In the opening shot of Francis Ford Coppola’s The Conversation – one of the great opening shots in cinema – a slow, telescopic zoom scans the lunchtime crowd on a sunny day in San Francisco’s Union Square. As if by accident, the camera settles on Harry Caul (Gene Hackman), a middle-aged man in a grey raincoat whom we may not have even noticed if it weren’t for a busking mime sidling over and beginning to mimic his movements. Harry walks off. The mime follows, trying to mine more material from his gait, but quickly grows bored and gives up. Right from the start, Harry Caul is apparently so unmemorable, so thoroughly nondescript, that he seems immune to parody.