Francis Ford Coppola’s seminal eavesdropping drama starring Gene Hackman, John Cazale and Robert Duvall. Francis Ford Coppola’s seminal eavesdropping drama. When surveillance expert Harry Caul (Gene Hackman) and partner Stan (John Cazale) are hired by a mysterious client known only as \'the director\' (Robert Duvall) to follow a young couple, Harry deduces that the woman is the director\'s wife and the man an employee with whom she’s having an affair. Convinced that the director intends to murder the pair, and haunted by guilt from a previous assignment, Harry sets out to prevent the killing.