Sean Connery felt responsible for the failures of this crime thriller

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In 1964, Sean Connery stepped away from his breakout role as James Bond for two years “Dr. No,” which began cinema’s most enduring franchise. Having gone from unknown to global star, the Scottish actor was about to be remembered as one of those The best James Bond movies ever With “Goldfinger,” he debuted in September 1964. But before achieving that legendary triumph, Connery faced a crime drama that was anything but legendary — at least according to critics at the time, who gave 1964’s “Straw Woman” a comprehensive defeat. Shortly after its release, Connery would take responsibility for the film’s failure, but perhaps he was too hard on himself.

The film is directed by Basil Dearden, who four years earlier had directed the hugely successful The League of Gentlemen, one of his most popular films. Best heist movies of all time. “Woman of Straw” was one of two films Durden made for United Artists with his longtime producing partner Michael Relph, but it failed to match the success of the duo’s 1960 heist film.

Connery plays Anthony Richmond in “Woman of Straw”, the nephew of millionaire Charles Richmond (Ralph Richardson) who is about to pass away and intends to leave his fortune to charity. But Anthony has other plans. He hires Italian nurse Maria Marcello (Gina Lollobrigida) and convinces her to marry Charles so that he can inherit his fortune upon his death. The idea is that Anthony will retain the majority, but Maria will get $1 million for her trouble. Of course, things don’t go as planned, as Anthony tricks Maria into poisoning Charles before trying to frame the nurse for the crime. The melodramatic thriller failed to connect with critics, and Connery clearly saw the disappointment coming, telling Playboy (via James Bond file) in 1965, “When Straw Woman was dropped, I wasn’t exactly surprised.” Why? Well, according to the actor, it was all his fault.

“Woman of Straw” looked like it might help Sean Connery prove that he was more than just James Bond, something that was of the utmost importance to the actor during the early years of his fame as 007. Bond turned out to be a double-edged sword for ConneryBut “Straw Woman” saw him playing a treacherous and cunning villain, which might seem like just what the actor needed to undermine the public’s perception of him as England’s greatest spy. Unfortunately, Basil Dearden’s erotic novel, adapted from the French novel “La Femme de paille” by Catherine Arley, was considered a step backwards by most major reviewers, who considered it outdated.

While trade press critics were impressed, most film newspaper and magazine reviewers were not. the New York TimesEugene Archer, for example, wrote, “What could be more antiquated than the sight of James Bond himself, Sean Connery, morosely stalking through the kind of antiquated thrillers he usually mocks?” According to Archer, who attended the film’s premiere at the Criterion Theater, Connery “never looked sadder” during the event, suggesting that the actor knew immediately that he had failed — although the often austere Scott often seemed a bit annoyed anyway.

However, we know that Connery was fully aware of the film’s shortcomings based on his 1965 Playboy interview in which the star said: “I was not very happy with Woman of Straw, though the problems were my own. I have been working ceaselessly for good, I know how long, and trying to suggest a rewrite for it while making another film, which is always fatal. It was an experiment: but I will not commit “This mistake again.”

Shortly after “Woman of Straw” made a disappointing debut, Sean Connery starred in a similar but more memorable thriller with Alfred Hitchcock’s “Marnie.” Likewise adapted from a novel (this time Winston Graham’s 1961 book of the same name), the film was not well received upon its release (Connery’s New York Times friend Eugene Archer was similarly dismissive of “Marnie” as he was of the “straw woman”). But “Marnie” continued to enjoy reappraisal in the following decades, and today is viewed as a Hitchcock classic.

However, “Straw Woman” did not receive the same review, although it is not remembered as the blunder that Archer and his fellow critics claimed it was. However, even Connery could distinguish between his two 1964 thrillers only a year after their release. In his interview with Playboy magazine, the actor was asked if he was happy with the non-Bond films he had made in recent years, and he replied that he was happy with “Marnie”, but “with some reservations.” He felt differently about Straw Woman, and blamed himself for the film’s failure, even though he should have given himself a break.

In the book “The Cinema of Basil Dearden and Michael Relph” Writers Alan Burton and Tim O’Sullivan note that there were reports of a “difficult shoot” for the film Basil Dearden, in which Gina Lollobrigida was reported to be “demanding and temperamental” and at odds with both Dearden and Connery. Besides his hectic schedule, Connery was apparently dealing with a less-than-ideal atmosphere during filming. Furthermore, the film was often compared to Hitchcock’s thrillers, and critics were quick to do so. According to the Monthly Film Bulletin’s review, the picture could have benefited from “Hitchcock’s touch to sharpen the suspense and turn the dog’s howling into something inhuman rather than stopping the noise.” With critics seemingly willing to dismiss Dearden’s film as a pale imitation of Hitchcock from the start, and reports of a controversial filming experiment, perhaps Connery is not to blame.