The thirteenth episode of our season on the awesome movie year of 1971 features the Academy Awards Best Picture winner, William Friedkin’s The French Connection. Directed by William Friedkin, based on the book by Robin Moore, and starring Gene Hackman, Roy Scheider, Fernando Rey and Tony Lo Bianco, The French Connection was nominated for eight Academy Awards and won five, including Best Picture.

The contemporary reviews quoted in this episode come from Roger Greenspun in The New York Times (https://www.nytimes.com/1971/10/08/archives/the-french-connection.html), Charles Champlin in the Los Angeles Times (https://www.latimes.com/archives/story/2022-08-26/from-the-archives-high-adventure-in-connection), and Pauline Kael in The New Yorker (https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/1971/10/30/urban-gothic).

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