By Erin Free
In this regular column, we drag forgotten made-for-TV movies out of the vault and into the light. This week: the gritty, street-level 1973 thriller The Connection, starring Charles Durning, Ronny Cox, Dennis Cole, and Zohra Lampert.
With 1968’s Bullitt and 1971’s The French Connection, producer Philip D’Antoni was instrumental in putting together two of the greatest crime films of all time, each featuring a car chase that revolutionised on-screen vehicular action. With his sole directorial effort – 1973’s The Seven-Ups starring The French Connection’s Roy Scheider – D’Antoni offered more than ample proof that he could get more hands-on with a film project to great success.
After the popularity of The French Connection and The Seven-Ups, D’Antoni surprisingly shifted much of his attention to his company D’Antoni Television Productions, and proceeded to pump out strong TV series (the trucking drama Movin’ On with Claude Akins and Frank Converse) and telemovies, most of them based around cops and drug dealers: 1973’s Mr. Inside/Mr. Outside (with Tony Lo Bianco and Hal Linden), 1975’s Strike Force (with Cliff Gorman, Don Blakely and a very young Richard Gere) and 1977’s The Rubber Gun Squad (a comedy about a crew of misfit cops). D’Antoni also produced the out-of-character 1976 Jaws rip-off Shark Kill.
One of the most interesting of D’Antoni’s small screen projects was 1973’s The Connection, a telemovie designed to kick off a weekly series that failed to secure a pick-up after the initial broadcast on major network ABC on February 27, 1973. While essayed in the engagingly gritty, street-level, morally ambiguous manner that characterised D’Antoni’s most famous works, the real hook in The Connection is leading man and master character actor Charles Durning.
Beloved and revered for movies like Tootsie (1982), When A Stranger Calls (1979), Dog Day Afternoon (1975), and about a hundred more, Durning was also big in the telemovie game with essential titles like The Best Little Girl In The World (1981), Dark Night Of The Scarecrow (1981) and Death Of A Salesman (1985). A lead role for this wonderfully sympathetic actor – who passed away in 2012 at the age of 89 – was rare, however, which makes The Connection something to savour.
Durning is at his crafty, slyly funny best as perennially disheveled Frank Devlin, a one-time columnist for a major New York newspaper now doing it tough. His marriage has crumbled, his glory days have passed, and his accountant and best friend Everett Hutchnecker (character actor extraordinaire Ronny Cox in amusingly harried form) is constantly fretting over his dire financial circumstances. Devlin, however, still has some skills, many of which involve his impressive roster of friends and connections…in both high and low places.
This leads Devlin down a major rabbit hole when he’s drawn into the aftermath of a big diamond heist by young crook Sy McGruder (actor and anti-violence activist Dennis Cole, whose son, Joe Cole – Black Flag roadie and close friend of Henry Rollins – was tragically murdered in 1991) and his alluring wife June (Heather MacRae). Tapped to set up a meeting with the insurance company handling the diamonds so Sy can get an under-the-table payday, Devlin is soon getting roughed up by thugs, hounded by the cops, and gently harangued by his cheeky wife Hannah (Zohra Lampert).
A great time capsule of early 1970s New York, The Connection has much in common with The French Connection and The Seven-Ups (the films share a screenwriter in Albert Ruben), including a nicely staged late-game car chase. Shooting largely on location, director and Unsung Auteur Tom Gries handles proceedings in his characteristically assured and economic manner, while also smartly dialing up the droll humour laced through the pithy screenplay, which Durning plays to absolute perfection.
With the wily Frank Devlin dealing with all manner of seedy situations and shady characters each week, The Connection would likely have made for an enjoyable continuing series, while also providing a supreme showcase for the talents of Charles Durning. As it stands, however, The Connection is a rock-solid one-off telemovie brimming over with winning 1970s seaminess and biting black humour.
Availability: The Connection is a little difficult to find online, but it is in extremely watchable audio-visual form.
If you enjoyed this review, check out our other vintage telemovies Zuma Beach, The Third Girl From The Left, Snowbeast, Stagecoach, Terror On The Beach, Strange Homecoming, The Possessed, Memorial Day, That Certain Summer, Elvis And The Beauty Queen, Scandal In A Small Town, Victims For Victims: The Theresa Saldana Story, The Seduction Of Gina, Blue Murder, The Brotherhood Of Justice, The Wave, The California Kid, The Cracker Factory, Night Terror, Inmates: A Love Story, The Shadow Riders, CHiPs: Roller Disco, Dawn: Portrait Of A Teenage Runaway, Young Love, First Love, Escape From Bogen County, The Death Squad, Hit Lady, Brian’s Song, The Defiant Ones, A Cry For Help, Trilogy Of Terror, Policewoman Centerfold, Smash-Up On Interstate 5, Something Evil, Savage, A Step Out Of Line, The Boy In The Plastic Bubble, The Dirty Dozen: Next Mission, A Very Brady Christmas, The Gladiator, Elvis, The Rat Pack, Silent Victory: The Kitty O’Neil Story, Terror Among Us, The Hanged Man, Hardcase, Charlie’s Angels: Angels In Vegas, Vanishing Point, To Heal A Nation, Fugitive Among Us, To Kill A Cop, Dallas Cowboys Cheerleaders, Police Story: A Chance To Live, Murder On Flight 502, Moon Of The Wolf, The Secret Night Caller, Cotton Candy, And The Band Played On, Gargoyles, Death Car On The Freeway, Short Walk To Daylight, Trapped, Hotline, Killdozer, The Jericho Mile, Mongo’s Back In Town and Tribes.
