"Did
20 days later...
For those who enjoyed Brandon Peters's insanely exhaustive James Bond retrospective reviews, rejoice at his return to the world of franchise retrospectives. This time around, it's a mere five picture, which span from 1971 to 1988. Yup, it's the Dirty Harry franchise. As always, I'll do my best to stay out of it (I wrote about the franchise in a film school paper back in 2001), but I implore you to not do the same. Anyway, without further ado, into the world of Harry Callaghan we go!
Dirty Harry
1971
Director: Don Siegel
Starring: Clint
Eastwood, Andy Robinson, John Vernon, Reni Santoni
Rated R
And now, after 25 Bond films, I’m doing the “one for me”
retrospective. Hopefully it can turn
into a “one for you” too. The Dirty Harry series is one of my favorite
film franchises. I’ve noticed there’s
not a whole lot of retrospective analysis on the internet about a five film
franchise spanning 17 years. It’s likely
because the series hasn’t had an entry since 1988. There were some brief talks of a reboot in
the last decade, but nothing came to fruition.
And quite frankly, Dirty Harry’s
mark is so firmly implanted on the action hero that a reboot or return isn’t at
all going to prove or do anything. And
if you really want that extra entry, you can pretend Clint Eastwood’s character
in Gran Torino is named Harry
Callahan.
The character was written with John Wayne for inspiration
but the first casting call went to Frank Sinatra. With Frank on board, Irvin Kershner was
attached to direct. Frank dropped out of
the film because of a lingering wrist injury from shooting The Manchurian Candidate eight years prior along with a desire to
shoot a lighter films following the death of his father. When Sinatra left, so did Kershner. John Wayne was offered the part he inspired,
but turned it down because he didn’t want Frank Sinatra’s sloppy seconds. Burt Lancaster was then offered the role and
refused. Steve McQueen was the next to
turn it down. Paul Newman turned it down
but strongly suggested Warner Bros consider Clint Eastwood for the role. Eastwood loved the script and brought on Don
Siegel to direct.
The film’s title character is a widowed cop married to
upholding the law any way necessary. If
extreme measures are needed to save a life or stop a crime, Harry Callahan will
take them. Eastwood’s portrayal is
extremely that of a cold, bigoted man who refuses to let anyone or thing stand
in his way. But, he’s also good to those
who don’t cross him or choose to follow him.
The morals and tactics with which Harry goes to bring justice was the
source of much controversy upon the release of the film. However, the film’s authority figures do not
condone his actions and treat them as by the book. I don’t think the film is trying to speak for
every case, but trying to show in particular that in this case Harry’s tactics
become necessary. A lot of the
discussion was about Harry not respecting a person’s rights, however none of it
was about how much a complete nut job could take advantage of said rights. I personally choose not to get into that at
all, and see the film as a piece of entertainment, of good vs evil. And this is also was Eastwood and Siegel saw
it when making it. There’s a lot of fun to
have with this character and apparently the majority saw him as a positive as
his legacy has carried on through films still to this day.
The villain, whose rights are in question, is Scorpio (in a
surprisingly not star-making role for Andy Robinson). The basis for Scorpio’s actions was the
Zodiac Killer, who at the time was a current event still ongoing. He’s just a crazed loon who goes out sniping
innocent and random victims, asking for $100,000 from the police. After 3 murders and a kidnapped girl buried
alive with precious time left, Harry breaks into his residence to hurry up and
get the location of the girl before time runs out. As it turns out, the girl is already dead,
and without a warrant and Harry’s torture, Scorpio is set free. Harry stalks him, but in only a crazy kinda smart
way, Scorpio pays to have himself viciously beaten to blame on Callahan. He later does something Zodiac only
threatened to do, and hijacks a bus full of children. Harry once again takes it into his own hands
to track him down and finish him off.
Scorpio and Harry kind of parallel each other, making the
head to head match up only more engaging.
Scorpio is a little, scrawny, sloppily dressed man who is always
flailing as he moves and carries a big gun that he uses at long range so nobody
can see him. Harry is tall, carries
himself well, walks smoothly and carries a personal weapon, the magnum. His attack methods are also always up close,
in your face and out in the open. The two couldn’t be perfect opposites. Scorpio
takes advantage of the law to get away with his crimes while Harry breaks it to
uphold justice. And in the end, Scorpio
holds a child hostage hesitant to pull the trigger, while Harry isn’t afraid to
take the shot at Scorpio with the kid in the way.
This is a well directed and photographed film. There are bunch of beautiful aerial shots.
The night scenes in the movie are very dark at times, to where you can’t really
see what’s going on, but it somehow works and doesn’t remove you from the
film. And at times, it looks and feels
like a horror film where you’re following the slasher as the hero. The film features original and unique action
sequence with pretty much every one being a highlight worthy piece. The known action set piece is the bank
robbery where Harry first spouts his famous speech (“Do you feel lucky? Well do
ya, punk?”). It also features Fred Williamson
who we’ll later see in other entries (in different roles). The scene clearly and successfully establish
what not only a great sleuth, but what a great bad ass Harry is. Another favorite is the money drop-off scene
(later redone in Die Hard With A
Vengeance), where Harry must go payphone to payphone within a certain
amount of time to get the next destination to drop off the money. Along the way he comes across many obstacles
almost preventing him from getting to the phone in time. By today’s standards these aren’t huge, blow
up your speakers, action pieces.
However, they still work in spades with their violence and suspense.
The score of the film is from Lalo Schifrin (the man who
brought you the Mission: Impossible theme). And at times it sounds like the inspiration
for Super Fly and time the
inspiration for Friday the 13th. It’s a pretty good, above average score. The score is at times very complimentary and
at times just there.
Dirty Harry is one
of my absolute favorite films of all time. If you’re a younger film geek and you’ve not
yet explored this series (or maybe never heard of it), check this one out. And, hey, go through this series with me. We can discuss stuff in the comments
section. The film is compelling crime
drama, with an engaging central character, great villain and suspenseful
plot. The film can raise important
debate topics if you want or be sheer entertainment. When I first saw the film I was highly amused
at the overly bad ass Harry, but in subsequent viewings over the years I’ve seen
this film as so much more (especially since I grew up with it on VHS and the
advent of DVD/Blu-ray allowing us to see the beautiful photography in all its
intended glory).
Up Next: MAGNUM FORCE
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I specifically rewatched Dirty Harry because Andrew Robinson played Garek in Star Trek: Deep Space Nine (where he pretty much stole every scene he was in) so I imagined Harry chasing around a Cardassian the whole time.
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