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| Gene
Hackman, Fernando Rey, Roy Scheider, Tony Lo Bianco, Marcel Bozzuffi,
Frederic de Pasquale, Bill Hickman |
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Anamorphic
widescreen |
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Dolby Digital
5.1 |
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DTS |
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Trailer(s) |
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Featurette(s) |
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Documentary |
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Audio commentary
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Deleted scenes
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Concept art
/ storyboards |
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Multi-angle
feature |
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'Popeye'
Doyle (Gene Hackman): When's the last time you picked your feet,
Willy? Who's your connection, Willy? What's his name?... I've got a
man in Poughkeepsie who wants to talk to you. You ever been to Poughkeepsie?
Huh? Have you ever been to Poughkeepsie?
New
York undercover cops Doyle and Russo pick up the trail of a major
international drug smuggling operation and embark on an extensive
surveillance job.
 One
of the true classics of modern American cinema and by far the best movie
in William Friedkin's erratic career, who was only 32 at the time and
became the youngest director ever to win an Oscar. The film's raw script
was based on Robin Moore's eponymous best-selling book about the real-life
adventures of idiosyncratic Harlem special narcotics squad officers Eddie
Egan (the Doyle character) and Sonny Grosso (the Russo character). Both
real-life detectives have small roles in the film and served as technical
advisers, which may be the best indication of the authentic feeling Friedkin
tried to evoke both in the script and onscreen with a heavy documentary
stylization in cinematographer Owen Roitzman's camerawork. The streets
of New York had never seemed so alive before in a movie and combined with
a thorough dose of method acting (Friedkin spent two months with the detectives
finding out about the case and their personalities, Hackman and Scheider
spent a couple of weeks going on arrests and undercover assignments with
Grosso and Egan) with many actual experiences finding their way right
into the movie.
The French Connection has lost none of its power after 30 years,
with the fast-paced cutting between characters and constant unease of
being on the streets keeping the viewer on edge as much of the people
in the movie are. Friedkin uses little details and wordless scenes to
put across the differences and similarities between the good and the bad
guys, never stooping to facile explanations and audience-friendly exposition.
The viewer can make up his own mind about the methods employed by the
police and the brutal and destructive singlemindedness of the main character
Popeye Doyle. Gene Hackman makes this performance so real and in-your-face
that the whole movie is legitimized by his credible actions and aggression.
Roy Scheider is a perfect sidekick and the surveillance scenes he shares
with Hackman are wonders of cinema, with only glances and small gestures
between them conveying worlds of meaning. The initial tailing of Sal Boca
is a good example of a mind-numbingly boring aspects of real-life detective
work taking on the power of cinema vérité in Friedkin's
hands. There was some controversy at the time of release about the movie
being overly violent and racist, but this had more to do with an ignorance
about real police work in New York than with any specific movie-making
decisions. In the end, The French Connection swept the boards at
the Academy Awards and set a definite and highly intelligent template
for all action movies and police series.
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Available
only in Region 1 as a Five Star edition double DVD set and as part of
The French Connection box which also inludes The French Connection
II.
The
anamorphic widescreen image is framed at an aspect ratio of 1.85:1
and has been extensively restored and comes THX-certified. Print flaws
are absent and the inherent film grain used to such great effect in
the movie is always tightly controlled in this transfer. Colors are
bold when they need to be but in essence this is the right depiction
of the grimy and dirty underbelly of New York City that Friedkin always
wanted to capture in the telling of this story. It's an amazing transfer,
one that puts many other movies of the same vintage to shame. Anybody
who has seen this movie on TV or VHS will instantly appreciate the work
that has gone into this DVD.
An even bigger surprise for me is the soudtrack which has been brought
up to a fully fledged Dolby Digital 5.1 soundtrack. Turn up the
volume and where you expect to hear a tinny, overly bright tone, you'll
be punched in the stomach by the excellent bass response of the opening
theme (I never knew this score had any bass!). All the dialogue can
be appreciated as never before, with no distortion audible and excellent
use of all speakers during some intense moments (check out the scene
in the bar where Doyle spots some criminals and the music takes on the
note of Doyle's minds eye - the eerie sound fills the room as you watch
with him). The good quality of the track also highlights the terrific
soundtrack by jazz musician Don Ellis who created a note-perfect enhancement
for the screen.
Extras
are plentiful on this double-disc set. The first disc has a non-scene-specific
commentary by Gene Hackman and Roy Scheider, each talking for
roughly 25 minutes and reminiscing about their experiences in both prepairing
for the roles and the actual shoot. The second extra is a full length
director's commentary by William Friedkin who unfortunately tends
to narrate the action onscreen way too much and only comes up with interesting
side notes during the first half of his commentary. He points out some
blink-and-you'll-miss-'em details and always links to some real-life
occurence that either he or the actors witnessed with Egan and Grosso
during the preparation for the movie.
The second disc holds two 50-minute documentaries. The first
and best is the original BBC documentary "Poughkeepsie Shuffle" hosted
by Mark Kermode (who also did the excellent Exorcist documentary
available on the 25th Anniversary
DVD). All aspects, problems and persons involved with the making
of the movie are covered and interviewed. The whole program is nicely
segmented in different parts: this feature alone would surely have satisfied
any French Connection fan. A second documentary is the Sonny
Grosso-produced and hosted "Making the Connection: The Untold Story
of The French Connection" which delves even further into the real-life
elements of the story and once again features all the people involved
with the movie. Grosso reveals a bit more about his partner Eddie Egan
(who we also see in video footage) but the made-for-American network
TV feel is highlighted by the frequent jump cuts (from where the commercials
interruptions would have occurred) which gives this documentary a slightly
more disjointed feel than necessary.
The 9 minutes of deleted scenes can be viewed separately
with the original audio or as an 18 minute segment with running
commentary from Friedkin who gives some good insights on the material:
I just wish he had been as informative and to-the-point in his feature
commentary. He mentions he had them in storage in his garage and
that the scenes never have been viewed before. The quality is reasonable
but a couple of the scenes are definitely nice to have (and Friedkin
seems all too happy to share them, the man obviously loves the medium
as we do). The still gallery is the usual assortment of behind
the scenes and posed photographs and the original theatrical
trailer and the trailer for French Connection II round
out the extras. Stylized
animated menus in perfect synch with the feel of the movie, with easy
navigation and the different menu screens each offering a slightly different
introduction.
Gerard
Castelein
Reviewed: 2001
Click
here for IMDB info on The
French Connection.
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to return to the front page.
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