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I'm afraid I'm about to incur the wrath of my esteemed colleague (see his greatest films list). I came to this expecting great things, I'm a huge Coppola fan, I like Gene Hackman, I love character driven films and it promised much suspense and intrigue. However, I left feeling very disappointed. Harry Caul is, undoubtedly, an interesting character and Hackman's solid performance invests him with turmoil, guilt and doubt. However, despite being famous for being such a great character study, there seemed to me a gaping plot hole with made no sense and left the character in front of me without believability. Why does someone who is so paranoid, a. invite colleagues and rivals back to his office (and without even removing the evidence of the case that has been giving him so much grief - this was, besides, a level of unprofessionalism the -'first half' Caul would not have accepted)? Then, b, sleep with a girl he clearly doesn't know in the same office without taking any precautions? These just weren't the actions of the character I had been watching. There was another flaw I found it hard to accept as well. If the company had been watching Caul because they thought he was 'disturbed', why didn't they follow him when he went to the hotel or think that it might be a possibility that he might do that, being in the state he was? These, I'm afraid, left a very unsatisfactory taste in the mouth, though I'm sure my esteemed colleague will put me right.

On the positive side, Hackman is good and there is an excellent little cameo by Allen Garfield as Caul's unbelievably obnoxious rival and the tensions grips, albeit intermittently. And I didn't see the twist coming, which is good, although, as I said, it's ruined a bit because of the errors of the company, whose actions here don't add up to their otherwise high professionalism.
It's a shame because I really expected to enjoy this, but I just didn't. My recent roll has come to a grinding halt.