Review by Marty Mapes

In 1975, Sydney Pollack and Robert Redford played a tense spy game called Three Days of the Condor. But in 2009, as the film sees its Blu-ray debut, it's hard for this gen x-er to take the tension seriously. It's still fun, but it has a dose of camp that might not have been intended 30 years ago.

Robert Redford plays an academic. He works among the tweed in a converted genteel brownstone. He reads for a living -- books, magazines, anything -- and then reports to the CIA any surprising trends or codes or ciphers. Returning from lunch, he discovers his colleagues have been gunned down. Now he has to find out why they were targeted, and whether to trust his life to his CIAs superiors whom he's never met. He takes a woman hostage in trying to escape some suspicious-looking spooks. She warms to him and then decides to help him.

The story is just as suspenseful as the modern day Bourne movies. But Three Days of the Condor is much slower paced, which might frustrate younger audiences (personally, I like the rhythmic contrast). Really, the movie is mostly about the chase, but the MacGuffins are energy production and the flow of information, two topics that are still timely today. These larger themes help the movie seem less anachronistic.

The disco-influenced jazz score from Dave Grusin sets the era; it's hard not to chuckle at the funk with strings. And then there are the halo silhouettes filmed in soft focus with a star filter glinting off Redford's lower lip. Some of this '70s stuff looks silly, but it's not out of place within the context of the movie.

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