ViewGuide

Created Jan 22, 2009 10:13AM PST • Edited Jan 22, 2009 10:13AM PST

1. Quality

2. Summary

   Great 4.0

   For its time, The French Connection is a ground-breaking movie, and with a gripping narrative alongside brutal action and strong performances from Hackman and Schneider, it deserves recognition.

4. Acting

   Great 4.0

   Gene Hackman plays ‘Popeye’ Doyle, with his partner ‘Cloudy’ Russo played by the late, great Roy Schneider. Fernando Rey plays the slimy Frenchman Alain Charnier, whilst a host of lesser-known actors pad out the movie.

5. Male Stars Great 4.0

   Hackman and Schneider are perfectly cast as the partners, one impulsive and the other reticent. Hackman’s legendary acting prowess shows here – the man is able to hop from jovial to raging in a heartbeat, and casting the suave, chilled in comparison Schneider gives the film’s star pairing a jarring yet alluring quality.

6. Female Stars Great 4.0

   Adjusted accordingly (no significant women in the film).

7. Female Costars Great 4.0

   As above.

8. Male Costars Great 4.0

   Fernando Rey, as French drug trafficker Alain Charnier, dominates the support – his seemingly harmless old man in reality a truly reprehensible criminal; one who seems to be able to outwit his police pursuers at any turn. Tony Lo Bianco as Sal Boca is manifest of the low-life looking for a bigger score, whilst Marcel Bozzuffi portrays Charnier’s henchman Nicoli with a steely evil.

10. Film

    Great 4.0

    William Friedkin creates some of the most realistic car-chases ever put to film, as well as capturing the gritty, run-down heart of New York. The music and dialogue are both impressive, addressing the tone and tension of the film.

11. Direction Really Great 4.5

    Friedkin, later to be known more for his skill helming The Exorcist, commits to film a vision of police-work and gritty urban realism that is quite rightly lauded almost forty years later. The action and dialogue scenes sit perfectly in proximity, and the rising tension throughout the movie, as well as the sharp beats of action, present a tightly-produced and slick movie that any director would be proud of.

12. Play Great 4.0

    Most people will know of the Poughkeepsie dialogue, and its bizzare nature. The rest of the film’s script is full of intelligent discussion and real-life references however, and the fact that the narrative is based on a real-life counterpart series of events only adds to the realism of the procedurals. Doyle does get the best lines, and Hackman can deliver any form of dialogue with a rasping sarcasm if he wants.

13. Music Good 3.0

    The score is brooding – at the onset it’s swift, reflecting the quick and brash entry into the events, but later it builds tension, reminding me very much of the Dirty Harry score – urbane and seventies.

14. Visuals Great 4.0

    The car chase that is so revered is a brutal, bone-crushing scene that Friedkin filmed without the permission of the city of New York. Bear that in mind when you watch the car smashed to pieces as it pursues its target – this is the level of realism that Friedkin aimed for, and this, along with the dilapidated, crumbling surroundings, adds another layer of realism atop a film already too close to reality for its own good.

15. Content

16. Edge

    Sordid 3.0

    There’s a presence of all three here – though the violence and the profanity, like so many action films, are the more featured.

17. Sex Titillating 2.1

18. Violence Brutal 3.5

19. Rudeness Profane 3.5

21. Reality

    Natural 1.0

    Based on a real-life criminal operation and its undoing, this film is a prime example of realistic cinema.

22. Circumstantial Natural 1.0

23. Biological Natural 1.0

24. Physical Natural 1.0