Workshop on The Conversation

1) Look at the opening sequence, up to Harry Caul's return home and the end of his phone
call, trying (with all those difficulties mentioned in the ‘Film Sound’ file...) to focus on sound.

In general- what kind of intro to Harry Caul and his work and to the couple and their situation (i.e.
the enigma the film wants us to be intrigued by)?

What kinds of diegetic music (i.e emerging from- in this case being performed live in- the world of
the film)

What kinds of image/sound combinations or juxtapositions?

What kind of non-diegetic music? (i.e. ‘soundtrack’ music, added post-production, NOT having a
source in the fictional world)

Does the sound being recorded on directional microphones have particular effects in the
sequence?

Harry Caul- what kind of man? How have they intro’d him, what is he doing, wearing, how does he
look?

How does his attitude to work get underlined in the extract? What contrasts him to his co-worker
Stan and their collaborator?

What is our intro to Harry’s apartment? How is the telephone call presented to us? (think of other
ways calls can be conveyed on film)
My thoughts on opening sequence:

To some extent it is a zoom on/of sound. The directional microphones picking up more
sound/louder diegetic sound from the square, the closer we get to it. We start with a very high-
angled long shot of a square in San Francisco- we can see/hear almost nothing of particularly
identifiable nature

The 1st distortion (probably a 'sound effect') to represent the 'blocked' recordings is potentially
unsettling/disquieting (some people, nowadays, restart their dvd as if it were a glitch on the disc)
which is in keeping with the sub-genre of 'paranoid conspiracy thrillers' this film emerged
amongst. It has sinister metallic overtones- some alien/inhumane force is surveilling the situation.
(The film is sometimes written about in connection to the ‘Watergate Scandal’ and fall of Pres Nixon-
he planted bugs and used secret service personnel to spy on the Democrats- but Coppola mentions
on the commentary that they knew nothing about it at the time).

the 1st cutaway shots show a telescopic mike/sight, looks like an assassin's rifle (1973-4, after a
decade of high-profile US assassinations, contributing to that paranoia)

There are 2 kinds of diegetic music- a jazz band busking for xmas; bongo drummers; again they
get much louder when the camera/direct sound recording is at ground level

Direct sound means quite a naturalistic/realistic soundscape: overlapping conversations

sometimes drown each other/ being drowned out. Direct sound recording still relatively new in early
70s.

Harry - intro'd avoiding the mime (!) avoiding attention as usual; costume? - ordinary middle-aged
man: suit, tie, white shirt, specs – an old-fashoned man compared to the longer-haired 70s men
around him PLUS his trademark plastic mac (grey!) which he always wears on the job, like a
protective cover?

Obsessed with his work and its technology, perfectionist, professional c.f. Stan/others- banter,
questioning why

Image/sound combinations: Harry walking across the road when she is saying 'look at that poor
guy...etc'

1st non-diegetic music occurs to show Harry, alone. Solo piano, recurring motif, repetitive, circular
form. melancholy, sad tone. So prevalent in the film it becomes 'Harry's theme';

Harry's apartment- lives alone/jealously protects his privacy; sound 'off' of landlord's end of the
phone call (again emphasis on isolation/loneliness?)

Harry plays jazz (like a virtuoso) but as a solo accompanist to recorded bands/groups (collectives,
like the happy one performing in the square). Jazz is associated with freedom of expression, each
band member collaborating but getting their moment of solo creativity- counterposed to Harry’s
ordered and guarded existence.

2) 2nd sequence: refuses to hand over tapes to Harrison Ford's character. I usually start the
sequence from him getting into the lift, away from Ford and show it up to Harry arriving in
the church for confession.

How are Point of view shots used in the company building to give us a sense of Harry’s
frame of mind in refusing the handover?
What about P.O.V. and sound? Back at his workshop, Harry plays and replays the tapes
but is interrupted by Stan- what does their discussion and disagreement reveal about Harry
here?

