The Conversation

press release:

USA | 1974 | 35mm | 113 min.

Director: Francis Ford Coppola

Cast: Gene Hackman, John Cazale, Allen Garfield

In perhaps his finest performance, Hackman plays surveillance expert Harry Caul, an extremely private man whose life is rudely invaded when his eavesdropping leads him too close to the truth. Made between the first and second Godfather films, Coppola’s intelligent and personal character piece stands as one of the great films of the 1970s. A rare IB Technicolor print, struck for the original release, will be shown.

Special Presentations: Spring 2017 is filled with numerous special repertory screenings. Our lineup includes several new restorations, including new DCPs of Julie Dash’s landmark movie Daughters of the Dust, Juzo Itami’s uproarious food comedy Tampopo, and Julien Duvivier’s terrific thriller Panique. We will also present a new DCP of the long-thought-lost RKO proto-disaster movie Deluge which will screen as part of a “flood and fire” double feature with a 35mm print of another RKO super production, The Last Days of Pompeii. Other 35mm showings include the ultra-rare "Moment in Time" cut of animator Richard Williams' magnum opus, The Thief and the Cobbler; Ingmar Bergman’s film of Mozart’s The Magic Flute and two fine IB Technicolor prints of Francis Ford Coppola’s two 1974 releases (and Best Picture Oscar nominees) The Godfather Part II and The Conversation. Plus an evening of musical Vitaphone shorts and live musical performance; Al Pacino in William Friedkin’s controversial Cruising; and two very different Cannon Films adaptations of an Elmore Leonard crime novel classic (52 Pick-Up), made only two years apart!

All Cinematheque screenings are free and open to the public.