element. On the other side of this cinematic coin is the Black Nationalist
hero who is staunchly counter-cultural in mind, body, and soul. He is a
badass because he makes no apology for bucking a racist social system. Both
cinematic tropes of mastery rely on the presence of the racial “Other” for an
opportunity to adduce superior masculine authority. More specifically, both
depend on the presence of other men to prove their manhood. Both Dirty
Harry and The French Connection exclude women (except in the most mar-
ginal contexts), thereby confirming what was latent in earlier genre films—
that all the feeling and rapport are between the men, between a cop and his
superior, a cop and his sidekick, or a cop and his nemesis, the criminal
(Haskell 363). These cinematic conventions underscore Michael Kimmel’s
argument that manhood is demonstrated for other men’s approval, making
proof of masculinity a homosocial enactment (Kimmel 128–29). Perhaps
the similarities between some of these characters are not accidental, since
Ernest Tidyman scripted both The French Connection and Shaft—though the
former was based on a book by Robin Moore.
In The French Connection, two New York detectives uncover a drug ring
importing heroin smuggled into the United States from Marseilles. One of
these two detectives is Jimmy “Popeye” Doyle (Gene Hackman), a violent
renegade cop who is “a sadist, tyrannizing over blacks” by day and “a sex
pervert” and masochist by night (Hart 67). The other detective, Buddy
“Cloudy” Russo (Roy Scheider), is his loyal—more ethical—partner. At the
head of the international dope syndicate is Alain Charnier (Fernando Rey),
a cultured, urbane, middle-aged man who keeps a beautiful, young mistress
in a lovely house overlooking the Mediterranean. At the beginning, Doyle
leads the police department in arrests but is nonetheless distrusted and
resented in his department, which is overly concerned with regulations and
not sufficiently concerned with the business of catching criminals. Working
mainly on instinct, Doyle is rough, uncompromising, and obsessively com-
mitted to his case.
If these cop characters sound familiar, writes Todd Berliner, “it’s
because it applies to lead characters in just about any police thriller released
before or after The French Connection, including the other major police
thriller of the year, Don Siegel’s Dirty Harry” (26). “Dirty” Harry Callahan
(Clint Eastwood) is, like Doyle, violent and headstrong, a renegade and a
racist. In the film, one fellow officer even says as much: “Harry hates every-
body—limeys, micks, hebes, fat dagos, niggers, honkies, chinks. You name
it.” Both Doyle and Callahan are in constant conflict with their superiors
over their disregard of regulations and their excessive use of force. In The
French Connection, an obstinate Doyle spearheads this conflict with superi-
64 MIA MASK