Three Days of the Condor is a 1975 American action thriller film produced by Stanley Schneider and directed by Sydney Pollack

Sydney Pollack

Sydney Irwin Pollack was an American film director, producer and actor. Pollack studied with Sanford Meisner at the Neighborhood Playhouse in New York City, where he later taught acting...

. The screenplay, by Lorenzo Semple Jr.

Lorenzo Semple Jr.

Lorenzo Semple Jr. is an American screenwriter and sometime playwright, best known for his work on the campy television series Batman and the political/paranoia movie thrillers The Parallax View and Three Days of the Condor .-Early work:Semple's writing career started in 1951, as a short story...

 and David Rayfiel, was adapted from the novel Six Days of the Condor

Six Days of the Condor

Six Days of the Condor is a thriller novel by James Grady first published in 1974 by W.W. Norton.The story is a suspense drama set in contemporary Washington, D.C., and is considerably different from the 1975 film version, Three Days of the Condor...

by James Grady

James Grady (author)

James Grady is the Montana born author of thriller novels. He graduated from the University of Montana School of Journalism in 1974. During college, he worked for United States Senator Lee Metcalf of Montana. Best known as the author of Six Days of the Condor, which was famously adapted to film...

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The film is a suspense drama set in contemporary New York City

New York City

New York is the most populous city in the United States and the center of the New York Metropolitan Area, one of the most populous metropolitan areas in the world. New York exerts a significant impact upon global commerce, finance, media, art, fashion, research, technology, education, and...

, and is considered an exposition of the moral ambiguity of the actions of the United States government following the Vietnam War

Vietnam War

The Vietnam War was a Cold War-era military conflict that occurred in Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia from 1 November 1955 to the fall of Saigon on 30 April 1975. This war followed the First Indochina War and was fought between North Vietnam, supported by its communist allies, and the government of...

 and Watergate

Watergate scandal

The Watergate scandal was a political scandal during the 1970s in the United States resulting from the break-in of the Democratic National Committee headquarters at the Watergate office complex in Washington, D.C., and the Nixon administration's attempted cover-up of its involvement...

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