The Parallax View (1974)
Country: US
Technical: col/scope 102m
Director: Alan J. Pakula
Cast: Warren Beatty, Paula Prentiss, William Daniels, Hume Cronyn
Synopsis:
Convinced of an assassination cover-up by the mysterious deaths of those who were also present, a journalist resolves that the only way to infiltrate the organisation and uncover the truth is to apply as an assassin himself.
Review:
One of a number of political thrillers in the seventies to have been formed by the experience of the 1960s (Kennedy et al.), and one of the best. Pakula conjures an ambience of utter mistrust and takes care not to make everything crystal clear. The film-making is first-rate, with imaginative framings and transitions, and an unsettling soundtrack that perfectly captures the paranoia and alienation of the era. The paper napkin scene on the plane is a Hitchcockian treat if ever there was one, and the sousaphone player at the climax seems to have strayed in from a contemporaneous Woody Allen movie, but these are the only ripples in the atmosphere of sustained unpredictability.
Country: US
Technical: col/scope 102m
Director: Alan J. Pakula
Cast: Warren Beatty, Paula Prentiss, William Daniels, Hume Cronyn
Synopsis:
Convinced of an assassination cover-up by the mysterious deaths of those who were also present, a journalist resolves that the only way to infiltrate the organisation and uncover the truth is to apply as an assassin himself.
Review:
One of a number of political thrillers in the seventies to have been formed by the experience of the 1960s (Kennedy et al.), and one of the best. Pakula conjures an ambience of utter mistrust and takes care not to make everything crystal clear. The film-making is first-rate, with imaginative framings and transitions, and an unsettling soundtrack that perfectly captures the paranoia and alienation of the era. The paper napkin scene on the plane is a Hitchcockian treat if ever there was one, and the sousaphone player at the climax seems to have strayed in from a contemporaneous Woody Allen movie, but these are the only ripples in the atmosphere of sustained unpredictability.
Country: US
Technical: col/scope 102m
Director: Alan J. Pakula
Cast: Warren Beatty, Paula Prentiss, William Daniels, Hume Cronyn
Synopsis:
Convinced of an assassination cover-up by the mysterious deaths of those who were also present, a journalist resolves that the only way to infiltrate the organisation and uncover the truth is to apply as an assassin himself.
Review:
One of a number of political thrillers in the seventies to have been formed by the experience of the 1960s (Kennedy et al.), and one of the best. Pakula conjures an ambience of utter mistrust and takes care not to make everything crystal clear. The film-making is first-rate, with imaginative framings and transitions, and an unsettling soundtrack that perfectly captures the paranoia and alienation of the era. The paper napkin scene on the plane is a Hitchcockian treat if ever there was one, and the sousaphone player at the climax seems to have strayed in from a contemporaneous Woody Allen movie, but these are the only ripples in the atmosphere of sustained unpredictability.