♣ The Conversation
Tuesday 24 April 2007
I started watching this film completely on a whim, and it paid off hugely. I had heard mention of the film before, but Gene Hackman (who plays the main protagonist Harry Caul) had never been one of my favourite actors, and the idea of a film based around the adventures of an audio surveillance expert seemed a little bit to techno-focused and dated for my liking.
Obviously I learnt nothing from the revelation that was Blow Up, a film which incidentally I think The Conversation shares a great deal with. Where Blow Up was concerned with the medium of the still photograph, The Conversation is focused on the medium of audio. The film, which appeared post-Watergate Scandal examines the conflict between the modern intrusions of privacy afforded by the rapid advancement of technology. As a result, a number of postmodern conditions are touched upon. Claustraphobia and isolation, voyeurism, betrayal, paranoia and transcience are all commented upon to greater or lesser effect. But enough of the themes for now, lets move on to the plot proper.
The haunted surveillance expert (Caul) pursues a case (seemingly of marital infidelity) and in doing so discovers that he has become the victim of his own technological profession and intrigue by film's end. (His last name, 'caul', literally means the protective, embryonic membrane that sometimes covers the head of a child at birth.) Well that's it in a nutshell. The film itself is as binary in structure as the polarity of it's themes might suggest. The first half is slow and deliberate, reflecting Harry's own impotence in taking the course of action he feels is needed by the information he finds buried deep on his audio recording. The second half is charachterised by its decision, its assertiveness and its questioning. Harry only realises that he himself is being bugged in the second half, even though a great deal of the first half is spent showing just how protective and closed he is socially and in his work.
At roughly half way, Harry resolves to prevent the murders he believes will inevitably occur as a result of his surveillance attempts. He takes a room next door to the one the couple he first recorded said they would meet at. He listens, as he always does, and crucially, he makes no real move of action, but remains passive. A series of disturbing scenes follow, with Harry seeing blood in a number of different places; though it is never made clear to the audience whether this blood is a result of his paranoia or part of an elaborate deception.
This transition from more deliberate, brooding tones to frenzied neurotic ones works as more than just a charachter development however. It's also an effective device to draw the audience into Harry's own neuroses. As the scenes become increasingly more frantic, we find ourselves questioning our own presumptions about the film, and in a dramatic and even shocking climax, must admit, just as Harry does, that our own perceptions cannot always tell us everything. Even with the best surveillance in the world, we can be duped by ourselves. This is an important message, and one the film shows off quite tastefully. Harry destroys his equipment, searching for the bug we know is in the room, and yet finds nothing. He returns finally to playing his saxophone, a return to the most human part of himself, away from the constructs and artificiality his work afforded him.
We know that you know, Mr. Caul. For your own sake, don't get involved any further. We'll be listening to you. (He hears a playback of his own saxophone playing)
In an expanse on this idea, one of my favourite scenes occurs at the hotel Harry goes to, trying to determine the fate of the couple he recorded. In a series fo shots Harry is filmed through a number of different mediums; a shower curtain, the mottled glass of a patio window, and a mirror. Inviting the audience, no, forcing the audience into a direct involvement with Harry's paranoia of being watched, it works fantastically.
I like to always examine the dimension between charachters in films and texts, and The Conversation, though not presenting a great number of human dynamics, nonetheless has a great deal of thematic content. The subject of relationships are touched upon, in exactly the same way we would expect Harry to deal with them. Harry falls out with his co-worker Stan over the fairly minor issue of blasphemy, and as for more sunsual relationships, we see only two examples. In the first, we see Harry in what seems to be a genuinely tender but rather stifled relationship with a woman he pays the rent for called Amy. Though we never see there relationship develop to a physical extent, there is a warmth between the two which suggests there might be. However, angered by Amy's qestioning, Harry makes his exit. The second encounter with a woman shows Harry eventually consenting to a friend's (Meredith's) pleas that he 'trust her.' He relates the stroy of Amy and him, and asks Meredith's advice. Harry is hurt when he finds his private conversation has been recorded, and still later when after spending the night with Meredith he finds his tapes have been stolen. These relations show the paradox of Harry's human relations. In the first, there is a willing and genuine concern for him his shown by Amy , but he resents this, and cannot keep his guard down, eventually finiding himself unable to trust her. In the second, on realising his mistake with Amy, he breaks down into tears and wears his heart on his sleeve, only to be double-crossed by Meredith. No wonder he puts these boundary's up in front of him. It is a strength of the film to portray a man of such seemingly irreconcilable work and social ethics. For a man whose job it is to become so intimate with other's conversations and relations, he is remarkably inadequate in his own love life.
Meredith: Something is on your mind. I wish you'd tell me. I do, I wish that, I wish that you'd feel that you could talk to me and, and that we could be friends, I mean, aside from all of this junk.
Harry: (after a long pause) If you were a girl who waited for someone...
Meredith: You can trust me.
Harry: ...and you never really knew when he was gonna come to see you. You just lived in a room alone and you knew nothing about him. And if you loved him and were patient with him, and even though he didn't dare ever tell you anything about himself personally, even though he may have loved you, would you..would you, would you go back to him?
Meredith: How would I know - how would I know that he loved me?
Harry: You'd have no way of knowing.
So then, a verdict. Masterfully shot by Coppolla, this relatively low budget film makes an important move forward; tending to focus on the internal struggles of man, rather than focusing more on the battle between social obligation and personal conviction shown so eloquently on The Godfather II. Special mention must be made to the music within the piece. Utilising the squeals and burbles of audio recording eqipment, it really draws you into the paranoi and obsession of Harry, and works remarkably well.
Tintin's Verdict? 5 Mass-hypnotised Gallic Catoon charachters
Labels: film
posted by danny @ 15:29,
