Tuesday, March 29, 2016

Cinema Bestius: The French Connection

This gritty, urban drama is guilty of being a masterpiece… and of picking its feet in Poughkeepsie.

#47: The French Connection
William Friedkin is a national cinema treasure. I can imagine him saying to the bouncers at the Greatest Directors in History club, “I directed The French Connection,” and they’d say, “Oh, right this way, Sir!” Then he sidles up to the bar, orders a drink, turns to Welles, Hitchcock, Ford, and Coppola, and announces, “By the way, I also directed The Exorcist, Sorcerer, and To Live and Die in LA.

I imagine a lot of great scenarios like that, because I’m the Pope of Film. Let’s just say that it is part of the gig.
The French Connection is justifiably famous for its epic car chase sequence, but there is so much more in the film to love. Friedkin uses every technique from his former career as a documentary filmmaker to bring us a film so authentic it hurts. The French Connection is based on real life NYC narcotics officers Eddie Egan and Sonny Grosso, who were both on the set as advisors. In fact, the famous scene where a detective loudly accuses a perpetrator of “picking his feet in Poughkeepsie” comes directly from Sonny Grosso’s playbook: he used to say this (and other things like this) to confuse suspects into making confessions.

The Plot in Brief: New York police detective Jimmy “Popeye” Doyle (Gene Hackman) and his partner Buddy Russo (Roy Scheider) learn of a dealer’s drug connection after a routine arrest. They also suspect local diner owner Sal Boca (Tony Lo Bianco) of having mob connections. They learn that a large shipment of heroin is due in New York, arriving hidden in the Lincoln Continental of a famous French television star. After the two detectives intercept the shipment, the mysterious Charnier (Fernando Rey) travels to America to see what has gone wrong with his smuggling plan. He and Doyle play a game of “cat and mouse” on the New York subway. Charnier hires hitman Nicoli (Marcel Bozzuffi) to kill Doyle, but Doyle has other ideas about that. Will Popeye Doyle succeed in bringing the elusive Charnier to justice?
At a theatrical screening a few years ago, I remember being impressed by director Friedkin’s ability to keep the audience completely engaged—but completely confused—for the first third of the film. It is engrossing. This is the way to immerse an audience in a story; this is the way to get people to pay attention. It is the filmic equivalent of lowering your voice to get people to lean in, so they can hear what you have to say. Modern movies are robotically obsessed with pleasing the audience, stimulating and bombarding viewers for every second of their bloated running times; it’s as if the filmmakers are afraid of letting audiences do any of the heavy lifting. I am not aware of a single film in the last twenty years that gives its audience as much credit as The French Connection. What modern film so willfully (and delightfully) keeps its audience in the dark?

In a Film Studies class in high school, our beloved teacher rented The French Connection on 16mm and we ran the car chase again and again on a projector, backwards and forwards, at various speeds, and frame by frame, analyzing it for an entire week until it gave up its secrets. Much of the relentless drive of the sequence is due to cinematographer Owen Roizman under-cranking the camera to speed up the action and give the impression of a higher speed chase. The scene is a film class in itself—in cinematography, in acting, in stunt work, and most especially the art of editing that combines all the other aspects into a cohesive (and thrilling) whole.
The film was nominated for eight Academy Awards and won five: Best Picture, Best Director, Best Actor (Gene Hackman), Best Adapted Screenplay (Ernest Tidyman), and Best Film Editing (Gerald B. Greenberg). Remember, this is back in the day when the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences got more of these winners right than wrong. The French Connection won Best Picture in 1972, beating both A Clockwork Orange and The Last Picture Show—two other terrific films.

The French Connection’s Three Miracles: The aforementioned car chase, one of the best ever filmed; the performances of the leads, who we never catch “acting”; and the grimmer-than-grim, “it’s the Seventies, baby” final minute.
FUN TRIVIA NOTE: Believe it or not, the Popeyes Chicken franchise was named after Gene Hackman’s character in the film. Like the film (and Hackman’s performance) Popeyes Chicken is fucking awesome.

"In nomine Patrici, et Scorsese, qui mecum est Jai Beaie, Amen."

14 comments:

  1. The French Connection positively reeks of the 70's yet also has a timeless quality. It's a sacred cow movie for me....one you pray to god they never consider remaking. Hackman and Friedkin have never been better, Scheider perhaps only better in Jaws. A flawless, perfect film.

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  2. One other point.....I have never upgrade to the BD from DVD due to some concerns with the transfer. Wondering of anyone has any thoughts on this?

