3 Days of the Condor (Three Days of the Condor) (1975)

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General		Extras
Category	Thriller	Main Menu Introduction Main Menu Audio & Animation Scene Selection Anim & Audio
Rating
Year Of Production	1975
Running Time	112:15 (Case: 117)
RSDL / Flipper	RSDL (50:00)	Cast & Crew
Start Up	Language Select Then Menu
Region Coding	2,4	Directed By	Sydney Pollack
Studio Distributor	Universal Pictures Home Video	Starring	Robert Redford Faye Dunaway Cliff Robertson Max Von Sydow John Houseman Addison Powell Walter McGinn Tina Chen Michael Kane Don McHenry Michael B. Miller Jess Osuna Dino Narizzano
Case	?
RPI	$19.95	Music	Dave Grusin

Video		Audio
Pan & Scan/Full Frame	None	English Dolby Digital 5.1 (448Kb/s)
Widescreen Aspect Ratio	2.35:1
16x9 Enhancement
Video Format	576i (PAL)
Original Aspect Ratio	2.35:1	Miscellaneous
Jacket Pictures	No
Subtitles	Dutch Swedish Finnish Danish Norwegian	Smoking	Yes
		Annoying Product Placement	No
		Action In or After Credits	No

    Despite their sometimes slightly dated look, I do enjoy films of this era and am always happy to see one which I have not previously had the chance to see, especially one with the reputation of Three Days Of The Condor.

    Three Days of the Condor is an excellent thriller with a good build-up of tension, focusing on innocents caught up in the madness which suddenly envelops them. The main character is Joseph Turner (Robert Redford) who is a low-level analyst for the CIA. His job is to read books and analyse them for coded messages or other useful information. He is not a field operative and only has a military background in the signals corps. One day, seemingly like any other, he heads out to pick up lunch for himself and his co-workers from the local deli. As it is raining he uses a back door which takes him closer to the deli. At the same time, believing all the employees to be inside, an assassin, Joubert (Max Van Sydow) and his accomplices attack the building and kill all his co-workers. Turner obviously comes back to find the bodies and immediately decides to leave. The rest of the movie involves him trying to work out why they were killed and trying to avoid being killed himself. He kidnaps Cathy (Faye Dunaway) so he can use her house and car to hide.

    This film undoubtedly has some dated elements including obviously the computer technology and the opening titles. That computer font absolutely screams 1970s. However, the themes of the film and the reasons behind the attack are very relevant to today as many world events today are occurring for similar reasons. Also, to my mind, a good thriller does not date and is still exciting and intriguing. This film is certainly that - it does an excellent job of only allowing the audience to know as much as the main protagonist knows, thus keeping up the suspense.

    The acting is very good, especially from the main three mentioned above. Faye Dunaway received a Golden Globe nomination for her efforts.

    Overall, if you like a good thriller, you will like this, especially if you are a fan of the stars.

Video

    The video quality is very good for a film of this age.

    The feature is presented in a 2.35:1 aspect ratio 16x9 enhanced which is the original aspect ratio.

    The picture was generally clear and sharp throughout, with no evidence of low level noise. Shadow detail was average with night scenes only showing some details.

    The colour was very good throughout with all colours being well saturated and free from colour bleeding. Skin tones were very natural. The colours were not as vibrant as more modern films, but considering the age of the film, they come up very well in this transfer.

    There were quite a few white specks on and off throughout the film - noticeable when you are looking for them but not too bad. Also some minor aliasing was present such as on Robert Redford's jacket at 3:38 and the grilles at 9:56. I also noticed some moire on a television set at 45:05.

    There are subtitles in five languages not including English which is a shame for the hearing impaired. Unfortunately, I do not speak any of the languages involved so cannot comment on their accuracy.

    This is a dual layered disc and the layer change is well placed and not terribly distracting at 50:00.
    

Video Ratings Summary

Sharpness
Shadow Detail
Colour
Grain/Pixelization
Film-To-Video Artefacts
Film Artefacts
Overall

Audio

    The audio quality is good, but very front and centre focussed.

    This DVD contains only one audio option: an English Dolby Digital 5.1 soundtrack encoded at 448 Kb/s. Despite the encoding this sounds more like a 3.1 soundtrack as the surrounds are virtually not used. Considering it was originally in mono, this is not a big issue.

    Dialogue was clear and easy to understand and there were no problems with audio sync.    

    The score of this film by Dave Grusin involves a fair amount of sax and sounds quite dated. There is a very cool funk tune played toward the end of the film, however, it is not credited.

    The surround speakers were virtually not used at all.

    The subwoofer was used occasionally for music.

Audio Ratings Summary

Dialogue
Audio Sync
Clicks/Pops/Dropouts
Surround Channel Use
Subwoofer
Overall

Menu

    The menu included a scene selection function but precious little else.

    This movie is available on a very similar disc in Region 1 with the exception of  the Region 1 disc having an additional Dolby Digital 2.0 soundtrack and a trailer. I can't see that these things would make you bother ordering this from the US and the disc is being released at mid price here.

    The video quality is very good considering the age of the film.

    The audio quality is reasonable.

    The disc has no extras, which is shame for a film of this calibre.

Video
Audio
Extras
Plot
Overall