Marathon Man (John Schlesinger, 1976): U. S.

Reviewed by Kathleen Amboy. Viewed on DVD

Marathon Man is an exciting quasi-political, espionage thriller that deals with stolen diamonds, evil henchmen, ruthless covert operatives, and one sadistic Nazi dentist on the lam.

Thomas “Babe” Levy (Dustin Hoffman) is a grad student at Columbia who helps out and befriends a foreign student.  When the two eventually become lovers, big brother “Doc” (Roy Scheider) appears on the scene and informs Babe that his girlfriend is a phony, which suspiciously scares her off.   Shortly thereafter, Doc, near death and bleeding profusely from the effects of a nifty wrist shank stuck in him, stumbles into Babe’s apartment and dies on his floor.  Enter the Division agent and Doc’s friend Peter Janeway (William Devane), who proceeds to enlighten Babe about the truth of Doc’s profession and the search for smuggled diamonds.  Babe is then abducted from his apartment, dragged into a warehouse, tied up to a chair, and asked repeatedly “is it safe?”  Facing the threat of dental torture and puzzled by the circumstances, Babe’s reply is “yes it’s safe, it’s very very safe.”   Dr. Christian Szell (performed deliciously to the hilt by Sir Laurence Olivier) is a greedy and paranoid former Nazi dentist.  Szell has come to the States to collect the precious stones that were responsible for his brother’s untimely death, and he sadistically wants to know “is it safe?”  After a bit of cat and mouse chases, near hit and misses, Babe reconnects with his lover, but much to his chagrin, he realizes his brother was correct in his assessment of her.   There is a climactic show-down between Babe and Szell much to the audience’s delight.

The film is well-paced from beginning to end with a nice tidy script which is exempt from any unnecessary dialogue.