20. The French Connection
20th Century Fox
The Drug: Heroin If there's one thing that's guaranteed to happen if you make a drug illegal it's that the black market will take over where the high street left off. This is precisely what happened with heroin - legal until the passing of the Harrison Narcotic Act in 1914, it has since proved to be incredibly lucrative for the many criminal organisations willing to take the risk to smuggle it from its country of origin to the cities of the western world. William Friedkin's classic movie The French Connection examines the trafficking of heroin in the 1970s, when the notorious Corsican gangs smuggled it into the US from their laboratories in Marseilles, France. Gene Hackman - in one of the finest performances of his career (which is saying something) - plays New York detective "Popeye" Doyle, hot on the heels of the syndicate with his partner Buddy "Cloudy" Russo (played by Roy Scheider). As tense and invigorating today as it was on its release over 40 years ago, The French Connection harks back to lean, mean American filmmaking at its best.