Dear person who got here by searching “the movie with the director who is looking for a screamer and ends…” Are you looking for Blow Out? I love Blow Out. John Travolta is a sound guy trying to find the right scream for a slasher film. The woman they have screaming in the movie-within-the-movie is the worst screamer ever. He auditions someone else, but she sucks too. Frustrated, he goes out for a walk with his microphone, trying to record a good wind noise. There’s no such thing as too many sound effects, otherwise people start to recognize the fact that Hollywood uses the same ones over and over.

Anyway, what he gets, at first, is the sound of a tire blowing out. He sees the car crash into a body of water (I’m going on memory here), so he dives in. He manages to save Nancy Allen from a watery grave, but not her companion. Later he finds out that her companion was someone important because someone else actually took pictures of the crash and a newspaper publishes them in sequence, like a film strip. So Travolta cuts the pictures out and syncs them up with the sound, which is some super cool ingenuity. Then he spends the rest of the movie trying to solve the mystery and protect the lady.

I remember seeing Carrie as a kid and thinking how gleefully evil Travolta and Allen were together, and wishing they had made a whole movie together. Well, my wish had already come true, because Blow Out had been made in 1981, but i didn’t know it yet. When I found out I watched it about a million times. They have great chemistry together in this movie too. I hope they were friends on set.

She is a makeup artist, and she is telling him while they’re getting to know each other that she is sporting the no-makeup look that day, and he says that if that is the no-makeup look he really wants to see the makeup look. Meaning she’s pretty. *looks down, blushes, kicks dirt* Some of you readers may know how much makeup ladies wear just to look like they don’t have any on. Travolta had such a cute smile back then, too. I like to remember him as this guy, and other roles around that time. I’m a sucker for a cute guy who can dance and is “family.”

Allen should have been a bigger star. DePalma should be more well-regarded among the general public for his 70s and 80s work. Travolta is obviously awesome; twice I’ve dreamt that I’ve met him and had a polite fan encounter. Once I told him in a dream that they should do a Grease sequel that is a high school reunion and he was very nice. Maybe he sometimes dreams of archetypal bossy big-haired southern ladies? I’m sure he sees enough of us since he lives in north Florida.

Oh yeah, and Dennis Franz is in this, looking more like Carl from Aqua Teen than ever, and John Lithgow is SUPER creepy. Travolta gets his scream, but not the way he wants it. Even if you are not the person searching for Blow Out, or if you are the person but were searching for something else, see this movie! You will not be sorry.