There's a technique used in a lot of movies about traumatized or haunted characters that shows the character in question's memories being triggered by a piece of innocuous stimuli in the present - our hero sees a couple kids playing cops and robbers and flashes back to Vietnam, etc. Sidney Lumet in The Pawnbroker does something similar but with a difference that makes it much more striking; the things that trigger Sol's concentration camp memories are usually sad or tragic in their own rights, the implication being that the world he lives in now can be just as cruel as the one he escaped. Harsh stuff, and definitely in keeping with the overall bleak and despairing worldview of a character who seems to feel that the greatest tragedy of his life is that he's still alive.

A Heartbreaking Work of Steigering Genius

“What happened?”

“I didn’t die.”

Steiger’s performance is clearly brilliant. I love Lumet’s style. It’s incredibly edited and the concentration camp flashbacks are remarkable. And yet, there’s something a little off. 

The Ortiz character grappling with the importance of money and criminality feels like a b-plot on a TV show and Geraldine Fitzgerald’s character is as flat of an audience surrogate as you’ll ever find. 

When those characters come into frame, you can almost feel Lumet get bored with them and go completely static.

But when Lumet is in his combative, claustrophobic wheelhouse, with moments like the Rodriguez confrontation or the train flashback, it is undoubtedly great and worthwhile. The only issue is you can feel the movie hedging it’s bets when it doesn’t trust its characters.

Rediscovering what a great director Sidney Lumet was ... so precise in how he framed his characters, cut his film, moved his camera and created the experience. Also love the way he captured the city..

There's a scene where a woman tries to pawn an engagement ring. As Steiger's character looks at the ring, there are quick flashes to when he was in a concentration camp and prisoners were forced to push their hands against a barbed wire fence while soldiers removed the prisoners' rings. As the woman shows off the ring, Steiger looks down and matter-of-factly states, "It's glass." The woman looks down and sadly says, "He told me it was real." Then we cut to a wider shot and see that she's pregnant. She turns and slowly staggers out of the pawnshop. That's the movie in a nutshell. And why I love it.

Watching Sidney Lumet movies is good for the brain and this is one I remember reading about in film school. Even though this is a difficult movie in its own right and not really a "pleasant" watch, I'm glad I finally caught up with it. Steiger gives a hell of a performance, the gritty black and white cinematography and Lumet's framing adds a lot cinematically and the subject matter is incredibly dark and challenging by today's standards, I can't imagine how it played in the early 60s. There's a lot to admire about this film, but the constant bleakness and episodic narrative unfortunately makes it kind of a slog to get through. I see most of the people I follow here on Letterboxd also fall between 3 and 3.5 stars for this one, despite the acclaim it's received over the years, so I'm glad I'm not alone in respecting, but not fully loving this one.

Utterly devastating. One of the first Holocaust films focusing from the perspective of a survivor, The Pawnbroker is a hard-hitting gem from Sidney Lumet. Rod Steiger gives such a haunting performance as Sol Nazerman that it's a crime he was robbed of the Oscar that year (another Academy screw up). He's broken to the point that he won't show emotion but it's captivating as hell when he does. Also really like the supporting turns from Brock Peters and Jaime Sanchez. The flashback sequences are striking and some of the most visceral moments in the film. It's also hard not to feel a little heartbroken when Nazerman shuts down a lonely customer looking for a friendly ear to chat with. Lumet's camerawork is fantastic and does some amazing closeup work on par with 12 Angry Men. All in all, a very tragic but fantastic film.

I always love intimate mid-sixties dramas like this one, with all their gorgeous ugly realism. Rod Steiger was no joke--he tackled some difficult roles.

A tremendous look at what PTSD can do to someone, before such a term even existed.

Searing. Harrowing. Almost too painful to watch. Sorry

I had no idea Rod Steiger had this much range. Amazing performances! It’s not a feel good movie, be warned.

Sol Nazerman (Rod Steiger) is a Jewish pawnbroker, and as we learn throughout the movie, a Holocaust survivor. All that Sol loved, his wife and children, were taken from him and died while they were on their way to and while imprisoned in a concentration camp. He's lost his ability to feel, to love, to have friends. One event after another dredges up memories that he had suppressed for the past 25 years. Sol begins to give up on his business and friends/family reaching out to touch him, and give in to a gangster, who wants his business. He begins to feel, but it's too late.

Steiger gives a fantastic performance, as well as so many other supporting cast members such as Brock Peters, Geraldine Fitzgerald, Jamie Sanchez, and Thelma Oliver.

I watch the Pawnbroker ever 5 - 10 years, and I see something new every time.

VERY difficult film to watch. Rod Steiger is extraordinary as a Holocaust survivor who owns a pawnshop in Spanish Harlem and is haunted by memories of the torturous loss he suffered, along with survivor's guilt. Lots of great supporting performances.

Want to give Rod Steiger a hug.

Directed by Sydney Lumet this is a total vehicle for the great Rod Stiger most enjoyable

An absolute punch in the gut! It explores guilt and trauma in a specific way that arguably no other film has ever attempted or dared to do. You can feel the grimness in the air, and the pain that Steiger's character feels all throughout. And speaking of Steiger, his performance will send chills all through you. You can feel the pain his eyes and body movements, which suggest that this a man who has seen, felt and witnessed what no other person alive should ever have to. This, in my opinion, is one of Sidney Lumet's very best films, that also shows New York in a beautifully bleak, stripped-down manner that doesn't feel gregarious nor false