Rating summary

Movie		4.0
Video		4.5
Audio		4.0
Extras		3.5
Overall		4.0

The Connection Blu-ray Movie Review

Popeye's Not Here

Reviewed by Michael Reuben October 1, 2015

William Friedkin's 1971 classic, The French Connection, told a fact-based story about an international heroin smuggling operation, but Friedkin focused on two maverick NYPD detectives trying to intercept the narcotics at the distribution point in New York City. In The Connection, director and co-writer Cédric Jimenez explores the same smuggling network from the opposite end, its supply base in Marseille. In Friedkin's film (and its fictional sequel directed by John Frankenheimer), the French supplier of heroin was a single individual, the aristocratic Alain Charnier (a/k/a "Frog One"), but Jimenez paints on a broader canvas. A native of Marseille, he shows an entire city gripped by a criminal organization known simply as "La French" (the film's original title), which has so thoroughly infiltrated every facet of urban life that heroin smuggling is only part of its operations. In Jimenez's portrayal, Marseille of the Seventies becomes a latter-day version of Al Capone's Chicago, where everyone knows who the criminals are but no one dares to cross them.

One man did. An outsider like Eliot Ness, Magistrate Pierre Michel began his career in Juvenile Court, where his dealings with teenage addicts left him with an abiding hatred of the drug trade. Transferred to the organized crime division in Marseille, he began an increasingly violent crusade against "La French" and its leader, Gaètan Zampa, known by the nickname "Tany". Although Jimenez and his co-writer Audrey Diwan describe their story as "loosely based on real events", The Connection follows the broad factual outlines of Michel's war with Zampa's organization. It lets the viewer decide who won.

The Connection premiered at the Toronto International Film Festival in September 2014 and was released in France the following December. It received a limited release in U.S. theaters last May and is now being issued by Drafthouse Films as No. 31 in the company's increasingly impressive catalog of distinctive cinema.

It's tempting to treat The Connection as an afterword to Friedkin's film because of the common subject matter, but Jimenez is too good a student of crime cinema, and too loyal a citizen of Marseille, to set his aspirations so low. While establishing its own style, The Connection draws inspiration from numerous crime classics, of which the most obvious is Heat. Like Michael Mann, Jimenez depicts two implacable adversaries whose battle ranges across an extended urban landscape and encompasses armies of subordinates. Each is aware of the other, and both are such powerful presences that you feel them even when they are not onscreen. They meet only briefly, much like the obsessed detective and master thief played by Al Pacino and Robert De Niro in Heat. Indeed, when Jimenez frames his two principals at opposite ends of a two-shot, it's almost as if he's responding to the many complaints that Michael Mann failed to do that very thing during the famous coffee shop confrontation between De Niro and Pacino (thereby prompting endless speculation that the two actors filmed their dialogue separately).

Magistrate Pierre Michel is played by Oscar winner Jean Dujardin (The Artist), who forcefully conveys each step of Michel's journey from idealistic crusader to a fanatic for whom the ends justify the means. Echoing an early sequence in Brian DePalma's The Untouchables, Michel and his detectives bust a chemist, Charles Peretti (Georges Neri), whom they believe to have received a shipment of morphine to be processed into heroin, only to discover that they have been decoyed. As he realizes that conventional methods are ineffective, Michel begins applying methods similar to those espoused by Sean Connery's beat cop in DePalma's film. Brute force replaces the rule of law. "We'll think of the charges later" becomes a frequent refrain, as Michel orders multiple arrests. His determination is only intensified when the tenacious magistrate discovers that the police force itself has been corrupted by a group of officers known as the Corsican Cops.

Tany Zampa is played by Gilles Lellouche (Point Blank) with a reptilian intensity that makes his silence more intimidating than his rare eruptions of anger. Much of Zampa's power resides in his invisibility. Shielded behind layers of subordinates, he is everywhere and nowhere. When Michel forces Zampa into a more active role by imprisoning as many of his soldiers as possible—Michel calls it "cutting off the arms of the octopus"—he challenges the kingpin's aura of invincibility. Eventually, one of Zampa's own lieutenants, an ambitious underling known as Le Fou, translated in this disc's subtitles as "Crazy Horse" (Benoît Magimel), challenges Zampa's leadership. The ensuing gang warfare furthers Michel's goal of ending Zampa's reign, but it does nothing to restore public order—indeed, the opposite.

