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67 of 68 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
George Orwell warned us...., September 9, 2003
Most of us know at least one person who can compartmentalize her or his life, separating business from pleasure, career from family, etc. Such people have exceptional focus and determination. Brilliantly portrayed by Gene Hackman, Harry Caul is such a person. (Even his girlfriend Amy, played by Teri Garr, does not know where he lives.) Harry is an expert technician who is retained to conduct electronic surveillance of those identified by his clients. In effect, he is a high-tech private investigator. What he records becomes evidence of illegal, unethical, or immoral behavior. Harry has no personal interest in the private lives he invades surreptitiously. But then he accepts an assignment and begins to suspect that the subjects of his surveillance will be murdered. The "compartments" in his life which Harry has so carefully separated begin to merge (albeit gradually) and he begins to have second thoughts about how he earns a living. Of course, he is better qualified than any other character in the film to understand (if not yet fully appreciate) the implications of an invasion of privacy. Under Francis Ford Coppola's brilliant direction, Harry begins to feel paranoid.
I view The Conversation as a dark film because its raises so many questions which seem even more relevant today than they were in 1974. How secure can any life be? Who is accumulating personal as well as professional data about whom? Why? Satellites can take photographs of a license plate. All of the data on computer hard drives can be recovered. DNA tests can determine whether or not a monarch was poisoned hundreds of years ago. In so many ways, "there is nowhere to run and nowhere to hide" from modern technologies. What intrigues me most about Harry Caul is his growing sense of dislocation and vulnerability as the conflict between his personal conscience and professional objectivity intensifies. The assignment for The Director (Robert Duvall) to conduct surveillance on Ann (Cindy Williams) and Mark (Frederic Forest) serves as a trigger which activates self-doubts and insecurities which Harry has presumably suppressed and denied for many years.
For me, the final scene is most memorable because it's so ambiguous. To what extent has Harry invaded his own privacy? What has he learned? How will he now proceed with his personal life and career? For whatever reasons, only in recent years has this film received the praise it deserved but was denied when it first appeared almost 20 years ago. It seems to get even better each time it is seen again, especially in the DVD format which offers clearer image and sound as well as several excellent supplementary items such as commentaries by Coppola and his supervising editor Walter Murch as well as a "Close-Up on the Conversation" featurette.
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24 of 24 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
"The Conversation" on DVD, February 14, 2001
"The Conversation" is one of those great little masterpieces of the 1970s that just so happens to be directed by Francis Ford Coppola. "The Conversation" tells the tale of Harry Caul, (geniously played by Gene Hackman) a surveillance expert who makes the mistake of getting personally involved in a disturbing assignment. Gene Hackman's performance is so subtle, underplayed, and finely-tuned that it alone makes the film worthwhile. The script is fabulous, with a twist that makes "The Sixth Sense" look like kid's stuff.The DVD of "The Conversation" is great. To start off, it has good, animated menus. The theatrical trailer is nice, just for nostalgic purposes. There is also a featurette, "Close-Up on The Conversation". It makes for a nice, brief look at the making of the film, and it's fun to see Coppola so young. What really makes this DVD great though, are the two commentary tracks. The first is by the director himself, Francis Ford Coppola. Coppola's commentary is one of the most comprehensive I've ever heard. If you don't appreciate this movie now, you will after you've heard his commentary. The second commentary is by editor Walter Murch, which is also very good, especially if you are specifically interested in the editing process. If you like Coppola, Hackman, or are just a sucker for a clever script, this DVD is for your collection.
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29 of 30 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
A gem of 70s paranoia, November 22, 2000
By A Customer
The 70s were the heyday of conspiracy paranoia in popular entertainment: 1974 The Conversation, 1975 The Three Days Of The Condor, 1975 The Parallax View, 1976 All The President's Men ...The worldview advanced in those films, was that a Cold War mindset had infected American domestic life ... powerful, mysterious forces were foisting a secret spy game on the unsuspecting public. Those jaded messages resonated with Americans, who had lost their innocence to political assassinations, Vietnam, and Watergate. The Conversation is perfectly representative of those times. Gene Hackman is ideally cast as a lonely electronic surveillance professional, whose carefully detached world cracks apart when a routine assignment goes wrong and drives him over the moral edge. Deprived of a human support system, Hackman's intelligence turns on itself and leads him into a series of dangerous mistakes. In the end Hackman finds himself no longer the safe detached observer, but instead, a vulnerable pawn in a cruel conspiracy plot. The film's direction is masterful in the hands of Francis Ford Coppola at his restrained best. The style is European noirish: spare, cerebral, brooding, enhanced by masterful photography and intellectual jazz music. Though the film is shot in color, you may find that you remember it in black and white. Viewers beware: The Conversation is not for action lovers, it moves slowly and requires a love of introspection.
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