Alone, he works and reworks the tape, ‘revealing’ what he thinks to be the truth of the
situation: how are image and sound combined in this part of the sequence? What is Harry
thinking?
 Thoughts on sequence 2:

We get Harry’s point of view of the couple, separately- they both work there; there is then
subjectivised sound in the lift, amplified noise of the lift mechanism indicating his
concern about the woman, from whom he almost cowers away in the lift, clutching the
file/tapes protectively across his body (clad, of course, in his grey plastic mac).

A Sound bridge (editing technique bringing ‘in advance’ the sound of one space into the
preceding one, to take us there) is used in lift of the screeching tape reels rewinding, taking
us to the work space, but also suggesting Harry's nervous agitation about this job.

Debate with Stan- bad faith of his statements (just do the job/don't ask questions)
revealed/contradicted by his obsessive, meticulous (re)working of the tape until it supposedly
reveals 'the truth'.

Blasphemy/saying things out loud.

Film reworks the images for us while he constantly replays extracts. Subjective? His POV shot
of the couple's still image; later the corner has curled over, to focus only on her. Attracted to
her? Sexist assumption that she is a victim..?

3) The 'murder'

Ambitious attempt to represent a dramatic turning point, a murder, almost exclusively by use
of sound or at least without direct images of it.  Look at Harry’s preparatory work before
managing to listen in- why, after all that effort does he throw the headphones away in
disgust?

Can we really be sure a murder is happening/has happened? Look for (and LISTEN
FOR!) the evidence

After the fact - how is his search for evidence represented- what significance is there that the
evidence eventually turns up (erupts ) from the toilet?
 There’s been a murder (or has there?)

His arrival at the hotel room, preparation for listening- the wall is a mural of a fictionalised
version of the city outside. Voyeurism by sound- access via toilet wall: Freudian..? It’s a dirty
job?

BUT instantly throws the headphones away after all that prep. when? When he hears HIS
recordings being used to confront the couple. Guilt, personal involvement/implication in pain
and violence being done to someone (just as he confesses earlier)

then we are entirely unsure what, if anything, is happening next door:

 
there is a hand/some blood on the balcony glass. There is augmented booming on the soundtrack, as
Harry begins to react in panic. What there IS is a Hitchcockian distorted screech on the soundtrack.
Harry's mental collapse? revulsion at (another) death on his conscience? or a self-conscious
soundtrack marker that a death IS occurring?

He curls into a foetal ball, pulls the cover over his head, and underlining the child-like reaction, there
is a Flintstones cartoon on tv when he 'awakes'/returns to reality (seems later, it's dark) in which Fred
is 'having a baby'.

His (again meticulous) search for evidence of the crime is also self-consciously cinephile: because
we heard the screech, it must've been in the shower, like Psycho right..? Interestingly there is
arguably MORE suspense in the search after than in the initial murder.

Again no clear sense of whether the blood really DOES erupt from a blocked toilet, but Freud and 
Lacan may ride again in considering why the evidence is THERE (Zizek talked about it as the return of
the repressed in The Pervert's Guide to the Cinema). Students in previous years have suggested he
has almost as much revulsion at (commitment to) the opposite sex as Carole in Repulsion! And
therefore the blood/white tissue that erupts is symbolic of sexual difference (menstruation).

4) The end of the film is powerful in its use of sound: the playback on his phone (unlike the
1st phone call, we can hear the other end this time) interrupts his jazz playing, showing him
they are watching/listening and he is at their mercy.

He dismantles the room as if smashing his whole life/identity – again, like Carole, he is associated
with a ‘safe space’ that is now invaded/spoiled (they shot it in a row of houses due for demolition-
they had the good fortune to reveal children’s wallpaper with an aeroplane motif in the room as he
tears it apart); by the end he is playing sax again BUT improvising around ‘his’ NON-diegetic theme
music, NOT a vinyl recording.

Where IS the bug? Probably in his glasses- there’s a shot of Frederic Forrest having his specs
removed randomly (or not) inserted into the editing of the concluding sequence. But it doesn’t matter
where- its presence provokes breakdown- the bugger bugged, the biter bit, the spy spied upon.

The Independent on Sunday listed it in their top 10 all-time best endings to a film. And if you didn’t
like it/Harry Caul, imagine meeting him again helping Will Smith to escape surveillance in Tony Scott’s
Enemy of the State!