FREE ON CINEGEEK.DE Sidney Lumet - The Pawnbroker 

He is not only one of the best craftsmen in cinema; he is also a great humanist. And whoever experiences him live like I did at the Berlinale, knows that Sidney Lumet must be a loveable person! Lumet was always productive. He started in the 50's and surprised us all with his last film - that was 2007. Lumet makes films that grab us and never let go! Lumet is a New York filmmaker and almost all of his films take place there. He obviously prefers a milieu that he knows and understands from the inside out. Lumet always brought the best together and served as a thoughtful director, probably even more of a consultant. You can read his book Making Movies, which sounds almost humble. It's all about the work; there's no gibberish at all. Like in Lumet's films. They are completely free of gibberish. He reduces everything to the essentials, staging it invisibly. Lumet's parents were immigrants from Poland and played at the Jewish theater, as you can read in the book. That's why Sidney Lumet started acting as a child. During the 50s he was attracted by a new medium: Television. He was one of the representatives of live TV, like so many New Hollywood directors. This simply means that live filming is done, not unlike the theater. The Pawnbroker was founded in 1964 and works on the basis of ethical questions, which are not obviously formulated. We feel them. Rod Steiger plays The Pawnbroker, a man who survived the hell of a concentration camp. Today he runs a pawnbroker's shop in Harlem and still has to fight prejudices. He has lost his faith in God, the arts and science. It cannot be said that he discriminates against individual people, rather he regards the whole of humanity as scum. In truth, his pawn shop serves as a façade for a man who does business with prostitution. The Pawnbroker is a character study that gets by with a minimum of action. Episodically staged, the film stands and falls with Rod Steiger's portrayal.