131 - The Conversation

    A surveillance expert records a conversation between two people.  Since he still feels guilty about a prior job where someone killed his targets, he feels increasingly nervous about the results of this job.
    Another Coppola movie - that makes three so far this year.  I had never heard of this, but it seemed to be worth it.  A notable cast, including Harrison Ford, Gene Hackman, Teri Garr… it's an impressive lineup.
    It's not as ambitious in scale as Coppola's other movies.  There are some big shots and sequences, but much of the movie is taken up with smaller locations, smaller sets, and more intimate shots of his subjects.
    Despite this description, I think I prefer this to The Godfather or Apocalypse Now.  There's a nice development of character, and despite Harry Caul's oddities, it's easy for the audience to start identifying with him as his story moves along.  In fact, it would be easy to play the story with a stronger horror angle, but the direction doesn't feel manipulative.  It keeps things very firmly ambiguous, and we're left with an uneasy feeling, which is what I think we're supposed to get.
    This movie throws the viewer into a world of surveillance, which doesn't come across the way it does nowadays.  I've been pretty confident since 9/11 that effectively all computer, phone, and banking activities have been monitored.  I've found it a little puzzling that there's been surprise at the scope of these programs.  The difference is that most of us offer little that would be of interest to the government, local authorities, or anyone outside of our immediate circles.  And that's where this movie targets.  We don't know what the relationship is between the client and the targets, only that they have some kind of relationship.  The idea that a direct conversation, in a crowded place, with lots of ambient noise, could be recorded and cleaned up so effectively is a little chilling.  The world of these experts is strange, but it's mostly because there's no particular moral code among them.  It's all just a job.  There's an obvious parallel drawn here, between doing this work, and prostitution, which seems a little heavy-handed.  Regardless, it's an effective idea.
    I like it.  I don't know how likely it is that I'll revisit it, but it's one of these movies that will probably stick with me.