The Conversation

Before I go into a full post about this film, I have to imagine the way I would pitch it to a stranger who had just asked me "Should I see The Conversation?" 

       Do you like meta critical film soundtracks that are full of foley sound? Because if so this film is totally up your alley.

Now that wouldn't necessarily describe my usual first choice of film to see, but in this case, The Conversation (1974), directed by Francis Ford Coppola, ended up being one of my favorite films of the semester. The film centers around surveillance expert Harry Caul and a specific case he has been investigating. Caul carries out this investigation by recording his subjects (a couple) as they walk around Union Square in San Fransisco. He does this by utilizing multiple targeted long range microphones from overlooking windows and by having a man tail the couple in question. Later, Caul is seen mixing adjusting the volume and frequency on each recording to get a complete audio recording of the conversation. It is worth noting that this opening scene is revisited throughout the film to the point where it serves as exposition, rising action, and plays heavily towards the climax of the film as well.
This scene is just one example of both the film's innovative use of sound and the meta critical nature of the film. Supervising editior and sound editor Walter Murch explained the electronic component sound heard in the opening scene of The Conversation in an interview, saying, "This film was made in 1973, but we said: 'There's going to be digital sound. Let's pretend somehow that Harry Caul has his hand on some prototype digital processing equipment, and when he's recording these people's voices, he's recording some kind of digital interference matrixing'" (Sound-On-Film,  88-89). The fact that the sound design anticipates (and pretty successfully) the types of noises made by digital sound interference is innovative in itself, however, it is doubly so when considering the pervasiveness of this device throughout the plot. The presence of these devices and numerous scenes in which Caul mixes sound advance to the meta criticism, showing processes that are inherently similar to processes utilized in creating The Conversation.
Another example of the innovation in this film is also related to the opening scene. In the same interview in the book Sound on Film, Murch described the way in which the audio for this sequence was recorded. When asked if they began with a clean studio recording of the dialogue, Murch responds frankly. "No, we didn't." He continues, saying "We had a conversation recorded at Union Square with three cameras and radio mikes" (90). Murch talks about how this method of recording seemed like it would be simple, but that they encountered a large number of radio waves that interfered with their mikes. After recording the scene several times, they were able to put together a mix of those recordings and additional sound, recorded in a more controlled environment. The methods that Murch and Coppola used and the problems they encountered while recording were relatively new at the time the film was made (Nashville is famous for using radio mikes, but they did that in '75!). Additionally, this method is intensely meta critical, as the sound heard in the film was actually recorded in a convoluted way almost identical to the way this recording process is depicted in the film.
The remarkable use of sound is also present in the final scene, in which Caul himself has been bugged. Caul is shown breaking apart his apartment (perhaps a metaphor for the breakdown he is undergoing as a victim of his own craft) in search of the secret recording device. The sound for this sequence is perhaps the most detailed use of Foley I have ever seen. Every single minute action on screen in this sequence is audible, and it is all added via Foley art.

Combined with the ominous music, partially drawn from the sound in the opening scene, these sounds help provide a clear picture of Caul's disturbance by clarifying the detail of his destruction.
Sound serves a clarifying purpose throughout The Conversation. In many instances, this sound is the product of an innovative method of recording and presentation. I think, however, my favorite part of the sound how self-reflexive it is. There's nothing like a good movie that knows it's a movie, and here we have a great soundtrack that knows it's a soundtrack.