The Parallax View

Directed by Alan J. Pakula, The Parallax View follows an ambitious reporter (Warren Beatty’s Joseph Frady) as he stumbles on a wide-ranging conspiracy while investigating a senator’s assassination. Filmmaker Pakula, working from a script by David Giler and Lorenzo Semple Jr., delivers a deliberately-paced yet mostly compelling endeavor that benefits substantially from its captivating lead performance and raft of agreeably unexpected plot developments, and it’s clear, too, that the picture’s perpetually watchable vibe is heightened by Michael Small’s haunting score and Gordon Willis’ eye-catching cinematography – with Pakula’s steady directorial hand ensuring that the movie is, for the most part, both taut and convincing. (This is despite the inclusion of a few episodes that don’t quite stand up to close scrutiny, with this especially true of an airplane explosion that seems to occur at just the right moment.) And although the slow-burn atmosphere is occasionally just a little too slow-burn for its own good, The Parallax View builds towards an engrossing climax that’s capped off with an impressively bleak finale – which does, in the end, cement the movie’s place as an above-average conspiracy thriller that holds up remarkably well all these years later.

*** out of ****