Thursday, September 14, 2023

TCM's William Friedkin tribute, Part 1

Roy Scheider (l.) and Gene Hackman in The French Connection (8:00 PM today).

Director William Friedkin died back in August. It's fairly common for TCM to do programming tributes not only to stars, but to directors and other behind the camera people. What is somewhat uncommon, however, is the sort of tribute TCM is going to have for Friedkin. That's because they've divided it into two parts, airing two months apart. The first part is tonight (Sept. 14), and has three of Friedkin's movies:

The French Connection (8:00 PM). I'd presume that the print TCM will get is what Disney infamously edited because the characters used period-appropriate (and the movie was contemporary anyway) language that some people who engage in presentism think should never be heard today.
To Live and Die in LA (10:00 PM). I had this 1980s crime movie on my old DVR but never got around to watching it before moving and having to get rid of that DVR since I was changing cable providers. At the time I couldn't find it on DVD, but that may have been my lack of search skills and the movie only being out-of-print on DVD.
The Boys in the Band (12:15 AM, so still late this evening in more westerly time zones). I also had this movie, well-known for its groundbreaking gay themes, on my old DVR, but once again hadn't gotten around to watching it. So I've got two movies to record.

As I said earlier, the second half of the tribute is in November, and I'll do another brief post on it then.

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