The Enforcer
1976
Director: James Fargo
Starring: Clint
Eastwood, Tyne Daly, Harry Guardino, John Mitchum, DeVeren Bookwalter
Rated R
Dirty Harry falls prey to the curse of the third film in a franchise in The Enforcer. Intended as the final chapter to the series,
the film comes off cheap, amateur, outlandish and dated. The film’s themes and plot’s believably may have sold better in 1976, but even then it had to have seemed a bit
cartoonish and laughable.
Two fans of the first 2 films in the series took it upon
themselves to write their own Dirty Harry film, Moving Target and by chance got it through to Clint Eastwood
himself. Eastwood thought it needed
work, but took it to Warner Bros. Warner
had already begun work on a script for a third picture called Dirty Harry and More. The villain plot of Moving Target was combined with the female partner angle of More and thus the film with the working
title Dirty Harry III (later renamed The Enforcer, as Eastwood wanted each
film to have a standalone name) was put into production.
Clint Eastwood second unit director (and later the director
of Every Which Way But Loose), James
Fargo makes his directorial debut on The
Enforcer. Eastwood was originally
slated to direct, but due to The Outlaw
Josey Wales going over on its production dates, Eastwood could not be
involved in preproduction. James Fargo
was brought in as a director who would be a yes man to Eastwood after things
went way south with Eastwood and Ted Post on Magnum Force.
It comes as no surprise when I read that Fargo went on to
direct a lot of television in the 80s (including The A-Team, Hunter and The
Scarecrow and Mrs. King). The film
reeks of this. The aesthetic is that of
a 70s or 80s television show. From the
acting, the actors, the sets, the props to the costuming (I swear one of the
People’s Revolutionary Strike Force members and the thug holding the liquor
stores up at the beginning had the EXACT same outfit). The photography and choreography of
everything is very pedestrian. It’s a
very lazy looking film. And when you
have a film that is basically 70s/80s a Dirty Harry the television procedural
episode and it runs at a little over an hour and a half things get very boring. I swear I’ve seen these locations they shot
at on shows like The Incredible Hulk,
Wonder Woman, Knight Rider, etc.
Just incredibly generic.
The villains in this film kidnap the mayor and somehow take
over Alcatraz holding him hostage. This
group of five or six never looks, nor feels threatening at all. It’s almost a joke. They almost look like they walked off the set
of a Friday the 13th
sequel. They’re supposed to be dirty
hippies, yet their outfits look freshly pressed and their faces are nicely cleansed
and made up. It’s a pit pathetic. We’re not given much insight to them other
than they are evil. According to the
story of making this film, Eastwood thought the script had far too much
character development and was chopping it down in favor of more action. If this was his goal, he didn’t do it enough.
Another group in this film posing as a possibly threat is
obviously based off the Black Panthers.
They are lead by famed blaxploitation icon Fred Williamson, whom we’ve
seen in the first two films as different characters (The “Do ya, punk” guy from
Dirty Harry and the pimp from Magnum Force). Unlike when James Bond went to Harlem, these
characters don’t feel as rich or in the spirit of things as Live and Let Die. It’s a little bit cringe worthy.
It's worth mentioning that our one recurring character in
this series besides Harry, Frank DiGiorgio, is killed off in this chapter. Frank was Harry’s replacement partner in the
first film and met up with Harry after a stakeout in Magnum Force. This kind of
raise the stakes death may have seemed bigger had the scene not been so
comically acted and blocked. Also
notable is that Tyne Daly’s Kate Moore is killed protecting Harry at the film’s
climax. So if you’re keeping track of
Harry’s partners…
Chico Gonzalez (Dirty
Harry) – Wounded, retired
Frank DiGiorgio (Dirty
Harry, Magnum Force, Enforcer) – Deceased
Earlington “Early” Smith (Magnum Force) - Deceased
Kate Moore (Enforcer)
– Deceased
He’s living up to his reputation when it comes to partners
as you can see.
This whole film feels like a giant buildup to an action
sequence in Alcatraz. It doesn’t make
sense why the villains go there; it has no purpose in the story. I feel Eastwood just thought it would be cool
to do. So cool, 3 years later he’d do a
full movie called Escape from Alcatraz.
The Enforcer has
some strong ideas for its time, buts executed in a rather dull and cheap
fashion. It’s pretty boring throughout
and never feels engaging at all. Dirty
Harry delivers some fun lines and learns a little as a character, but there’s
really nothing to see here. It’s just
not worth your time unless you’re a completest.
Next up: SUDDEN IMPACT
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