Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #3988 in DVD
• Released on: 2004-01-05
• Rating: Suitable for 18 years and over
• Aspect ratio: 1.85:1
• Number of discs: 2
• Format: PAL
• Original language: English, French
• Number of discs: 2
• Running time: 213 minutes

Amazon.co.uk Review
A milestone film from 1971 and winner of five Academy Awards including Best Picture, Best Director, and Best Actor, The French Connection transformed the crime thriller with its gritty, authentic story about New York City police detectives on the trail of a large shipment of heroin. Based on an actual police case and the illustrious career of New York cop Eddie Egan, the film stars Gene Hackman as Jimmy "Popeye" Doyle, whose unorthodox methods of crime fighting are anything but diplomatic. With his partner (Roy Scheider), Popeye investigates the international shipment of heroin masterminded by the suave Frenchman (Fernando Rey) who eludes Popeye throughout an escalating series of pursuits. The obsessive tension of Doyle's investigation reaches peak intensity during the film's breathtaking car chase, in which Doyle races under New York's elevated train tracks in a borrowed sedan--a sequence that earned an Oscar for editing and was instantly hailed as one of the greatest chase scenes ever filmed. Produced on location, The French Connection had an immediate influence on dozens of movies and TV shows to follow, virtually redefining the crime thriller with its combination of brutal realism and high-octane craftsmanship. Boosted by the film's phenomenal success, director William Friedkin gained even more attention with his follow-up film, The Exorcist. --Jeff Shannon

DVD Description
Directors commentaries by William Friedkin and John Frankenheimer.

French Connection commentaries by Gene Hackman and Roy Schneider.

French Connection 2 commentaries by Gene Hackman and produced by Robert Rosen.

Original Theatrical Trailers

French Connection 2 Still Galleries.

Synopsis
This special set features two of the 1970s' most exciting action pictures, THE FRENCH CONNECTION and FRENCH CONNECTION 2.
THE FRENCH CONNECTION (1971): Released the same year as Clint Eastwood's DIRTY HARRY, William Friedkin's THE FRENCH CONNECTION marked the beginning of a new era of gritty, urban police dramas in which the theme of tough-cop amorality seemed to serve an epochal conservative demand for a police-state crackdown on the domestic chaos and subversive youth culture of the Vietnam War period. Based on the true story of two New York City police detectives and their investigation into a French heroin smuggling operation, this film is perhaps best known for its infamous, masterfully filmed chase scene (directly influenced by Steve McQueen's BULLITT) in which the lead policeman, Popeye Doyle (Gene Hackman), recklessly drives a stolen car through oncoming traffic in pursuit of a sniper escaping by elevated train. The exciting thrill of this ostensibly conventional crime drama is accentuated by director Friedkin's early European influences, perhaps best represented by the often handheld documentary-style visual approach that brings the viewer into a more personal proximity to the characters, as well as Friedkin's claims that the Oscar-winning screenplay was frequently disregarded in favor of improvisation. THE FRENCH CONNECTION is the first film Friedkin made after announcing to Variety that he would abandon his European influences in favor of genre entertainment and not only marked a significant change of course for his career but also signified a demographic shift that all of Hollywood would soon follow.
THE FRENCH CONNECTION 2 (1975): Gene Hackman again stars as hard-boiled New York narcotics cop Popeye Doyle in the sequel to the Oscar-winning FRENCH CONNECTION. Still on the trail of heroin kingpin Charnier (Fernando Rey), whom he's dubbed Frog One, Doyle heads for Marseilles. On arrival, his aggressive ugly-American persona alienates French inspector Barthelmy (Bernard Fresson), and his limited ability to speak French doesn't help. Frustrated by Barthelmy's lack of progress, he slips his assigned police protection and goes looking for Frog One on his own. He's soon captured by Charnier's minions, who lock him in a fleabag hotel and shoot him up repeatedly with free samples of their product until Doyle is completely addicted. Charnier uses the detective's narcotized state to interrogate him and is surprised to find that he's virtually ignorant about his operation. The disdainful Charnier has him dumped in front of police headquarters, and Barthemy arranges for him to be put in isolation. Doyle undergoes the lengthy, grueling ordeal of quitting heroin cold turkey while his desperation to capture Charnier builds inside him. Hackman's brilliant performance highlights this somewhat overlooked sequel; Claude Renoir's camera fully captures the squalor of the milieu, and Frankenheimer engineers a harrowing final chase.

Customer Reviews

Stunning Cinema
What can you say about this film. arguably one of the high points of the seventies cinema, beginning with this and the Godfather and ending with Apocalypse Now. Some how nobody makes films like this anymore, as this is edgy and dangerous and shot will a semi-documentary style which makes New York look stunning. Modern day thrillers (ie James Bond and Mission Impossible)should take a leaf out of the French Connection and try and follow the trend. Hackman as Popeye Doyle is really playing at the top of his game delivering a career defining performance as well is Roy Schieder. The star though is really the direction and photography, from a man at the top of his creative powers, which lately seem to have eluded him. Take a bow William Friedkin. The car chase through the city is probably the best ever commited to film, but is exceeded by an awesome ending. If you have a home cinema system, the sound of Schieder firing that pump action shot gun (In 5.1 Surround)at the end is worth buying this DVD alone.