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    1. Same here. The original BD release of "French Connection" had Friedkin tinkering big time with the picture (changing colors, adding grain, etc.), enough that cinematographer Owen Roizman called him out on it and disowned the new transfer (as he should since the original cinematograph got Owen an Oscar nomination). Subsequent releases on BD have done away with Friendkin's visuals and reverted to the pre-mastering (i.e. the unmolested restoration before Friedkin went 'loco' with it) version. Since the Friendkin BD is out of print all you have to do is look in the back of the BD case to see if it reads 'An All New Video Transfer supervised by Director William Friedkin' or words to that effect. If it says so it's the OOP old transfer, which you won't find on Best Buy or stores that receive new stock regularly.

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  3. I've said it before and I'll say it again: Fernando Rey is the coolest mother-fucker to ever appear on film. He's what I assume Dos Equis' 'The Most Interesting Man in the World' ad campaign is based on, a smart and old school man that can walk among us without being one of us. Hackman and Scheider are fine, but for my money Rey is the man. As inferior as it is, I'm glad "French Connection 2" exists as a result of Friedkin's ambiguous ending for the prequel. More Hackman and Rey playing cat and mouse games (in France instead of NYC) is a good thing.

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  4. A great film, which also could serve as a documentary (along with Taxi Driver) as to how New York City looked like before the corporations remade it in their own image.

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  5. Hey - I've seen this one! Great movie, but I guess you already knew that so I'll talk about another movie that got a brief mention that I just watched a couple weeks ago: Sorcerer. Holy S...(forgive me, father) it was good. I think much like you mention re TFC, you kinda don't know what's going on or where it's going for the first little bit and then you start to get it and soon you're in the thick of it practically suffocating from the tension. Gorgeous blu-ray too.

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    1. I wrote an Unsung column on Sorcerer three years ago. God, that film is great.

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    2. I looove Sorcerer (that coloumn rocks JB). I need to watch French Connection a few. I can tell it is great but I need a bit more time for the love to kick in. Shamefully, I have not seen To live and die in LA. I will try see it asap.

      Have you seen Cruising? I am curious to watch it. It comes up in the brilliant Celluloid Closet documentary. I cannot remember if they analyse the film as homophobic itself as well as trying to expose it. I wish to see it to decide for myself. Any thoughts on this?

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    3. I also remember Patrick bringing Cruising up on the Batman vs Superman podcast. He called it interesting I think. Which, makes me more keen to seek it out than the previously cautious me, trying to put off watch from risk of being hurt by homophoic content in a film whose director I really admire, which might have been silly of me.

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    4. I just (re)read that column - it's great and yeah, the practicality of the bridge scene in particular - going into the movie I had some doubts that it would all still work on a modern young man such as myself but I was absolutely enthralled.

      I know what you mean re The French Connection, Gabby - I saw it in the nascent stage of my Finally Appreciating "Older" Movies Evolution of the Mind, and I could tell I was seeing something special, and did like it, but didn't quite LOVE it. The last time I watched Citizen Kane it made a big leap from like to love so I suspect the same could happen with TFC. Especially with Blessings from the Pope!

      I can't really comment on Cruising other than to say I remember Elric Kane on Killer POV giving it a positive review and I would imagine him being sensitive to overt homophobia in a film...I guess watching anything from that period with homosexual subject matter runs the risk of offending as stereotyping re homosexuals (and in general, really) was far more socially acceptable, so even something with good intentions then could have some pretty offensive generalizations and such now, but Friedkin's pretty great and I think you'd be remiss to leave one of his stones unturned for fear of being offended - I'm sure you can take it anyway!

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  6. Gabby, there´s no risk of being hurt by homophobic content, because there isn´t any in Cruising.

    I still don´t understand the protests it caused in 1980 because all it does is showing a very specific part of the gay subculture - maybe back then it hit a bit too close to home and people thought that depicting this presumably disturbing subculture would harm the fight for gay rights.

    To me Cruising is a dense crime thriller located in a very specific and unusual environment with a mostly bleak and ambiguous worldview, asking uncomfortable questions not least about sexual identity, which may be pretty normal today but surely wasn´t in 1980.
    A sometimes tough watch but director Friedkin has never been a vanilla guy...

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  7. Noted film critic Robin Wood, in his book "Hollywood From Vietnam to Reagan," talks extensively about Cruising as what he calls an "incoherent text." He notes that the film actually has very strong things to say about the persecution of homosexuals at that time, but the message gets muddled by other factors. I would recommend that anyone interested in Cruising (which is a fascinating film) also read Wood's comments about it.

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  8. Thanks for the responses guys, I appreciate it. I think I will stop avoiding it :)

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  9. Thanks for the responses guys, I appreciate it. I think I will stop avoiding it :)

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