TristramShandy

It seems like a common refrain review for this series is that it could have been two hours long instead of four. I believe the length is necessary to cover how this is a tragedy for all who were involved. The girls obviously. The families of course. But then there are the first two detectives, and, finally, the four boys who were accused. Everybody is shattered or haunted. And the four episodes allows for the weight of the tragedy to be felt on each group. If part of the purpose is to show time and how it affects individuals for thirty plus years, trying to finish the documentary as quickly as possible disallows the weight of the event to be felt. To get that last episode which shows how everyone continues to suffer and how the job gets pushed off to yet another detective, this time in cold cases' where they'll need a VCR to play the original tapes they took - - it just reinforces how time can't heal the wounds of those who were touched most directly by the tragedy.

My favorite time period for movies is the late 60s through the 70s. Films that are considered or are adjacent to the label New Hollywood are my favorites. Knowing that the supply of these is finite, I've held back on watching some, and The French Connection was one of those.

While the movie is good and recommended, I just don't get the Best Picture win. I have to believe that a lot of what seems to be fairly normal in the genre was brand new when Friedkin directed it. Maybe the film is extremely revolutionary, but so many films (and tv shows) afterwards copped the style, that it appears commonplace watching it today. Personally, I'd have chosen either A Clockwork Orange or The Last Picture Show over The French Connection for best picture.

At the two-thirds point in the film, I wondered to myself if the film was going to be able to stick the landing. It didn't, but I'm not sure if there would have been an ending that would have made me feel that way. The first two-thirds of the movie is excellent as you see how trauma reverberates through all of the victims (which, quite possibly, includes the perpetrator). But because of how many characters there are, it made the last third of the movie hard to tie up, not just in terms of plot but with theme as well.

With that being said, it's a film that seems destined to stick with me. As with other Todd Haynes films that I've seen, the style is engaging with slightly offbeat choices (sound, palette, fictive time). I saw a variety of connections to Far From Heaven in both style and theme, to be sure. That film is one that I've revisited periodically; I think this one will be no different.