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7 of 7 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Grim yet effective portrait of drug addiction, May 3, 2001
This film by maverick filmmaker Shirley Clarke (THE COOL WORLD) gets its power by its sheer simplicity. A group of jazz musicians await their drug "connection" inside a seedy New York City apartment while being filmed for a documentary. Set entirely in one room of the apartment, THE CONNECTION effectively creates a very claustrophobic feel. The viewer feels like someone awkwardly eavesdropping on the lives of people on the fringes of society. THE CONNECTION features many fine performances. Carl Lee (THE COOL WORLD) plays one of the few aggressive black men seen on screen during the early 1960's. He plays Cowboy, the "Connection" indicated by the title. He also has one of the film's best lines with: "Man, I believe anything that's illegal is illegal because it makes more money for more people that way." Roscoe Lee Browne (narrator of BABE: PIG IN THE CITY) makes his feature film debut in the role of J. J. Burden, the documentary cinematographer who also provides narration for the film. Warren Finnerty (EASY RIDER) gives a hyper performance as "Leach," the "host" of the gathering. Watching him, you'll swear that current indie favorite, Steve Buscemi (FARGO) is a reincarnation of him. Finnerty won an Obie award for his performance in the play. In its own way, THE CONNECTION rivals the recent commercial and critical favorite TRAFFIC in how it forces the viewer to examine his or her attitudes about illegal drug use. More importantly, it does this without the latter film's use of visual gimmickry or tricks. As an added bonus, check out Freddie Redd's jazz score. He performs it on camera along with Jackie McLean (sax), Larry Richie (drums) and Michael Mattos (bass). If you're looking for something gritty and raw in sharp contrast to 1960's Hollywood, you need to look no further.
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3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
The Connection, May 20, 2008
This review is from: The Connection (DVD)
You wouldn't know it from the cover (which makes it look like a strictly music video), but this is the 1962 Shirley Clarke film based on the Living Theater's production of "The Connection," with a screenplay by the playwright, Jack Gelber. Not only did Gelber write the screenplay, but actors from the original stage production include Warren Finnerty, Jerome Raphel, Garry Goodrow, Carl Lee, Henry Proach, and Barbara Winchester, as well as original musicians Freddie Redd (composer, piano), Jackie McLean (alto sax), Michael Mattos (bass), and Larry Ritchie (drums). So I imagine that this is a pretty authentic adaptation of the play. I think it is a fine, interesting film, but have only given 4 instead of 5 stars because the video and audio quality is just ok. For those just interested in the music, the CD would be a better choice. However, watching the film is definitely worthwhile. Recommended.
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5 of 7 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
I shall be the first...., April 8, 2007
This review is from: The Connection (DVD)
This movie has not yet been reviewed, so I I call upon the muses to give me sufficiently adequate rhetoric to not only describe its excellence, but also give a brief analysis of it. The movie itself is cheaply made. There is only one set, an apartment somewhere in New York, where an interracial group of druggies sit and wait for their drug dealer, 'The Connection'. They sit there and wait, while a documentary film maker attempts to document their lives and their collective addiction to heroin. They accuse him of exploitation and eventually convince him to stick the spike into his vein. The movie is purportedly put together by the assistant director, a school time friend of one of the junkies. Everything in this movie is a lie. The film is based off of a play and the play is based off of a debate that at this time raged between different styles of documentary. Is the best way to film a documentary to film it as though the camera isn't there, or it is better to film the documentary without any pretences that it is a film and the people will act regardless? The director Shirley Clarke was a protagonist of the second position, she knew that people will act in front of the camera no matter how used they are to its presence. As such, the performances are over the top. The junkies talk directly to the camera and engage in overlong monologues that barely touch the surface of heroin addicton. Shadows of the camera appear on walls and the junkies always try to talk to the director, who constantly appears on the screen to provide proper lighting for the junkies faces. His intended effect of having an invisible director is completely self-subversive as he joins the junkies in the act of taking heroin and indulging in that same euphoric apathy of the drug. The movie works because it exists on so many levels. It probes the debate over documentary style. It draws some sort of picture of Bohemian lifestyles in the early 60s. It films jazz musicians grooving to the anticipation and effects of heroin. It works because it acknowledges that people are bad actors, but aspiring ones too. It works because there is no truth and only a lie, a vague dissimulation of real life. Something that looks like life, but very clearly is not. An imperceptive eye would maybe mistake this film for a real documentary, but that would be missing out on all of the fun.
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