The French ConnectionDriven too far, a man can lose sight of his mission. This is essentially what happens to tough cop, Jimmy "Popeye" Doyle (Gene Hackman), a narcotics detective in New York City, who is relentless in his quest to determine the source of an impending influx of high-grade heroin from an unknown supplier. That supplier turns out to be Alain Charnier (Fernando Rey), a rich and cunning drug smuggler who stays invisible when he can, and slyly escapes from the clutches of Doyle when he cannot. Their game of cat and mouse escalates into a dogged pursuit, threatening to turn the city into their battleground.
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At its core, The French Connection is a cops and robbers tale, one heavily dramatized from true events. Directed by William Friedkin, the film constantly plays with your expectations--a staple of Friedkin's best works, especially those involving the adversarial (yet paradoxically symbiotic) relationship between the law and criminals. Doyle and his partner, Buddy "Cloudy" Russo (Roy Scheider), are often in disguise or putting on an act as they tail various conspirators in this massive drug deal in the works, even before they know one even exists. Doyle is the protagonist of The French Connection, although he is rarely portrayed as sympathetic. He is driven by an urge to deny the encroachment of drugs and crime into the city, but thrives in its presence. He plays this role like a star performer on stage, acting to make himself appear the top dog among the curs. Even in the first scene where we see Doyle and Russo, they are incognito--with Doyle playing Santa Claus--waiting to bust a local hood as part of the process to make a connection to some other, bigger drug pusher. Doyle frequently lets loose a routine about "picking toes in Poughkeepsie" in order to throw his targets off balance--another act. There's little genuine sense that Doyle has a moral interest in keeping narcotics off the street, but he is driven to prove himself over and over by stomping anyone he can get away with stomping--and who better than criminals. Doyle spends all night in a bar, waking the next morning and shuffling out in a stupor. He ogles a young woman riding a bicycle without any shame; later, Russo discovers that Doyle has brought the same girl back to his apartment and they have slept together. Much of Doyle is conveyed visually, by his behavior and his vices. He is observant and generally knows how to identify shady characters, although as his superior points out, sometimes his hunches are wrong. One infamous event is periodically and unceremoniously thrown back in his face, an incident where his inconsistent intuition ended up getting a fellow cop killed. Doyle is portrayed as part cunning shark and part wild dog, his emphatic need to catch the bad guys driving him to reckless--even dangerous--behavior. This unrelenting drive is most apparent in the iconic car chase in The French Connection. Aside from the technical prowess of the scene, the chase where Doyle commandeers a civilian's Pontiac to pursue an elevated train--narrowly missing hitting a woman with her baby in a stroller--shows that Doyle is even willing to endanger public safety in order to justify his crusade. Although somewhat apocryphal, the story goes that Friedkin shot the car chase without permits and without shutting down the streets upon which the chase takes place, which would be ironic given Doyle's own recklessness.
