French Connection (The)     

Genre: police drama

With: Gene Hackman (Jimmy ‟Popeye” Doyle), Fernando Rey (Alain Charnier), Roy Scheider (Buddy ‟Cloudy” Russo), Tony Lo Bianco (Sal Boca), Marcel Bozzuffi (Pierre Nicoli), Frédéric de Pasquale (Devereaux), Harold Gary (Weinstock), Arlene Farber (Angie Boca), Benny Marino (Lou Boca), Bill Hickman (Mulderig)

Director: William Friedkin

Screenplay: Ernest Tidyman (based on the book by Robin Moore)

Release: 1971

Studio: Twentieth Century Fox, Philip D’Antoni Productions, Schine-Moore Productions

Rating: R

MBiS score: 8.7/10 

 

Who’s the Greater Menace to Society? 

 

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Story-line: in Marseilles, Charnier and Nicoli go about their business endeavours (legal and otherwise) in a calculated and professional manner. An ocean away in the Big Apple, NYPD detectives Doyle and Russo scrape by and scour the streets to make drug busts any way they can. Soon enough, these cold crooks and frantic narcs will be drawn together – albeit on opposite sides of the law – by a high-stakes drug deal logically labelled the ‟French connection”.  

Pluses: mind-blowing performances by Gene Hackman, Roy Scheider, Fernando Rey and Marcel Bozzuffi, an enthralling screenplay featuring memorable characters, mordant dialogues and non-stop action, virile direction, gritty cinematography in all locales, seamless editing, appropriate production values and an efficient musical score (by Don Ellis) that may have inspired the sinister string flourishes of JAWS a few years later.  

Minuses: whatever happened to that poor guy who lent his car to Popeye Doyle? Sorry I asked!

Comments: in THE FRENCH CONNECTION, an engrossing film even for those of us who have little taste for police dramas, Popeye Doyle attains mythical status as a lonely, driven and pathetic figure, a big-city version of Captain Ahab. From its surprising opening scenes to its breathless chases and stunning ending, William Friedkin’s draining thriller remains a Hollywood classic, having garnered 8 Academy Award nominations and 5 Oscars in 1972 (Writing, Lead Actor, Film Editing, Best Picture and Director). Need I say more?

  

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