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Obviously, this is being posted because of the NSA and FBI scandals even though it was, originally, more of a response to the Watergate scandal. Even if you're
by beloch 13y ago
Obviously, this is being posted because of the NSA and FBI scandals even though it was, originally, more of a response to the Watergate scandal. Even if you're sick of hearing about all of those this is still a fantastic film and well worth watching.
Gene Hackman plays a private consultant who specializes in the surveillance of difficult targets, such as people talking as they walk through a crowd. Technology is handled brilliantly in this film. It's antiquated analogue 70's tech obviously, but it's also both believable and impressive. Hackman's character is layered and complex. He specializes in surveillance but values his own privacy to the point of paranoia. The Conversation makes an incredibly strong statement about the value of privacy and the price of destroying it. Who watches the watchers? Somebody apparently, and the watchers don't like it one bit!
If you're not convinced, read one of Ebert's reviews.
http://www.rogerebert.com/reviews/the-conversation-1974 http://www.rogerebert.com/reviews/the-conversation-1974
http://www.rogerebert.com/reviews/great-movie-the-conversation-1974 http://www.rogerebert.com/reviews/great-movie-the-conversati...
- pvarangot 13y agoThe film is also still really fresh if you are a seasoned technologist. Hackman's character goes to a trade show in one part of the movie where he looks at all the new surveilance equipment he can buy and talks to some vendors, and it really feels amazingly real and accurate.
- ojbyrne 13y agoWhenever I debug some particularly difficult bug, I think of the scene where he basically tears his house down looking for the other kind of bug.
- awongh 13y agoalso, if you live in the sf bay area, it has a lot of cool location shots from that era.
- anigbrowl 13y agoI, too, love this film, to the point that I ended up in the same line of work - mostly for the entertainment industry, but sometimes for other purposes. He specializes in surveillance but values his own privacy to the point of paranoia. There's a striking overlap between people who argue that information ought ot be free and that scraping content or user data is a perfectly legitimate business tactic, and people who are shocked, shocked [1]to discover that the government is not excluded from such activities. 1. per Captain Renault in Casablanca.
- jfb 13y agoIt's also a great San Francisco movie.
- vorg 13y ago> "Obviously, this is being posted because”... Or maybe it's part of someone showing off to someone else that they're part of the action.
- icebraining 13y agoA fantastic film, and with a great soundtrack to boot! I've listened to it far too many times after watching the film.