The interesting thing about The French Connection is how much is observed in the film. Made in 1971, this New York City is a gritty, grimy town where poor kids still play street hockey on roller skates with a tin can, and the streets by the docs are made of brick, buckling from moisture. Doyle and Russo spend much of the film tailing the various players in the giant drug deal set to flood the city with overseas heroin. They watch people like Charnier (who Doyle dubs "Frog One") and his accomplice and personal assassin, Pierre Nicoli (Marcel Bozzuffi), enjoy fine dining in a restaurant, while Doyle monitors them from across the street, eating a slice of thin pizza and drinking crummy coffee. Doyle and Russo's efforts are like hunting--they stalk their prey, and get a better understanding of their enemy by knowing their familiar haunts and adopting camouflage to blend in. When Doyle invites Russo out for a drink, Doyle uses the opportunity to spy on a collection of shady gangsters from afar while he flirts with a hostess in a scene where the only sounds to be heard are of "The Three Degrees" performing. Charnier--the eponymous "French connection"--adopts the role of the antagonist because he is the drug smuggler. He enjoys a jovial relationship with his lover back in Marseilles, and is, in fact, more clever than his harrier, Doyle--able to nimbly dodge his attempts to tail him, much to Doyle's chagrin. Much of The French Connection is to show the procedural story through a documentary-style filter, following the NYPD (and later, members of the FBI), as they engage in a proverbial tug of war with the ominous threat of drugs. The irony is that while The French Connection avoids moralizing about the evils of drugs, the conflict that comes from it--between the cops and the dealers--becomes a war waged by men like Doyle and Charnier, played out like an elaborate chess game, one where the public's welfare is an ancillary concern. The tension rises because we are naturally inclined to identify (and even sympathize) with the police in cop movies; The French Connection toys with this expectation by making Doyle both intuitive and daring, but one with serious character flaws--frankly, Doyle isn't as smart as he thinks he is when compared with the oily Charnier. Doyle even occasionally lets slip racist or bigoted comments; the fact that he is being outsmarted by foreigners stokes this vitriolic side, goading him into a foaming frenzy. The French Connection deliberately undermines our wish to trust law enforcement as upholding the highest standards of accountability and behavior by giving us not a hero, but a mad dog ready to rip the bad guys--and anyone else in his path--to shreds.
Recommended for: Fans of a cynical but riveting procedural drama about cops and drug dealers in a pre-gentrified New York City, where the pursuit of justice without the foundation of morality can make even those we hold up as heroes appear reckless.
The interesting thing about The French Connection is how much is observed in the film. Made in 1971, this New York City is a gritty, grimy town where poor kids still play street hockey on roller skates with a tin can, and the streets by the docs are made of brick, buckling from moisture. Doyle and Russo spend much of the film tailing the various players in the giant drug deal set to flood the city with overseas heroin. They watch people like Charnier (who Doyle dubs "Frog One") and his accomplice and personal assassin, Pierre Nicoli (Marcel Bozzuffi), enjoy fine dining in a restaurant, while Doyle monitors them from across the street, eating a slice of thin pizza and drinking crummy coffee. Doyle and Russo's efforts are like hunting--they stalk their prey, and get a better understanding of their enemy by knowing their familiar haunts and adopting camouflage to blend in. When Doyle invites Russo out for a drink, Doyle uses the opportunity to spy on a collection of shady gangsters from afar while he flirts with a hostess in a scene where the only sounds to be heard are of "The Three Degrees" performing. Charnier--the eponymous "French connection"--adopts the role of the antagonist because he is the drug smuggler. He enjoys a jovial relationship with his lover back in Marseilles, and is, in fact, more clever than his harrier, Doyle--able to nimbly dodge his attempts to tail him, much to Doyle's chagrin. Much of The French Connection is to show the procedural story through a documentary-style filter, following the NYPD (and later, members of the FBI), as they engage in a proverbial tug of war with the ominous threat of drugs. The irony is that while The French Connection avoids moralizing about the evils of drugs, the conflict that comes from it--between the cops and the dealers--becomes a war waged by men like Doyle and Charnier, played out like an elaborate chess game, one where the public's welfare is an ancillary concern. The tension rises because we are naturally inclined to identify (and even sympathize) with the police in cop movies; The French Connection toys with this expectation by making Doyle both intuitive and daring, but one with serious character flaws--frankly, Doyle isn't as smart as he thinks he is when compared with the oily Charnier. Doyle even occasionally lets slip racist or bigoted comments; the fact that he is being outsmarted by foreigners stokes this vitriolic side, goading him into a foaming frenzy. The French Connection deliberately undermines our wish to trust law enforcement as upholding the highest standards of accountability and behavior by giving us not a hero, but a mad dog ready to rip the bad guys--and anyone else in his path--to shreds.
Recommended for: Fans of a cynical but riveting procedural drama about cops and drug dealers in a pre-gentrified New York City, where the pursuit of justice without the foundation of morality can make even those we hold up as heroes appear reckless.