Jimenez shot with handheld cameras in real locations, and he instructed his cinematographer to keep every location free of lighting equipment so that the actors would not be distracted by fixtures and cables. Even more than in its subject matter, The Connection recalls the gritty realism that made Friedkin's The French Connection so startling for its time. But Jimenez goes even further by avoiding obvious set pieces, such as Friedkin's famous car chase, and by cutting away from scenes abruptly, creating a disquieting sense that the real action is always happening elsewhere. Violence in The Connection is sudden, brief and final; life is snuffed out quickly and without warning, as it usually is in reality. To the extent that Martin Scorsese's Goodfellas is an influence on The Connection, it is so by negative inference. Nothing in Jimenez's depiction of the criminal life is attractive or exhilarating. It's a deadly serious business. Zampa may say that he enjoys having fun, but like Michael Corleone, he routinely drinks water while those around him consume alcohol.

The pressure of Pierre Michel's work damages his family life, and some of Dujardin's finest scenes portray his deteriorating relationship with wife Jacqueline (Céline Sallette), who wants him to spend more time at home with her and their daughters. When Jacqueline eventually leaves him, Michel breaks down emotionally, drawing her back to him in an awkward reconciliation. Still, his commitment to ending Zampa's reign remains a barrier between them. Zampa's relatively conventional home life with his wife, Christiane (Mélanie Doutey), and three children stands in sharp contrast, a tribute both to the power of wealth—he buys Christiane a nightclub just to keep her happy—and to Zampa's superior ability to compartmentalize his emotions.

Those familiar with the history of "La French" will know how the story ends. For those who are not, let's just say that, as in The French Connection, which was also based on true events, the conclusion leaves many ambiguities and loose ends. Life doesn't sum up neatly, and heroes rarely achieve complete victory.

The Connection Blu-ray Movie, Video Quality 

The Connection was shot on film by Laurent Tangy, who learned his craft on the camera crews of such films as The Transporter, Tell No One and Unleashed. Post-production was completed at the all-digital Eclair Group facility in Paris. Drafthouse's 1080p, AVC-encoded Blu-ray was presumably sourced directly from digital files.

The Blu-ray image is superb: sharp and detailed, with a generally modest palette that gives the streets and waterfront of Marseille a weather-beaten, everyday contrast with the sunny resorts and neon and mirrored luxury of the bars and night spots where Zampa is likely to be found (especially Krypton, the disco he buys for his wife). Police stations and other government offices are usually cool and threadbare by contrast. Most of the action plays out in daylight, but blacks are strong when they appear. As is common with projects originated on contemporary film stocks and finished digitally, the film grain is extremely fine.

Drafthouse has mastered The Connection with an average bitrate of 29.99 Mbps, and the compression has been carefully done. The image quality remains stable throughout.

The Connection Blu-ray Movie, Audio Quality 

The Connection's 5.1 soundtrack, encoded in lossless DTS-HD MA, takes a more nuanced approach than the layered cacophony that often characterizes American crime films such as Heat. Instead, Jimenez's sound team tends to narrow the sonic focus to a few key sounds that are critical to a scene: footsteps, breathing, a car's engine. Only occasionally is a sequence accompanied by a loud and enveloping soundscape, e.g., at the Krypton disco. Subtle environmental cues are placed to left and right and in the surrounds, but they register almost subliminally. Dialogue remains primary. The original French language track is the sole audio option, with optional English subtitles (and a separate option for English SDH).

The Connection Blu-ray Movie, Special Features and Extras 

• The Making of The Connection (1080p; 1.78:1; 51:08): This comprehensive documentary features detailed interviews with Jimenez, Dujardin, Lellouche, Sallette and Doutey (among others), as well as extensive footage from location shooting showing the cast and crew at work.



• Deleted Scenes (1080p; 2.39:1; 6:46)
• Magistrate Michel at Da Costa's House
• Tany Meets Peretti
• Tany Offers the Krypton
• Pierre and Jacqueline Argue
• Death of Fabrizio
• The Secretary
• Tany and Son



• Trailers
• Red Band Theatrical Trailer
• Theatrical Trailer
• 20,000 Days on Earth
• Borgman
• Bullhead
• Mood Indigo
• Spring



• Booklet: Drafthouse's booklet features additional interviews with Jimenez, Dujardin and Lellouche, as well as stills and film and disc credits.

The Connection Blu-ray Movie, Overall Score and Recommendation 

The crime film is such a well-established genre that it can't escape familiarity, but The Connection reinvigorates the form with two memorable lead performances, with a vivid sense of place and time, with a firm anchor in real events and, most of all, with its coolly detached view of both the cop and the criminal. The former may be more admirable than the latter, but crusaders usually pay a price. Like Shane, Magistrate Michel can never return to what he was. Once you enter this fight, there is no going back. Highly recommended.