Blowup vs The Conversation vs Blow Out

Blowup, The Conversation or Blow Out?


  • Total voters
    8
  • Poll closed .

version

Well-known member
I'm going to vote for Blow Out since it's the one I watched most recently and I love the scene where he reenacts the recording process with the pencil, also the bit where he puts the recording together with the footage like his own Zapruder film, the spinning sequence where he realises the tapes have all been erased and the fireworks at the end.
 

version

Well-known member
Something which has always stood out to me about The Conversation is how unsettling Harrison Ford is in it. You never really think of him as a villain and I can't think of any other film where he is one.
 
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WashYourHands

Cat Malogen
The Conversation for Hackman and dislocating editing techniques. The way it mixes open sound vistas into claustrophobic, paranoid recordings of intimate human exchanges results in a genius psycho-sphere, where Hackman’s restraint and presence shines

Not just a classic, a monument
 

version

Well-known member
The Conversation for Hackman and dislocating editing techniques. The way it mixes open sound vistas into claustrophobic, paranoid recordings of intimate human exchanges results in a genius psycho-sphere, where Hackman’s restraint and presence shines

Not just a classic, a monument
I remember finding it surprisingly frightening. I don't think I expected it to be as eerie as it turned out to be. The score plays a big part.



For those who've seen it, do you subscribe to the theory that the bug's in his sax or do you just take it as being somewhere and the actual location not being the point?
 

WashYourHands

Cat Malogen
Not sure about the bug, it has a mood that‘s relentless in penning part of your fear response to the wall, subtle too and a bit like Roeg for editing juxtapositions. The threat tightens like asthma
 

version

Well-known member
Not sure about the bug, it has a mood that‘s relentless in penning part of your fear response to the wall, subtle too and a bit like Roeg for editing juxtapositions. The threat tightens like asthma
The toilet scene's horrifying. I'm still not sure whether he actually sees it or whether it's some sort of hallucination.

Talking of Roeg, I finally watched Don't Look Now the other day and found it pretty disappointing. I thought the sex scene, the general atmosphere and shots of the alleys and waterways of Venice and some of the editing was good, but it never really came together. I already knew about the twist with the dwarf too, so it didn't have the shock factor either.

The one of his I'm really intrigued by and might buy just to watch is Eureka, another Hackman thing; The Witches and Walkabout were both good.
 

craner

Beast of Burden
The toilet scene's horrifying. I'm still not sure whether he actually sees it or whether it's some sort of hallucination.

Talking of Roeg, I finally watched Don't Look Now the other day and found it pretty disappointing. I thought the sex scene, the general atmosphere and shots of the alleys and waterways of Venice and some of the editing was good, but it never really came together. I already knew about the twist with the dwarf too, so it didn't have the shock factor either.

The one of his I'm really intrigued by and might buy just to watch is Eureka, another Hackman thing; The Witches and Walkabout were both good.

Aldo Lado's Who Saw Her Die? is a better Venetian chiller.
 

version

Well-known member
I think Blow Out's probably the weakest of the three because De Palma's so on the nose, but then that's kind of the appeal of De Palma too. You don't watch something like Body Double for subtlety. He's screaming the stuff about watching and voyeurism and the artifice of images and film at you.
 

WashYourHands

Cat Malogen
The toilet scene's horrifying. I'm still not sure whether he actually sees it or whether it's some sort of hallucination.

Talking of Roeg, I finally watched Don't Look Now the other day and found it pretty disappointing. I thought the sex scene, the general atmosphere and shots of the alleys and waterways of Venice and some of the editing was good, but it never really came together. I already knew about the twist with the dwarf too, so it didn't have the shock factor either.

The one of his I'm really intrigued by and might buy just to watch is Eureka, another Hackman thing; The Witches and Walkabout were both good.

Eureka is a bit more clunky. It gets at the cold a bit like McCabe & Mrs. Miller does with the weird dialled up. It was on C4 late one night and didn’t see it again until demonoid era
 

version

Well-known member
Eureka is a bit more clunky. It gets at the cold a bit like McCabe & Mrs. Miller does with the weird dialled up. It was on C4 late one night and didn’t see it again until demonoid era
There's a proper Blu-ray of it now, released by... Eureka!

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version

Well-known member
Hackman's one of those people who elevates a film by presence alone, even a dud like Behind Enemy Lines.
 

Leo

Well-known member
I remember finding it surprisingly frightening. I don't think I expected it to be as eerie as it turned out to be. The score plays a big part.

one of the few original soundtracks I own. I read hackman learned to play sax for the part, and that's actually him playing. not sure if that's for all of the score, or just the scenes he's in.
 

catalog

Well-known member
Something which has always stood out to me about The Conversation is how unsettling Harrison Ford is in it. You never really think of him as a villain and I can't think of any other film where he is one.
He is sort of a villain in apocalypse now, but it's so brief it's not really anything noticeable
 

catalog

Well-known member
I liked Rififi, Topkapi and Le Cercle Rouge, but I dunno whether the former two count as Dassin was an American in exile.
Le Samurai by Melville is good. Most Melvilles are very good. L.627 is brilliant. As is La Haine. Also Betty Blue is very good. And that newish director, Jacques Audiard, was very exciting for a bit... The beat that my heart skipped, a prophet.
 

catalog

Well-known member
I don't have a lot of time for godard, but alphaville is a lot of fun. And truffaut is good: 400 blows, bande a part.

My favourite French new wave director is Eric rohmer. I love the green way. He's very whimsical but if you're in the right mood, there's something about how he does things thats great.
 

catalog

Well-known member
Truffaut is a weird one, he's kind of annoying, too earnest, but those early films are really good, really zippy with a lot of life. And his book of interviews with hitchcock is excellent.
 
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