Gene Hackman recalls ‘The French Connection’ 50 years later: ‘A moment in a checkered career of hits, misses’

It’s the heart-stopping moment when a bashed-in Pontiac LeMans hurtles beneath NYC’s elevated subway at 90 miles an hour, dodging traffic and pedestrians in a wild race to keep up with a hijacked N train rumbling overhead. That five-minute sequence — a crash course in ‘70s guerrilla filmmaking — is now regarded by many to be the best movie car chase of all time. 

"Filmmaking has always been risky — both physically and emotionally — but I do choose to consider that film a moment in a checkered career of hits and misses," the reclusive Hackman, 91, who retired from the screen in 2004, told The Post in a rare interview — his first in a decade.

"As for the car chase, there was a better one filmed a few years earlier with Steve McQueen," he added via email, slyly referencing his fellow film icon’s motorized Mustang stampede through the rolling hills of San Francisco in 1968’s "Bullitt."