``The Conversation'' Coppola's 1974 work is a sharp warning for modern society.

“The Conversation” Synopsis

San Francisco. Professional eavesdropper Harry Cole watches a young couple strolling through the square. At his request, he recorded the couple's conversations on tape. Harry, who has given up his "curiosity" due to his years of experience, handles his work calmly. However, the next day, Harry breaks his own policy and plays the tape due to his suspicions about his client. Then, a voice hinting at a murder was recorded...

Index

• The movie that master director Coppola really wanted to make
• Influence from two works
• A film that achieved Coppola's unique aesthetic.
• Modernity influences many filmmakers

The movie that master director Coppola really wanted to make

``The Conversation'', directed by master director Francis Ford Coppola in 1974, was shot between his masterpieces `` The Godfather '' (1972) and `` The Godfather Part II '' (1974). Coppola himself has said that this film is ``the embodiment of the movie that I really want to make.''

Originally, he was attracted to original and personal stories that followed the European trend of the late 1950s and early 1960s, such as La Dolce Vita (60) and 8½ (63). For him, his original screenplays for ``The Woman in the Rain'' (1969) and ``The Conversation'' were the films he was originally aiming for.

Coppola wanted to make this film immediately after The Woman in the Rain, but he was unable to raise the funds for his original script (at the same time, he started working with American, the film production company he had founded with George Lucas). This also coincided with the fact that Zoetrope's first film, `` THX 1138, '' released in 1971, was a commercial failure), so he put this project on hold and had no choice but to work on it to make a living at the urging of Lucas and others. That was ``The Godfather.''

Due to the unexpected success of The Godfather, Coppola was able to secure funding from Paramount, which made the film a reality.

“The Conversation” Preview

The idea for this film came in 1966, when Coppola was around 27 years old, from a chat with Irvin Kershner, who would go on to direct `` Star Wars: The Empire Strikes Back '' (1980). Coppola learned that a shotgun microphone with a gun sight could be used to zero in on the mouths of people far away in a crowd and pick up their conversations. What if there was a secret hidden in that conversation? ...From this device and motif, he expanded his delusions.

One day, professional eavesdropper Harry Cole (Gene Hackman) receives a request from a director of a large company to eavesdrop on the conversation of a young man and woman meeting in secret in a crowded Union Square. Harry hears the mysterious words, ``If given the Being There, he intends to kill us,'' and proceeds to analyze the audio tape on his own. Who are that couple? What do they really mean? Who wants the tape? Harry listens to the same conversation over and over again, trying to figure out the tape's purpose.

Influence from two works