Excellent but underrated film

best movie i've ever seen.

Good films always raise compelling questions, whether the format is fiction or documentary fact.

Through painfully honest and emotional moments, the movie becomes irresistibly relatable

"The Panic in Needle Park" is an incredibly unpleasant film...which is what you'd expect about a film that centers around two heroin addicts living in New York. So, if you are looking for a film to make you smile or a good date film, do NOT see this movie! In fact, that is the biggest problem with the picture...most folks won't wanna see two people slowly destroying themselves. Most folks watch films to be entertained. Now I am NOT saying it's a bad film and it might be a good one to show teens, as it shows how wretched a life hooked on drugs can be...though there are a few more recent films which make drug use seem a lot more unpleasant, such as the brilliant but hard to watch "Requiem for a Dream".The film has very little in the way of plot. It simply shows two addicts who are in love, Bobby and Helen (Al Pacino and Kitty Winn), as they slowly degenerate...sinking lower and lower and lower through the course of the movie. At first, Bobby is very glib...and fun to be with and Helen seems rather innocent. Naturally, this doesn't last and both sink deeper and deeper into their habit. Bobby claims he's a 'chipper' (a casual user who is not addicted) but after a while he's dealing and overdoses. Helen begins turning tricks to buy their next fix. Unpleasant, to be sure, but mostly realistic. When they shot up, it looks real...and the language is street language...nasty and crude. But the only problem I saw is that both LOOKED healthy through the course of the film and the makeup could have been better...enabling them not only to act like addicts but to look more like them. Well made but I am strongly warning you...it's not a movie for kids or for the squeamish.

The storyline's about as close to two hours of sheer futility that I've seen. One thing—don't see it if you're at all depressed; I think I counted two smiles from actress Winn the entire time. But then she and fellow junkie Bobby (Pacino) have little to be happy about. Sure, they love each other, at least during their sober moments. But those moments are really just preludes to shooting up again. All in all, life's a teeter-totter ride. So which is going to win out— love or dependency. It's a harrowing descent for Helen (Winn). She starts off conventionally enough, until Bobby's fast life pulls her into sharing his heroin addiction. Then it's a treadmill to nowhere, from getting money by any means to feeding the never-ending bodily demand. Thus, the lovers can never be sure who's talking—the affectionate person, or the drug's long shadow. At the same time, trust in others can never be a certainty, even among lovers. It's a grim portrait of human relationships, to say the least.In my book, Winn deserves some kind of award for winning us over with troubled vulnerability. Thus, her tumble into personal desolation pulls us along. Pacino too is outstanding, though not nearly as sympathetic. Still, the way he maneuvers among the jungle of addicts and drug money is totally convincing. I can see why the role launched his A-picture career. Also, the NY city locations lend a further sense of realism, though I could have used more of the down-and-out street characters.Overall, I suspect PiNP is the best movie made about the seductive ravages of hard drugs. In fact, I think I'll open my medicine cabinet and check the prescription drugs.

Jerry Schatzberg's grim film about junkies circa 1971 New York has become something of a classic due in large part to the fact that it contains Al Pacino's first starring role. Pacino is indeed a dynamo as Bobby, a heroin addict and petty crook (he's better at being a junkie than he is at stealing). He's well matched with Kitty Winn as his girlfriend, a free-spirited would-be artist who also succumbs to shooting up. It's so extremely realistic d and shot on the same grimy NYC streets as Paul Morrissey's TRASH, that it's sometimes hard to believe a film crew was even at work. Pacino & Winn are excellent and so is Richard Bright as Pacino's entrepreneurial brother (he's a pusher who wears a suit and tie). Raul Julia, Alan Vint (perfect as a duplicitous narc) and Kiel Martin co-star. Winn won the best actress award at Cannes. The script is by John Gregory Dunne & Joan Didion.

I just finished watching this movie for the first time as an adult. See I saw it when I must have been about 13 or so because hey, it's an Al Pacino flick. And being a Godfather fan at the time I figured why not go back even further, to his first big break as an actor. Well not a movie for kids, at all.Panic in Needle Park starts out with this young girl who is new to The Big City. Maybe looking for love, or maybe just looking for meaning in life. I'd say a little of both. Then Al Pacino walks in as Bobby, and her life steadily changes throughout the course of this movie. And watching the decline is heartbreaking and disturbing at the same time. See it's different watching Pacino's character because he is already down n out. Working the streets of New York, hustling to support his $50 a day Heroin Addiction. But Helen forcibly wants in on this life of self destruction, as a way for her to be part of something. To be accepted. She chooses to be with Bobby and that's the drama of this whole movie. By the end he even acknowledges SHE does too much of that stuff. It's just a bad way to end up in life.So very good cautionary tale that I would recommend to people maybe looking for some insight into a world sometimes hidden from view. And I'd say even 40 plus years later, This Movie is very relevant in modern times. Also you get to see some of the early Al Pacino explosive anger that he later became known for. But overall, A Drama of the darkest kind.