He’d kill us if he had the chance.
This ominous phrase lies at the center of the plot in Francis Ford Coppola’s brilliant 1974 thriller “The Conversation”.
The film tells a story about listening. Gene Hackman plays Harry Caul – a surveillance expert with a unique ability to record private conversations. He’s a clever investigator and he’s skilled at manipulating (the hilariously analog) 70s-era surveillance technology.
After bugging a particularly important conversation, Hackman’s character spends hours and hours listening to the tape in search of answers.
But he doesn’t really listen. And people die as a result.
