Matt Connarton Unleashed: Erich Pilcher reviews The French Connection.

All right, Popeyes here, your hands on your hands, get off the

bar and get on the wall. What's my name? Popeye Doyle. If

he doesn't like you, he'll take you apart. And it's all perfectly legal

because Doyle fights dirty. You want to take a ride there? Fat man

and plays rough. J Doyle is bad news, but he's a good cop.

We're going there on the barn. How many times have I been down

hard? He looked up and saw him smiling like a shining dime. Yeah,

and hope that he would stay and tell me why he was so heavy?

If he handed out? Who is it? Jewish? Lucky? What

about the last big time Springers? Think? You know? Are you?

He's spritting around what the Russians are in Jersey? They said he sticker,

don't give him a tail. My friend's name is Boker Sounder too, a

Boker Boca from downtown. They're pretty sure you pull off a contract on a

guy named de Marco and that's not a drop. I'm not a charge for

your bloomy nails. Oh Sea doesn't mess. And then on our own,

after working the whole day and night, we tell him the book and we

sat only for particularly week now who do we come up with? The French

Connection? A millionaire export with a record too clean to be true, and

Doyle knows it, but he's been known to make mistakes. You're a hunch.

Is a backfired before it? Though? This time you can't afford to

be wrong. Ust I knew the deal hasn't gone down. I n I

know it hasn't. I could, I could feel I'm dead certain last time

you're dead? Certain we have a dead cop. I left him? Why

what You're hide? The air? The steak up, Frank seats, the

payoff, chase stop talk you all right? Why French Connection. Hollywood,

and of course the films that have been created there have went through many landmark

metamorphosis. These are often defined by era, style, or even political landscape.

This week's film brought forth a new style of filmmaking called the New Hollywood

Way. That brought forth a major change not just in how films were made,

but in how actors and actresses performed in them, how writers wrote them

in how us the viewers not just see them but remember them in the lasting

impressions they make on us. Directed by the recently passed on William Friedkin,

based on the nineteen sixty nine book of the same name. Nineteen seventy one's

French Connection introduces us to New York narcotics detectives Jimmy Popeye Doyle and Buddy Cloudy

Russo played by Gene Hackman and Roy Scheider, respectively. These men, early

in the film find themselves in a heroin investigation that could become the biggest drug

bust in American history. In our first clip, we are going to hear

how this film really change the image of police officers in cinema. Gone were

the happy, go lucky men hunting criminals joyfully? Doyle and Russell harken back

to the hard boiled detectives of the forties. This first scene is an example

of this, is they try to shake down a low rent drug dealer.

This scene is quite interesting because we hear the start of a possible good cop

bad cop game between the two that quickly goes to the wayside. And then

in our second clip, the duo crash a local bar and you again hear

the tough intensity of Doyle. But in this scene one cannot help but notice

allusions to future hard nosed detectives in cinema. Yeah, come on, break

please come on, ain't say nothing to this. Break your ass. Come

on, come on, get out. I don't stub me. Will you

stum men? Lit h? Come on, Jill, Jimmy, come on,

let me man, I'll mest I want to bust you. I want

to bust you. Post we talked, he talked to it. You got

a friend here Monday? You got a friend. You gotta tell us too,

your man? He's what's the last time you picked to pete? Willie?

Who's your connection? Welly, what's his name? Hey? John?

No? No? Mans no, hey no, Jodph Barber, Jodiph Barber.

Right, that's who it isn't it. I don't come sady. What's

Joe's last name? I don't know, man, I know there's a one

twenty fifty man about the barber show? What's time to set? Want to

talking about? Man? I don't. And you know what's said of the

street he lives on? Hey, what's the last on you pick your feet?

What's he talking about? I've got a man of po Keepsi wants to

talk to you. Have you ever been a Pokeepsi? H? Have you

ever been Pokeepsi? Hey? Man, come on, gim me a prag

here, let's talk him about. Hey, you say, come on,

have you ever been pokeepsi? You've been a pokeepsi? I'm I want to

hear it. Come on, yes, have you been there? All right?

Yeah? You sat on the edge of the bed, didn't you?

You talk off your shoes, put your finger between your toes and pick your

feet, didn't you. That's say, all right, you want to see

on my partner. You know what that means, Scott dude, all went

wrong. I gotta stim grip about his bowling scores. Now I'm gonna fust

your ass for those three bags, and I'm gonna nail you for picking your

feet for keepsie. Next the bar, shake down, all right? Pop

eyes here, get your hands on your heads, get off the bar and

get on the wall. Come on, move move it's not sweetheart. Move

Come on, gait around all right? Come on, heakes the window.

