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> It’s also not difficult to imagine Bishop as an older version of the more principled protagonists he played in Three Days of the Condor and All the President’

> It’s also not difficult to imagine Bishop as an older version of the more principled protagonists he played in Three Days of the Condor and All the President’s Men. That's a fun idea. If only the movie ran for just a bit longer and mega-casual assassin Max Von Sydow and spooky garage conversation informant Hal Holbrook could've been in on things somehow. "You've got to follow...the macguffin!" (Also this clock tower thing...yeah I admit I never noticed, loved the van and mustache though) A fun read, thanks op!

alasdair_ 4y ago
As a random aside, Day of the Condor is Kevin Mitnick’s favorite movie. Mitnick was probably the most famous hacker in the world at the time Sneakers was being cast.
- themodelplumber 4y ago
  That's really cool. Turner's phone company background was a very interesting facet of his characterization. I'm sure it was to many a Sneakers-like experience. Personally I liked this factor, and the Higgins character, enough that I outlined some fanfic in which Higgins quits the agency and convinces Turner to help him out on various freelance jobs. I thought they made a very rationally-sympathetic pair in the film.
chrisdhoover 4y ago
I watched both sneakers and three days of the condor recently. Sneakers is an OK Hollywood movie but I fail to see the reverence it has. The technical details of the physical security systems are nonsense. Condor is a better movie. It still suffers a bit around the Condor Cathy relationship. While Sneakers is make believe, condor resonates today. The speech about oil is pretty spot on. The whole idea of releasing to the papers is a movie trope, but the antagonist casts doubt, “will they publish the story” We know today that the press is a propaganda arm of the government and the answer is probably no. They will not publish the story.
- blincoln 4y ago
  > The technical details of the physical security systems are nonsense. Which parts are nonsense? The details of the "man trap" (including the voiceprint) are straight out of a late-80s Computer Security book I found at a garage sale last month: https://twitter.com/0x00C651E0/status/1521690225218490368/photo/1 https://twitter.com/0x00C651E0/status/1521690225218490368/ph... There's another section of the same book that describes ultrasonic motion detectors that work more or less like the ones in Cosmo's office. All of the other details I can think of offhand make me think the filmmakers did their research at least enough to get to the level of "it's plausible that someone would sell a security product that worked this way even if no one actually did in 1992", but I work in information security, not physical security. FWIW, I'm ordering Three Days of the Condor right now. Thanks for mentioning it.

alasdair_ 4y ago

As a random aside, Day of the Condor is Kevin Mitnick’s favorite movie. Mitnick was probably the most famous hacker in the world at the time Sneakers was being cast.

themodelplumber 4y ago
That's really cool. Turner's phone company background was a very interesting facet of his characterization. I'm sure it was to many a Sneakers-like experience. Personally I liked this factor, and the Higgins character, enough that I outlined some fanfic in which Higgins quits the agency and convinces Turner to help him out on various freelance jobs. I thought they made a very rationally-sympathetic pair in the film.

chrisdhoover 4y ago

I watched both sneakers and three days of the condor recently. Sneakers is an OK Hollywood movie but I fail to see the reverence it has. The technical details of the physical security systems are nonsense. Condor is a better movie. It still suffers a bit around the Condor Cathy relationship. While Sneakers is make believe, condor resonates today. The speech about oil is pretty spot on. The whole idea of releasing to the papers is a movie trope, but the antagonist casts doubt, “will they publish the story” We know today that the press is a propaganda arm of the government and the answer is probably no. They will not publish the story.

blincoln 4y ago
> The technical details of the physical security systems are nonsense. Which parts are nonsense? The details of the "man trap" (including the voiceprint) are straight out of a late-80s Computer Security book I found at a garage sale last month: https://twitter.com/0x00C651E0/status/1521690225218490368/photo/1 https://twitter.com/0x00C651E0/status/1521690225218490368/ph... There's another section of the same book that describes ultrasonic motion detectors that work more or less like the ones in Cosmo's office. All of the other details I can think of offhand make me think the filmmakers did their research at least enough to get to the level of "it's plausible that someone would sell a security product that worked this way even if no one actually did in 1992", but I work in information security, not physical security. FWIW, I'm ordering Three Days of the Condor right now. Thanks for mentioning it.