The Parallax View

Perhaps no director tapped into the pervasive sense of dread and mistrust that defined the 1970s more effectively than Alan J. Pakula, who, in the second installment of his celebrated Paranoia Trilogy, offers a chilling vision of America in the wake of the assassinations of the Kennedys and Martin Luther King Jr. and about to be shocked by Watergate. Three years after witnessing the murder of a leading senator atop Seattle’s Space Needle, reporter Joseph Frady (Warren Beatty) begins digging into the mysterious circumstances surrounding the killing—and stumbles into a labyrinthine conspiracy far more sinister than he could have imagined. The Parallax View’s coolly stylized, shadow-etched compositions by acclaimed cinematographer Gordon Willis give visual expression to a mood that begins as an anxious whisper and ends as a scream into the void. BLU-RAY SPECIAL EDITION FEATURES • New, restored 4K digital transfer, with uncompressed monaural soundtrack • New introduction by filmmaker Alex Cox • Interviews with director Alan J. Pakula from 1974 and 1995 • New program on cinematographer Gordon Willis featuring an interview with Willis from 2004 • New interview with Jon Boorstin, assistant to Pakula on The Parallax View • English subtitles for the deaf and hard of hearing • PLUS: An essay by critic Nathan Heller and a 1974 interview with Pakula