Fall turn around here, turn AROUNDO come on, loop, hands out of

your pocket, turn around, turn around on your heart, come on,

turn around, come on, turn around, Get on the wall, get

on an get turn around. Hey, you dropped that, look it up,

hands off, pick it up? Come on, move what are you

looking at? All right? Bring it here? Get your hands out of

your pockets. What's my name? Doyle? What mister Doyle? Come here?

You pick your feet? Do you get over? Get your hands on

your head. We told you people are coming back. We're gonna keep coming

back here until you clean his barrow. Keep your eye on your neighbor.

He dropped something that belongs to you. Hospel here, turn around, we

got here. I just belong to you. I'm stand up there, naughty.

Keep your hands on your head. Get in there if you want to

take a ride there fat ma'am. H they attention. We're gonna ask questions

later. Un around ash all right, shut up, damn shut up?

Anybody want a milk check? All right? Come over here, you and

you, hey whiskers, come on? Who lass? When I call you,

get in you. What made this film such a discovery upon its release

is that, despite being a somewhat fictional film, it views like a documentary.

This was intentionally done by the masterful work of Friedkin. He Is stated

he wanted the viewer to feel as if not even the camera knew what was

going to happen next. The car chase scenes the foot pursuits in this film

are evidence of this. The best auditory example of this is our next clip.

When the heroine finally enters the United States from France, it is tested

for purity. A scene such as this had not been conveyed on America cinema

with such realism. So much so both law enforcement and those that were in

evolved with drug dealing have complimented on its realism in both talking about the purity

of the drug and the business side of it. Last off one two hundred

Good Housekeeping Seal of Approval to ten US Government certified two twenty lunar trajectory Junk

of the Month club sirloin steak two thirty create a poison, absolute dynamite,

eighty nine percent pure junk, best I've ever seen. If the rest is

like this, you'll be dealing on this load for two years. So he

taught me. It's oneth a half million. How many kilos sixty sixty kilos,

eight big ones at quilo right, This stuff will take a seven to

one hit on the street, and by the time against down the nickel bags

will be at least thirty two million. Thank you, Howard, Take what

stuff there with you and good night. Ah, not that one, the

little one. I guess we gotta deal, Well, we gotta here sells

a test a deal for half a million dollars? Maybe, baby, Come

on, Joel, I don't know. Guy's an hour once the break,

wants to go back to France. This guy's not gonna hang around and play

games. Ok. He's one of the shrewdest cat I ever come across one

of wires. Schmuck, what's the hurry? You could see a couple of

shows. Visit the top of the Empire State Building. Don't jerk me,

wine stock. I spend a lot of time setting this one up. So

what do you want to badge? This is your first major league game?

Sell one thing I gonna learn. Move calmly, move cautiously. You'll never

be sorry. Look, I've been damned careful up to now. This is

why your phone lines are tapped in the fensive call on all over you like

Fleelans. Look, I'm telling you he'll take the deal somewhere else. So

let him take the sixty kilos of heroin someplace else and find out how easy

it is to put together. I have to make get in cash. He

wouldn't find there's any hurry to know this kind of business. The stuff is

here. We can make the switch in an hour. Look why Stock,

I'm telling you he'll split up. We don't move. This guy's got him

like that. He's everything they say he is. What about you? So?

Are you everything they say you are? In my opinion, the realism

conveyed in this film is what sets it apart from any other cop film.

The intense and brilliant performances by Hackman and Scheider just put this film on another

level. Couple that with the masterful direction of Freakin who you used his experience

in filming documentaries to truly make this film unique upon its release, and it

is allowed its influence to be felt to this day. This film is a

favorite of so many directors, including Spike lee In, David Fincher. The

late legendary director Akirakirasawa called it his favorite film. Brad Pitt stated he took

his acclaimed role in the film seven because of this movie. Upon its release,

it garnered mass critical acclaim. It was nominated for eight Academy Awards,

winning five. This includes Best Picture, Best Director. This is one of

the few films to accomplish that feat and Best Actor for Hackman. Scheider was

nominated for Best Boarding Actor, but did not win the accolades. The acclaim

the influence along with breakthroughs previously stated, truly make this a legendary treasure in

the history of cinema and also is Die cast ironclad proof of the directorial genius

that was William Friedkin. I hope you join me next week when with college

football season starting, we will look at a film often called a football movie,

but is it really will dissect that when we look at the nineteen seventy

four classic The Longest Yard for WMNH and Matt Connerton unleached. This has been

a classic film review with Piltre don't to