Wiliam Friedkin won Best Director and Best Picture for The French Connection, which is one of the best films ever made. It was unflinching in its depiction of policing in New York City, with scenes that feel so real it hardly feels like a movie.
The film is gritty and realistic, so much so that the N-word that was in casual usage back then was omitted recently to great frustration of many film fans. Friedkin made the call himself probably because he didn’t feel right about having the word be the only thing people think about when watching the movie.
As Deadline points out his Oscar game was strong:
Friedkin beat out some serious heavyweights to win the Best Direct Academy Award for The French Connnection at the 1972 ceremony. Also up for the statuette that year were Stanley Kubrick (A Clockwork Orange), Peter Bogdanovich (The Last Picture Show) and Norman Jewison (Fiddler on the Roof). He would go up against more heavy hitters with The Exorcists two years later. George Roy Hill won that year for The Sting, also besting Bernardo Bertolucci (Last Tango in Paris), Ingmar Bergman (Cries & Whispers) and George Lucas (American Graffiti).
Here is Friedkin talking about working with Gene Hackman:
The Exorcist was probably the more widely seen and known of his. What made it so good wasn’t so much the scenes with Linda Blair possessed by the Devil, but how good the movie is overall. Friedkin made a character drama more so than a horror film, which of course, made the horror elements even more frightening.
For those of us who have the movie committed to memory (although I will admit it’s harder for me to watch after having a daughter), we understand that much of this movie simply could not be made today. Trust me on that one. I’m not even sure some of those scenes are allowed on youtube. Let’s look. Well, okay, yeah it’s there.
I have to say that no movie has ever scared me like this movie did, both as a kid and as an adult. Credit goes to Friedkin for making it so realistic, just as he’d done with The French Connection.
Friedkin says in this interview that The Exorcist was his most challenging film:
Friedkin also directed The Boys in the Band and Cruising, which it must be said, were both fairly groundbreaking films for their time, telling untold stories from the gay community, even if they have been criticized in modern times for their depictions.
Ellen Burstyn is back for the new Exorcist, The Exorcist: Believer, to be released this year.
Friedkin was one of the all time greats. He will be greatly missed. Rest in peace.
