Blow Out
Brian De Palma
Jack Terri is a sound engineer on B-films. One night, while he is making some ambiance recordings, he witnesses a car crash. He manages to save the passenger. The driver, who dies in the accident, is presidential candidate Governor McRyan. Jack does not believe that it was an accident, and uses the recordings he made that night to reconstruct the scene.
With : John Travolta, Nancy Allen, John Lithgog, Dennis Franz
Screenplay : Brian De Plama
Image : Vilmos Zsigmond
Editing : Paul Hirsch
Music : Pino Donaggio
Screenplay : Brian De Plama
Image : Vilmos Zsigmond
Editing : Paul Hirsch
Music : Pino Donaggio
Production : Filmways Pictures
Distribution: Mission Distribution
Distribution: Mission Distribution
More than a recursive view of cinema, Blow Out is an almost didactic take on the cinematographic process itself. The heroes are the technicians working in the wings: Jack is a sound technician, Sally dreams of being a make-up artist; and cinematographic materials, sound tape and film, are the very subject of Blow Out. A number of allusions can be detected, from film (Antonioni's Blowup with a direct reference in the title, but also Coppola's The Conversation), or politics (the assassination of John F. Kennedy), there is also De Palma's own trademark techniques of the 70s and 80s, a mannerist style, at the limit of the B-series he makes reference to in this film, and its distinctive signs: the use of the split-screen, close-ups, expansion of time.