I am Robin Moore, the author of The French Connection. I was paid the film rights for The French Connection, was on the set during the filming and at the Oscars when the award was presented.

When I was writing the French Connection Sonny Grosso and Eddie Eagan came down to Jamaica to my Blue Lagoon. While they were there Barry Sadler and his wife, Lavonia, joined us. Barry and I had written The Ballad of The Green Berets a few years previously.

I enjoyed The French Connection II, however, I spent a lot of time trying to get paid, but never succeeded. Sad. After the French Connection II came out a lawyer in NY got me to sign the rights to The French Connection over to his law firm so I wouldn't be able to get any money from anything that came after The French Connection. We writers are always getting burnt by the film industry!

I last saw Sonny Grosso in NY a couple of years ago. I took the two emergency cops (the ones who raised the flag at The World Trade Centre) to meet Sonny and they gave him a copy of their DVD.

ROBIN MOORE...

Robin Moore...

As I see it a large number of unanswered questions arise in this account of Hackman's visit to Marseilles. The idea of Hackman acting as bait to locate Fernando Rey seemed faintly idiotic. After Hackman was captured by the bad guys what exactly was the point of them spending a lot of time turning him into a drug addict, and then dumping him back for the local police to look after ? Why was such a pointless extra long time spent on showing his cold turkey cure, and his sports fantasies ? Was this cure meant to last for three weeks or more ? What was the point of showing an old woman, who was nothing to do with the story, stealing his wrist watch ? Were all the people in the Hotel Tanger, or Colonnade, drug addicts ? Very little made sense --- or was I missing something ? After quite a lot of shooting, the whole scene was suddenly flooded by cascades of water. I had no idea where all that water came from, and the only point of it seemed to be to show how Hackman saved the life of the French cop. Then the French cop would be indebted to Hackman. For what reason ? It was all peculiar, and the only reason I might watch it again would be to try to figure it out. Somewhat like in the first film, Hackman ends up doing a fantastic amount of running, and then produces a stupendous long-distance pistol shot. He is often shown eating, and doesn't like Swiss chocolate. Don't know why.

Jimmy "Popeye" Doyle (Gene Hackman) travels to Marseilles to find Alain Charnier (Fernando Rey), the drug smuggler who eluded him in New York.

Roger Ebert of the Chicago Sun-Times gave the film two and a half out of four stars and said that "if Frankenheimer and his screenplay don't do justice to the character (of Jimmy "Popeye" Doyle), they at least do justice to the genre, and this is better than most of the many cop movies that followed." Is this the classic the original was? Of course not. But you have to give them credit for trying, and not just passing it off as a weak sequel. They kept Hackman, they brought in a big director like Frankenheimer. This was not something just to make a few bucks. And while it may not be the same level of "classic", it still has what most viewers want: some action, some chase scenes... and a devious subplot of a drug cop getting hooked on heroin!