Review: Three Days of the Condor (1975)

Three Days of the Condor

Rating

Director

Sydney Pollack

Screenplay

Lorenzo Semple Jr., David Rayfiel (Novel: James Grady)

Length

1h 57m

Starring

Robert Redford, Faye Dunaway, Cliff Robertson, Max Von Sydow, John Houseman, Addison Powell, Walter McGinn, Tina Chen, Michael Kane, Don McHenry, Michael Miller

MPAA Rating

Review

Spy thrillers have been romanticized since their early days on screen but films like Three Days of the Condor returned the genre to its realistic roots.

A bookish CIA analyst (Robert Redford) discovers a secret code in a widely translated book that’s sold few copies. During lunch after his report is sent to headquarters, he returns to find his entire office dead. Believing a target on his back, he goes to great measures to secure his safety while uncovering the plot that threatens to tear apart his CIA division. When the expected assassin (Max von Sydow) comes, he’s ready and easily deflects his attacks by outsmarting his maneuvers. Will the dashing agent who relies on his smarts over his combat skill win the day or will the system spit him out.

Faye Dunaway, Cliff Robertson, and John Houseman lend their support though Dunaway’s role is miniscule compared to her ostensible leading man. The effectiveness of Redford’s performance easily carries the film, showing a deft handling of a realistic individual making him seem like an everyman who just happens to be attractive rather than the reverse. Von Sydow makes his yang to Redford’s yin feel like a genuine rival, someone whose skill and expertise help define his role in the film without the need for resorting to pontification. The rest of the cast delivers amiable performances that anchor the film in the modern world.

For those who had been raised on the James Bond films, a film like Three Days of the Condor is a departure. Like its contemporaries Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy and The Day of the Jackal, Condor feels like an expression of Cold War tension without the effluence of excess that might bolster an excitement from audiences. Screenwriters Lorenzo Semple Jr. and David Rayfield saw something in James Grady’s novel that would translate to the big screen effectively even when a film light on action violence or debonair panache wouldn’t seem like something the viewing public would be excited to see. Bringing in Sydney Pollack alongside Redford lent the film gravitas and with Pollack’s skill with actors, the cast puts forth performances that support its slow boil nature.

With the exemplars of Dr. No and Goldfinger, audiences came to expect a certain style from its spy thrillers that might seem to some a bit far fetched. A film like Three Days of the Condor does a fascinating job creating a believable world of spies competing and killing over dangerous information. Getting caught in the crossfire is a risk, but even being smart isn’t all you need. Cunning and foresight are also required and Condor does a wonderful job exploring the medium from a different direction.