems as fresh and "lived" as ever.

But it's also worth commenting on the superb ensemble playing in the beseiged bank between the two robbers and the bank staff held hostage. The director Sidney Lumet gives ... Read More:

CD-Charts Position 5
Average Rating:

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The Agatha Christie Collection (4 Disc Box Set)

starring: Geraldine Chaplin, Anthony Perkins, Michael York, Vanessa Redgrave, Albert Finney
directed by: Sidney Lumet

Release Date September 25, 2006
Wow!
THE Hercule Poirot himself (A.k.a. Sir Peter Ustinov) in action! That's really something to watch and fully enjoy! I think Ustinov was realy born for this role (so sad he passed away, but, anyway, we don't live forever). Together with "Appointment With Death" (another great DVD) can make you stick in your armchair for several hours, not worrying where did you put the remote...

CD-Charts Position 6
Average Rating:

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The Deadly Affair [1966]

starring: James Mason, Simone Signoret, Harry Andrews, Maximilian Schell, Lynn Redgrave
directed by: Sidney Lumet

Release Date November 06, 2006
The Deadly Affair is one of the better John Le Carre screen adaptations. Based on 'Call For the Dead,' the title's not the only name change: though he's called Charles Dobbs here, James Mason is really George Smiley while Maximilian Schell's character also undergoes a name change from The Spy Who Came In from the Cold because Paramount still owned the character names. Shot in 1966, when Britain seemed to be closed due to bad weather (a look made even grimmer by Freddie Young pre-exposing the film stock to mute the colours), Sidney Lumet's low-key and very small-scale thriller works much successfully on screen than you might expect. Where many LeCarres fail because, as someone once said, they're all plot and no story, this has at its heart a fairly good mystery ... Read More:

CD-Charts Position 7
Average Rating:

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Agatha Christie's Murder On The Orient Express [1974]

starring: Albert Finney, Anthony Perkins, Richard Widmark, Ingrid Bergman, Lauren Bacall
directed by: Sidney Lumet

Release Date January 07, 2008
The movie was made as a period piece. There are great scenes of the express, landscapes, food and other items. The costumes are also very plush. Even though the movie is star studded the actors to not out shine the characters they play.

As usual Hercule is in earshot of many private conversations that will be used later to his sleuthing advantage once processed by his little gray cells. On the train Hercule (Albert Finney) is approached by an American business man who tries to heir him for protection. Hercule turns him down and the next morning the business man is dead.

This movie has everything that makes Agatha Christie movies great. Everyone is a suspect. Everybody could have done it. Only Hercule Poirot can figure this out. Naturally Hercule ... Read More:

CD-Charts Position 8
Average Rating:

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Before The Devil Knows You're Dead [2007]

starring: Albert Finney, Ethan Hawke, Philip Seymour Hoffman, Michael Shannon, Marisa Tomei
directed by: Sidney Lumet

Release Date May 26, 2008
Sidney Lumet has made a lot of really good films - 'Fail Safe', 'Twelve Angry Men' - and lot of really not so great - 'Family Business', 'Q & A'.

Before the Devil knows You're dead is in the latter category, but near the top. It's a credit to the guy (and the film's underwriters) that an 83-year-old can make a picture like this, but it is inescapable that matters of tone went a bit awry.

I think Phillip Seymour Hoffman is great, but - in this - he feels a bit miscast. From the opening, graphic shot of him going at it with Marisa Tomei, it all feels wrong. He's not adonis and she - frankly - is stunning. My first thought was that this was a commercial transaction. Later on, he's visiting a transvestite. Is that for sex? It appears to be for drugs, ... Read More:

CD-Charts Position 9
Average Rating:

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Serpico [1973]

starring: Al Pacino, John Randolph, Jack Kehoe, Biff McGuire, Barbara Eda-Young
directed by: Sidney Lumet

Release Date December 23, 2002
This true story based film is set in the corruption addled 1970s New York police force, with Serpico as the only cop who wouldn't take the huge bribes on offer. This is a great film, a slow builder but definitely worth the time to see this story unfold. It's a fine movie.

CD-Charts Position 10
Average Rating:

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Running On Empty

starring: Christine Lahti, River Phoenix, Judd Hirsch
directed by: Sidney Lumet

Release Date November 21, 2005
A well-constructed and well-acted film, based on the situation of a family in constant fear of detection by the FBI. The reason? The parents were involved in the bombing of a laboratory researching napalm, in 1971. A security guard was blinded in the attack and they have been fugitives since then, constantly changing locations, jobs, schools for their two children, who are drilled in their new names, backgrounds etc every few months. The boys are also schooled in how to spot and evade surveillance. The family have fallback rendezvous points just in case...the "whole nine yards" of terrorist/espionage tradecraft, really. They are assisted by The Network, the remnants of their late Sixties/early Seventies underground group.

The River Phoenix character is a skilled musical ... Read More: