The Stop Button

The espionage genre has gotten so stupid over the last couple decades, it’s hard to even imagine how a mediocre entry could be good. Now, it’s watching the least worst. Three Days of the Condor is such a peculiar film, even though it’s wholly commercial–I mean, Dino De Laurentiis produced it.

It’s not just a spy thriller (it’s also an urban, domestic spy thriller and one of the best New York films in Panavision), there’s the entire thing with Robert Redford and Faye Dunaway. It’s not a romance, it’s not a friendship, it’s not a companionship… it’s a thing. In the vernacular of twenty-first century American filmmaking, it’s probably unintelligible, because their chemistry has so much to do with it being the two of them, the two icons. There aren’t film icons in the same way, certainly not ones like Redford and Dunaway were in 1975.

So there are these wonderful scenes with the two of them talking. Not getting to know each other, but talking to each other.

Then there are the spy thriller scenes. It’s amazing how well Redford plays a smart guy. It’s sort of against type.

Cliff Robertson, Max von Sydow (especially von Sydow) and John Houseman are all excellent in supporting roles. Houseman, of course, just has to talk.

Pollack’s Panavision direction is great. There’s some lovely editing from Don Guidice.

The end is problematic, if “realistic.” We spend the film waiting to find out what happens and, instead, we found out why.

CREDITS

Directed by Sydney Pollack; screenplay by Lorenzo Semple Jr. and David Rayfiel, based on a novel by James Grady; director of photography, Owen Roizman; edited by Don Guidice; music by Dave Grusin; production designer, Stephen B. Grimes; produced by Stanley Schneider; released by Paramount Pictures.

Starring Robert Redford (Joseph Turner), Faye Dunaway (Kathy Hale), Cliff Robertson (Higgins), Max von Sydow (Joubert), John Houseman (Mr. Wabash), Addison Powell (Leonard Atwood), Walter McGinn (Sam Barber), Tina Chen (Janice) and Michael Kane (S.W. Wicks).

Related posts:

• Blind Horizon (2003, Michael Haussman)
• Sabrina (1995, Sydney Pollack)
• The Towering Inferno (1974, John Guillermin)
• The Thomas Crown Affair (1999, John McTiernan)
• The Fog (1980, John Carpenter)