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The Pawnbroker

Screening on Film
Directed by Sidney Lumet.
With Rod Steiger, Geraldine Fitzgerald, Brock Peters.
US, 1954, 35mm, black & white, 116 min.

Mostly shot on the streets of New York, this film combines cinéma-vérité style and a Resnais-like oneiric recollection of the past, as a Jewish pawnbroker (Steiger) copes with the obsession of his concentration camp memories. The pressures of living in Harlem force themselves upon the protagonist, while the interpolated memory flashes throughout the film make the narrative extremely associative and self-referential. Quincy Jones’ jazzy soundtrack serves as a fitting complement to Steiger’s tortured subjectivity.

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