The grittiest crime drama ever?
The best picture-winner in 1971 (it narrowly beat Kubrick's controversial Clockwork Orange), The French Connection is smart, cool and clever - and extremely powerful cinema. Perhaps the years have been unkind to the film - in its day the realism and complex characters were a fresh style, and whilst now shallow popcorn thrillers featuring whiter than white leads rule the roost, quality films influenced by 'Connection, like "Training Day", are also commonplace.

That said, it's still impossible not to become engrossed into the dirty, twisting narrative as the film still outshines later copycat works. Hackman sparkles in the lead role as Popeye Doyle, and William Friedkin's direction flows from portraying a grimy drug-feuled underworld, through kinetic pursuits and car-chases to a hammerering finale. One of the greatest films of the '70s, and one of the best cop films ever. Unforgettable.

This awesome special edition set features a director/cast commentary, multiple documentaries (like the excellent Poughkeepsie Shuffle) and deleted scenes with commentaries. One to own, I think.

"The sonofabitch is here. I saw him. I'm gonna get him ..."
Based on Robin Moore's novel recounting a true story of drug-trafficking in the early-60s (the then-largest-ever narcotics haul in 1962), William Friedkin's Oscar-winning film brought to the American public an hitherto unseen dark and seedy view of their cities (filmed on-location in New York's Lower East Side, Times Square, Bedford-Stuyvesant, and Grand Central Station, amongst others), where ne'er-do-wells lurk in the shadows of shop-fronts and side alleys, awaiting nightfall and their raison d'être: to do what cannot be seen in daylight ... It proved quite a shock. Later films like MEAN STREETS and SERPICO also brought the seamier side of metropolitan life to the fore - they, too, made for unpleasant viewing. But the critics hailed such innovation in the otherwise glossy Hollywood output.

As Jimmy 'Popeye' Doyle, Gene Hackman's bruising portrayal of real-life idiosyncratic Harlem special Narcotics Bureau officer Eddie Egan deservedly won him an Oscar - unfortunately overshadowing his partner in the film Buddy 'Cloudy' Russo's (Roy Scheider) less evident contribution to Ernest Tidyman's crackling script. Both Egan and Grosso had small starring rôles in the film (Egan as Lieutenant Walter Simonson, Grosso as Klein), as well as served as technical advisors. By most accounts, Eddie Egan was not a likeable person: an unsympathetic, tireless, vulgar and brutal man, obsessively wedded to his career which was itself engaged in off-the-main-street detective work [he died recently, 2006]. In an attempt to portray Egan's character as accurately as possible, Hackman spent several weeks 'up close and personal' with Egan, getting under his skin. And get under the latter's skin Hackman did, as was attested by Egan's irritation and near-violent outbursts. But Hackman obviously did his research well, did he not ...?!! Apparently, the NYPD was so angered by the film's depiction of it that it punished Egan by firing him just hours before he signed his retirement papers.

Otherwise the film is a pretty straightforward cop thriller ... but with exciting set pieces. The scenes of Hackman's car-train chase under the elevated-railway in Bensonhurst, Brooklyn, in pursuit of callous hitman 'Frog Two' Pierre Nicoli are extremely tense because ... they were genuine. Producer Phillip d'Antoni wanted something 'extra' over the chase scenes in his earlier Bullitt (1968). The New York City authorities were not contacted for permission to film the scenes there, nor was the NYPD involved in stewarding traffic. Hackman committed several moving violations with a camera plonked on the dashboard in front of him - the looks of horror and fear on his face at the near-misses (eg. the mother with a baby in the pram) ... were entirely real. As was the - entirely unplanned and therefore unrehearsed - 'minor' crash of a civilian's car ... Now THAT was a lucky escape ...

The target of Hackman and Scheider's obsessions is 'Frog One,' Alain Charnier (Fernando Rey), the lynchpin in a large heroin import scam. Whilst the cops get soaked standing out in the rain chewing cold pizza, debonair and urbane Charnier dines sumptuously in warm and expensive restaurants. Marseilles is (still) the centre of Union Corse ('Corsican Union') activities in France and parts of the Mediterranean, much as the Mafia is in Sicily, the Camorra in and around Naples, and the Cosa Nostra in the United States. The source of Union Corse heroin was the Laotian section of the still-flourishing 'Golden Triangle' around Burma-Thailand-Laos (recall the restaurateur in AIR AMERICA?). When the French pulled out of the region following defeat at Dien Bien Phu in 1954, the heroin trade remained largely under Union Corse control; the Communists saw no reason to stop the decadent/capitalist/imperialist [add your own adjective!] West poisoning itself ... preferably American soldiers and draftees in South Vietnam. Contacts with the region still exist.

After a number of surveillances, arrests, a stripped Lincoln Continental (the rocker panels!), a showdown, and a shoot-out ... wily operator Charnier evades capture, although the stash worth $32 million is lost. Ever relentless, vigilante Doyle will not give up:

"The son of a bitch is here. I saw him. I'm gonna get him ..."