The French Connection Themes
Rules and Order
"Stop! Police!" Or is it, "Stop police!"? Captain Simonson tells Popeye and Cloudy that the tiny drug arrests they've been coming up with don't mean a thing to the War on Drugs. It's up to these de...
Perseverance
Say anything you want about Popeye's social manners, his personal hygiene, even his own adherence to law. Just don't say he gives up easily. He's a dog with a bone when it comes to making The Frenc...
Violence
Compared to the blood-and-gore of a lot of contemporary movies (hello there, Mr. Tarantino), The French Connection isn't so big on guts. (Unless you count that seemingly gratuitous scene with the c...
Race
There's no getting around the fact that our dirtbag protagonist, Popeye, throws around racial epithets and stereotypes. A lot. Sure, this movie was made in 1970, but we think that the writer and di...
Gender
The French Connection is a world of men and masculinity. Popeye couldn't do a better impression an urban cowboy if he was wearing chaps, and he has two main vices: one is alcohol, and the other is...
Drugs and Alcohol
Popeye's love of whiskey and beer is a legal vice, while the drug addicts down the street are at constant risk of arrest. It doesn't seem like an accident on the filmmakers' part that everyone in T...