*** 1\2 (out of ****)
The movie starts off with a bird's eye view looking down on a San Francisco park of a crowd of people walking and talking. As the observers we don't know who to follow. Who are we looking for? Where should our eyes settle? And from who's vantage point are we seeing this? That, to me, is the point of Francis Ford Coppola's "The Conversation". Eyes and ears are always upon us. No action goes undetected.
It is a fitting message for today's technology age when the government and corporate America eavesdrop on citizens under the dual guises of "national security" and good ol' fashion commercialism. But in 1974 it could have been viewed as a commentary on Nixon and Watergate. Released two years after that infamous hotel break-in, here is a story dealing with wiretapping, hotels, and paranoia. It's hard not to think of Nixon.
But Coppola's ambitious, thought-provoking, and nuanced cornerstone of 1970s American cinema, can also be viewed minus the political messaging and simply as a story about loneliness, secrets, and privacy. The lengths an individual will go through to isolate himself to protect his privacy and the consequences of those actions in what is ultimately a fruitless exercise.
Gene Hackman is Harry Caul, a middle-aged man that works in surveillance. Highly regarded in his profession, some would call him an expert, all want to know his tricks. The day we meet Harry it is his birthday. When he walks into his apartment no one is there to greet him. He has no family. He opens three locks on his door before he can enter. He takes his privacy serious. When the door opens an alarm goes off. Harry shuts off his security system but wait a minute, a birthday gift has been left inside the apartment. Who left it and how did the person get in? Having left a birthday card with the gift, Harry discovers it was left by the landlord, who naturally had a key (which Harry didn't know) and knew it was his birthday. So much for privacy!
Later that day Harry walks into an apartment building and enters his girlfriend, Amy's (Terri Garr) apartment. It is not a warm welcome on either person's part. Amy doesn't even know it is Harry's birthday. When she asks him how old he is, he lies (the landlord knew his age!). Amy wants their relationship to grow and learn more about Harry. He can't commit to such demands. Amy even reveals she always knows when Harry is about to enter her apartment based on the way he opens the door. She even tells Harry she once spotted him waiting outside of her apartment though he never entered.
There is the irony of the fact Harry works in surveillance and yet people enter his apartment without is knowledge, he is spotted spying on others, people know his birthday and age but Coppola and "The Conversation" don't play this for comedy or even put dramatic emphasis on it. We just quietly observe. Our mind goes back to the first sequence - eyes and ears are all around us. Harry even believes his telephone number is unlisted and yet he receives phone calls. No one's life is a complete secret. A surveillance expert, above all others, should have known this.
As Coppola and his movie slowly reveal details about Harry we discover he is Catholic. A statue of the Virgin Mary stands in his apartment. We even see him go to church and hear his confession. Here is another example of eyes and ears all around us. As it states in the Bible (Proverbs 15:3) "the eyes of the Lord are in every place, beholding the evil and the good". Again, I call your attention to the movie's first sequence and what I called the "bird's eye view". Could it also be interpreted as having a religious meaning? Looking down from the Heavens, "God's eye view".
Catholic guilt will soon consume Harry because the opening sequence, we eventually find out, involved Harry working on an assignment. He has been paid to follow and record a man (Frederic Forrest) and a woman (Cindy Williams) having a conversation in the park. To outsider's ears the conversation doesn't amount to much. Harry doesn't even know why the person wants the conversation recorded or the individual's relationship to either of these people. It doesn't matter to Harry because it is just a job but then something happens. Did the man say "He'd kill us if he got the chance"? Who is "he"? The man paying Harry? What will happen when Harry hands him the recording? But Harry isn't sure what was said. This takes on further implications when we learn back in New York one of Harry's assignments may have lead to the death of two people. Harry takes no responsibility, as we hear during his confession but can he really be sure he bears no responsibility? That feeling of guilt makes him question what is the moral thing to do.
In a sense "The Conversation" is a thriller but there are no car chases and explosions. I don't believe modern audiences would recognize it as a thriller but Coppola creates suspense and builds tension. Someone wants Harry's tapes. That is the person calling his supposedly unlisted number. Harry suspects he is being followed and soon paranoia sets in. Who is watching Harry? Can his apartment be bugged?
Of the many great actors of Hackman's generation I believe only he could bring out the sensitivity of the character. Al Pacino and Robert De Niro are too macho. Maybe Dustin Hoffman would have been interesting to watch. There is a lot of vulnerability in the way Hackman plays Harry. One of my favorite scenes is between Harry and a woman he has met for the first time. Harry wants the woman's advice on something and gives her a "hypothetical" situation which seems to mirror Harry's own with Amy. It is essentially a "confession" but it is more sincere than his actual confession at church. Harry is aware of the choices he is making and the negative consequences of those choices.
The movie ends with a famous sequence involving Harry receiving a phone call as a recording of him in his apartment is heard on the other end of the line. A voice informs Harry they will be listening to him. Harry has tried to live a life devoid of meaningful, personal interaction to protect himself, to shield himself, and live a life of privacy. Where has it gotten him? In a completely justified act of paranoia he strips down his apartment to the bare essentials, just as he has stripped down his life, desperately looking for the microphone bugging his apartment. One of the last objects he hesitates to inspect is his Virgin Mary statue because it would mean breaking it. In the end there Harry sits, in his broken apartment, playing his saxophone. Couldn't the saxophone be bugged? That was what was played back to him over the phone. Could the saxophone have been as much an object as salvation as the statue? It is the one thing Harry didn't break. What else in life besides music does Harry have? What has he left himself, even before destroying his apartment?
Watching "The Conversation" again two things struck me. Both filled me with disappointment and are two sides of the same coin. One - why can't filmmakers make movies like "The Conversation" anymore? Character studies that just follow people. Hollywood seems so mired in politics and social messaging that it interferes with those old-fashion concepts of artistic merit and good storytelling. Two - is "The Conversation" too slow for today's audience? Steven Soderbergh released "Kimi" (2022) this year. It was obviously inspired by movies like "The Conversation" and Antonioni's "Blow-Up" (1966) and may prove to be one of the year's best movies but it moves so fast. Audiences seem to need a lot of action. Character studies may not hold their attention. We can't take a moment to reflect on things. People confuse me. On one hand they will sit and binge watch an entire Netflix series but seem to have short attention spans. A lot of movies, especially the Netflix movies, run over two hours (when did this trend happen that all movies must be over two hours) but they don't ask much of us attention-wise. The movies have gotten longer but they have less meaningful things to say. Even today's "message movies" feel rather pedantic.
"The Conversation" was released after Francis Ford Coppola had broken out into the mainstream with the release of "The Godfather" (1972). In the same year as "The Conversation", "The Godfather Part II" (1974) would also be released and that would be the movie Coppola would win the Academy Award for best director. Both movies however are actually about dealing with the consequences of our choices. "The Conversation" is the more subtle of the two and it was the movie Coppola said was his most personal. It would win three Academy Award nominations of its own (Picture, Screenplay, and Sound) and was even the preferred movie choice that year for both Siskel and Ebert, placing on both of their annual top ten list, leaving "The Godfather Part II" off.
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