The interesting thing about that scene for me is a certain sense of relief I felt at seeing some regular NYC dudes tell the big bad CIA operative ex-Nazi protector to blow his commands outta his butt.
--
Yeah, and its a WHITE CIA guy , (the fine William Devane, young and trying to be a star) but he ends up smiling and nodding and walking away. Up to that point, he's been merciless and cruel and uncaring , but even HE gets the joke.
---
More than any of the other 70s political paranoia thrillers, I think Marathon Man has the most relentless sense of dread and a feeling that everyone in a position of authority is willing to torture and kill you should you be unfortunate enough to have caught a glimpse of what the "deep state" is up to.
---
Yes.
Interesting to me. "Three Days of the Condor" was Paramount's big offering in the fall of 1975, and "Marathon Man" was Paramount's big offering in the fall of 1976. I saw both films at the same theater, a year apart, and what struck me was this: the overall plot and setting were the same (innocent trapped in a spy plot, NYC locations) with a big star as that innocent(Redford, Hoffman) BUT...Marathon Man was such a more violent, grueling, grim and stomach-turning take on the same material. The dental torture scene. Oliver's hidden wrist spring knife and how he uses it. The near drowning scene.
---
So after Babe sees his brother die from a knife wound in his living room, after being nearly drowned in his own bathtub by Nazi loyalist invaders, after having a creepily eloquent Nazi mercilessly drill into his choppers seeking information he didn't know,
---
"Is it safe?"
"Its very safe..." OUCH
"Is it safe?"
"No its not safe...its dangerous, stay away." OUCH.
CONT
reply
share
ecarle (14979)
2 years ago
after running for his life in his jammies
--
Worse yet. Only his jammie bottoms, with his shirtless (and well muscled) chest exposed, and in barefeet in the freezing cold.
---
from an ambitious CIA stooge who betrayed his trust...
--
Great twist!
--
it was indeed a relief to see our protagonist encounter neighborhood folk who only insulted him regularly and to earn some empathy from them over his desperate life-or-death situation.
--
It was rather uplifting. Day to day, they mocked and humiliated and bullied him. He had to identify himself to them over the intercom as "the creep...creepy..." But, in an uplifting way, when they saw him in that situation...they got down on it.
reply
share
Cognoscente (2463)
2 years ago
Interesting to me. "Three Days of the Condor" was Paramount's big offering in the fall of 1975, and "Marathon Man" was Paramount's big offering in the fall of 1976. I saw both films at the same theater, a year apart, and what struck me was this: the overall plot and setting were the same (innocent trapped in a spy plot, NYC locations) with a big star as that innocent(Redford, Hoffman).
I can see the attraction of Redford and Hoffman being in All the President's Men.
reply
share
ecarle (14979)
2 years ago
I can see the attraction of Redford and Hoffman being in All the President's Men.
--
It was an interesting progression through 1975 into 1976:
First was Redford in Three Days of the Condor(fall 1975.) About six months later Redford AND Hoffman in All the President's Men(April); and about six months later it was Hoffman in Marathon Man in the fall of 1976.
A trio of "political thrillers" -- except the fictional ones were far scarier than All the President's Men, whose real-life conspiracy looked a bit penny-ante and was easily ended.
The Redford-Redford/Hoffman-Hoffman progression reminds me that movies often break in patterns.
There were these three Westerns in 1967:
John Wayne and Kirk Douglas in The War Wagon
John Wayne and Robert Mitchum in El Dorado
Kirk Douglas and Robert Mitchum in The Way West(plus Richard Widmark)
And this: Robert Redford was the producer of All the President's Men and knew that he had to attract a major star to be Berstein to his Woodward. There were only two choices: Dustin Hoffman and Al Pacino. Hoffman got it evidently because, like Bernstein, he was Jewish -- plus Hoffman had been trying to set up his own Watergate movie playing Bernstein.
Said Dustin Hoffman of the success of All the President's Men: "It wasn't the politics. It was Hoffman's back and Redford's got him."
reply
share