"The Conversation"...worth having
"The Conversation" is not light-hearted fare. If you want Friday-night, mindless guffaws, you need another film. This is a movie that makes you think. The central theme of the film is privacy: how a professional eavesdropper (I'd say 'wiretapper', but the film shows they were using wireless technologies even in 1974), tries to protect his own even as he invades the privacy of others. The main character, Harry Caul (played by Gene Hackman), wrestles with his own moral responsibility toward some of the information he learns by discreet and illicit means, and by the end of the film must face an invasion of his own personal privacy. The secrets that unfold along the way present the main character with challenges he is in some cases not ready to face; he tries to stay personally detached from the work, but stumbles across the blur in the fine line between professionalism and social responsibility. (I'm being intentionally vague to not give away too much of the plot.)
Coppola does some interesting things with the camera that blend with the film's undercurrent of clandestine surveillance. He sometimes lets the camera mimic a security videocam, with action moving in and out of the shot. This in itself is a little disturbing to the viewer, since it's not what you're used to seeing in a movie, and it does serve to keep the audience a bit on edge. This is intentional; it's an edgy subject. But it is also probably part of what gives rise to the occasional criticism that the action moves too slowly. I suppose the movie could have been edited to go faster, but I think Coppola did a masterful job at developing the plot and the character...though he does take his time in doing so very thoroughly. Is it hard to follow? I didn't think so, but make no mistake--it IS complex, and it does assume an audience is bringing a sober attitude and a certain amount of intelligence with them to the film. It will challenge your thinking on privacy, surveillance, morality, and many other issues...especially in an age (not imagined thirty-odd years ago when the film was made) of wireless home telephones, instant messaging, handheld video cameras, Wi-Fi Internet connections, digital cell phones, and more. Current technology makes it easier to lose your privacy today than ever.
Speaking of technology--I found this movie interesting for another reason. I've worked with video and audio for my entire career (not spy work but professional production), and it was fun to see the tools that were used in the past to "do" surveillance. Three discreet recording passes on quarter-inch tape, with different microphones, then trying to play them back in sync in to create a master recording as the action passes from one mic to the next? Archaic, in 2006 terms! This would have been a frustrating and daunting feat...not completely impossible, but very complicated and even after painstaking effort still not entirely precise. (But then, they didn't imagine computer-based non-linear multitrack digital recording in 1974, either.) These scenes from Caul's warehouse as his is editing his master tape, plus the scenes shot in the midst of an actual surveillance trade show, provide interesting snapshots of the technology of the time.
"The Conversation" is not something you'll show at parties or pop on idly for background noise on a rainy afternoon; it's too dark for that. But I do recommend you view it at least once, and deal with the questions it poses.Read full review
