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Gene Hackman recreates his role as New York cop Popeye Doyle in FRENCH CONNECTION II.
OVC3S
'Connection II' vigorous
Review by Greg Lukow
One of the most pleasing
aspects of French Connection
II is that it seems to have been
made in spite of its
predecessor. Things we might
have expected to see in the
film have been reworked and
thrown back in the face of
French Connection I.
Similarities stop with the use
of only two returning actors
(Gene Heckman as "Popeye"
Doyle and Fernando Rey as
the cool, sophisticated drug
dealer, Oiainer), and the
natural follow-up to the
resolved conclusion of the first ,
film.
Director John
Frankenheimer has made a
startling, mean and effective
movie that puts his up and
down career at a momentary
peak.
Two years ago
Frankenheimer directed the
memorable adaptation of
O'Neill's Ttie Iceman Cometh
for the American Film Theater,
but then followed it with a
dismal little crime melodrama
called 99 and 44100 Dead.
The title was fudging since the
movie was 100 dead and
went nowhere.
But the excitement of
French Connection II is that
it's very much alive, a vigorous,
bursting motion picture much
like the first Connection but
reaching beneath the surface in
ways that the earlier film
didn't. William Friedkin's
Connection I was a slick,
run-and-gun mover while
Connection II is less
overwhelming on the surface
but weightier and more
concentrated on working
within the people and
confrontations of the story.
Life of its own
Friedkin's howling, noisy
New York Cityjiad a life of its
own and almost seemed to be
the force that made the rough,
Popeye Doyle kind of cop a
necessity. Frankenheimer's
Marseilcs, on the other hand, is
a more subdued, foreign
experience that Popeye must
learn to reckon with.
Popeye's vulgar, brutal style
is even more accentuated here
because it's all he has. In New
York he was carried along by
the inertia of the city but now
he is cast adrift and even used
as a decoy to help the French
police, headed by Barthelemy
(Bernard Fresson), in reporting
out Chanier's operation.
Movie disturbing
The movie is most
disturbing indeed, unsettling,
after Chanier has captured
Popeye, mainlined him on
heroin for three weeks and
then dumped him back where
he came from. As a result of all
this, Popeye becomes even
more obsessive-his animalistic
crudities come out as an even
more natural part of him.
Yet unlike Connection I,
Popeye now comes to realize
what he is. During his
addiction and subsequent cold
turkey period, he finally finds
out what it's like to be a
victim. In one of the film's key
lines, after he sees the police
drag a prisoner past his cell, he
yells, "Don't tell em anything
until you see your lawyer!" He
means it too whereas in
Connection I a similar
utterence would have come
only when (and if) he
mumbled legal rights to a punk
he had just beaten into
submission.
Chase was highlight
The highlight of Connection
I was of course, the reckless,
smashing chase scene, between
his In his third film to be
released in a month (along with
Bite the Bullet and Arthur
Penn's Night Moves), he
endows us with one of his most
unforgettable acting moments.
It comes mid-way in the movie
as he sits in his damp,
stone-walled cell while
recovering from his drug
addiction. In a rambling,
one-sided dialogue, he tries
desparately to converse with
his friend Barthelmy. lie is
drinking, weeping, screaming
and inwardly dying all at the
same time. One of the most
compelling releases of
frustration ever filmed, it may
become as famous as Brando's
taxi cab scene in On the
Waterfront or James Deans
desparate outpouring in the
stairway "sequence in" Rebel
Without a Cause.
More human
Hackman has made Popeye
Doyle one of the most
fascinating, and important
movie detectives-cops. In
Connection I he was a
character for the audience to
root for even though we might
not like him. Connection II has
made him more human, giving
him moments where we
sympathize with him but in
which we find nothing to cheer
about. He is Mickey SpiUane's
Mike Hammer revisited-thi
modern, anti-intellectua'
vigilante.
French Connection II
furthers the rather surprising
and satisfying potency of the
new Hollywood sequels. Also,
aside from Robert Altman's
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climax of Connection II is
again, a lengthy pursuit by
Popeye but here it is he and
Chanier on foot; a slow,
labored and painiui sequence
that throws itself up in direct
contrast to its famous
forerunner and gets away with
It.
Gene Hackman gives a
gutsy, exhaustive performance
as Popeye and he is brilliant. In
the best American film so far
this year. A dynamic,
short-fused genre picture, it
follows in the tradition of the
great American thriller. It has a
bleak, inner edge of paranoia
and darkness almost
reminiscent of the nightmare
film noir movies of the 40s and
SOs, with Claude Renoir's start,
no-nonsense photography
adding to the feeling.
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