It was the best of (movie) times... The French Connection

I am WAY off schedule with this project.  I apologize.  I have no real excuse, except my lack of motivation. So I will just dive back in and go.

This week, I watched The French Connection.  Most people know this movie because of it's BAD ASS car chase scene (and I completely say that with capital letters).  But this is a well written police drama centering on partners "Popeye" Doyle and "Cloudy" Russo.  Popeye and Cloudy stumble onto a drug smuggling operation running between Marseilles, France and New York.  Most of the movie is their investigation of the principles of this scheme.  That being said, there are a TON of slow scenes of the partners following various characters through the streets of New York.  And one BAD ASS scene with Popeye chasing down a train by driving through the street below.  The movie ends with the big bust.

The movie was filmed and written to be as realistic as possible.  The characters are flawed.  Popeye and Cloudy are upset about the federal agents assigned to the investigation (due to a wire tap).  In fact, Popeye comes to blows with the agent.  In the final bust, a trigger happy Popeye shoots the agent, but appears unaffected by that.  The movie has very little scoring (that I noticed), using it sparingly when tension needs built up.  The film work is basic (aside from the chase scene).

Why is such a simple film on the Top 100?  I would venture a guess to say that it's BECAUSE it is so realistic.  The cast was brilliant (Gene Hackman won an Oscar for his performance as Popeye and Roy Scheider was nominated for his as Cloudy), the screen play was simple and direct (won the Oscar for best Screenplay Adaptation), and the director knew what was needed to bring it to life (Best Director Oscar to William Freidkin).  Over all, a really great film and the first of it's kind to achieve what it set out to do.

And Gene Hackman's hat is just amazing.

GGC