MovieChat Forums > Three Days of the Condor (1975) Discussion > Any meaning to the "Equus" and "Lighthou...

Any meaning to the "Equus" and "Lighthouse/Blind" street adverts in the film?


I'm talking about the scene when Redford parts company with Dunaway at the train station. In the background we see an advert for the play "Equus". For those unfamiliar with what the play and later movie Equus was about may want to peruse this first:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Equus_(play)

Assuming this wasn't just a coincidence, I have no idea what this might mean symbolically, but I was wondering if there was any significance to the equestrian theme of Atwood's den and if the Equus sign was somehow foreshadowing in. The play was in the middle of it's initial Broadway run at that time, so maybe there isn't any deep mystery here. Still, it was striking to me that the train station scene with the "Equus" poster was so quickly followed by the Atwood scene where horses were so prominently featured. In any case, it is true the equestrian artwork in Atwood's den is VERY prominently displayed, and at the very least seems to suggest an aristocratic class mind set. If there was any deeper significance than that or any intentional connection with the play I can't say.

There's another street sign that seems pregnant with possible symbolic meaning at the end of the film outside the New York Times building. It's near to where the street Santa Claus was standing. We see a sign that has a lighthouse and the word "lighthouse" and "blind". The "light of truth" and the "blindness of ignorance", perhaps.

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I don't think there was a deeper meaning, they were just signs in New York at that time.

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I think Equus is coincidence due to the fact it was running on Broadway at the time. "Lighthouse/Blind"...not so sure about that one...could've been symbolic or maybe not.

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The Lighthouse for the Blind is a real place. That being said, on rewatch, I do think there could possibly be thematic connections: the idea that Joe has been "blind" to the truth of his situation until the events of the film. He previously believed that he lived in a secure, trustworthy milieu. By the end of the movie, he's alone, in danger, and hyperaware of the games played by the state-- games in which he is little more than a pawn, hardly secure at all.

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