Most cinephiles are more than familiar with William "Wild Bill" Friedkin's The French Connection, the crime-film classic that stars Gene Hackman and features arguably the best car chase ever put to celluloid. In contrast, not many people have held up The French Connection 2, wherein Hackman's detective heads to France to find the titular source, as anything more than a run-of-the-mill procedural. It's not a great film, or even a good film for that matter, which is unfortunate, considering the subject matter is just as rich as the events that spurred Friedkin's original. Thankfully, Cedric Jimenez's The Connection, which stars Jean Dujardin (The Artist) as Hackman's character's French counterpart, looks to correct that, and the trailer goes a long way to building anticipation for the Drafthouse Films release.

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Image via Drafthouse Films

The film recently played the Film Society of Lincoln Center's excellent Rendezvous with French Cinema series to major accolades, and the buzz has been building for Jimenez's film since its premiere at last year's Toronto Film Festival and its subsequent December release in its native country. The film also stars Gilles Lellouche as the villainous head of an all-powerful crime syndicate, a high-tier drug kingpin with zero scruples about going after Dujardin's cop and his family. The trailer highlights the exceptional action sequences that power Jimenez's exhilerating film, but doesn't quite communicate the tremendous tension of the film, which follows in the line of such relatively recent French crime flicks as Mesrine and Sleepless Night.

The Connection will be released by Draftouse Films in the U.S. on May 15th.

Watch the trailer below, via Yahoo Movies:

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Image via Drafthouse Films