The French Connection (1971)

The French Connection
Directed by William Friedkin
Written by Ernest Tidyman based on a book by Robin Moore
1971/US
IMDb page
Repeat viewing/Amazon Prime rental
One of 1001 Movies You Must See Before You Die

Tagline: Doyle is bad news – but a good cop.

Tagline not withstanding, I would argue that Doyle was a pretty bad cop and human as well.  This is a spectacular action thriller with a bleak and grimy center.

Jimmy “Popeye” Doyle (Gene Hackman) is a detective on the NYPD narcotics squad.  He is crude and vulgar, swears copiously, belittles every race and nationality, and couldn’t give a damn about any “rights”, not that anybody in this movie cares much about those.  He is obsessed with his job. He’s like a 70’s Hank Quinlan (Touch of Evil (1958)).  He is respected for the frequent accuracy of his hunches and disliked for his disregard for the safety of his colleagues.  We will find later that he also has no regard for the safety of innocent civilians either.  All he cares about is proving he is right and getting his man.  He could use an Anger Management course.

The NYPD’s efforts have largely taken heroin off the streets.  Popeye gets one of his famous hunches and traces it to a car that will be arriving from France carrying millions of dollars of smack.  On the French side the effort is masterminded by the suave, unflappable Alain Charnier (Fernando Rey), who is like Popeye’s polar opposite.  The movie is violent throughout.  It ends with the famous car v. subway chase in which Popeye slams at high speed into who knows how many cars in order to get to the next subway stop. But the collateral damage doesn’t stop there.  With Roy Scheider as Popeye’s long-suffering but loyal partner.

This film has all the energy of “The New Hollywood” (Friedkin was only 26 at the time) and was extremely influential on every action film that followed.  The performances are great, including that by Hackman as the perpetually angry Popeye.  I’ve been debating whether the film is condemning Popeye’s tactics or glamorizing them.  Popeye is certainly an anti-hero, a species we will get to know well throughout the early 70’s.

The French Connection won Oscars for Best Picture; Best Actor; Best Director; Best Writing Screenplay Based on Material from Another Medium; and Best Film Editing.  It was nominated in the categories of Best Supporting Actor (Scheider); Best Cinematography; and Best Sound.