The Pawnbroker

An uneasy mixture of European art movie (the Resnais-like flashbacks that punctuate the narrative) and American ciné-vérité (it was shot on the streets of New York), The Pawnbroker never achieves the intensity its subject matter threatens. It's almost as though Lumet was unsure as to whether he wanted to shock or move his audience with the story of a Jewish pawnbroker (Steiger) who is finally forced to leave the world of his concentration camp memories as the pressures of living in Harlem force themselves upon him.