Film Excess - Free Ukraine - Stop Putin - End the war NOW!!: Dirty Harry (1971) - Eastwood's great, signature renegade cop character comes to life

3/24/2015

Dirty Harry (1971) - Eastwood's great, signature renegade cop character comes to life

♥♥♥♥♥

Clint Eastwood strikes a humorous tough-guy pose on this poster for Don Siegel's Dirty Harry

QUICK REVIEW:

Detective Harry Callahan from the San Francisco Police Department hunts the Bay area's feared, lunatic Scorpio serial killer.

Dirty Harry is a true classic: A groundbreaking crime actioner and one of the all-time great San Francisco movies. It contains lots of concepts that were later recycled; from the pay phone instructions (reused in Die Hard: With a Vengeance (1995)) and the chilling stadium at night scene (reused in The Fan (1996)) to the out-of-control bus scene (reused in Speed (1994)), - and that's not even mentioning Clint Eastwood's (Gran Torino (2008)) title hero, the hard-punching 'Dirty' Harry Callahan, who has been emulated in a vast number of films, besides becoming a franchise figure (Eastwood has starred in four sequels) and a trademark character throughout Eastwood's career, who in a way got 'his' last film in the masterpiece Gran Torino, which is not officially about Dirty Harry, but in a way seems to be the character's swan song anyway. The screenplay is written by Harry Julia Fink and Rita M. Fink (Cahill (1973)) and Dean Riesner (The Enforcer (1976)) with uncredited contributions from John Milius (Apocalypse Now (1979)) and Jo Heims (Play Misty for Me (1971)).
Dirty Harry is extremely entertaining and well-made by master filmmaker Don Siegel (Escape from Alcatraz (1979)), and Eastwood, who, impressively, did all of his own stunts in the film, rocks in it. - A number of older, more experienced stars at the time were offered the part; Robert Mitchum, Frank Sinatra, John Wayne and Burt Lancaster, who all turned it down. - Luckily for everyone, I think.
Andrew Robinson (Hellraiser (1987)) also gives a hair-raising, unforgettable great villain's performance as the Scorpio madman, who was modeled on the authentic Zodiac killer, later portrayed in David Fincher's great Zodiac (2007).

Related reviews:

Don Siegel: Charley Varrick (1973) or, The Last of the Independents
The Beguiled (1971) - Intense, erotic Civil War kammerspiel thriller
Coogan's Bluff (1968) or, Dopes and Hippies, Beat It!

Watch the film's original trailer here

Cost: 4 mil. $
Box office: 35.9 mil. $ (US only)
= Huge hit
[Dirty Harry was met with protests by angry feminists and has become an oft-cited example when debating vigilante or brutal police work. Roger Ebert denounced the film's "fascist moral position." But movie audiences loved it, and it became the 5th highest grossing film of 1971. Unfortunately, I can find very few figures about the film's performance internationally.]

What do you think of Dirty Harry?

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Donald Sutherland has passed away

Born in Canada, Sutherland battled polio as a child. His first credit was in Suspense (1963, TV-series) and his first film was The Castle of the Living Dead (1964). Later credits in his remarkable career include The Saint (1965-66), The Dirty Dozen (1967), M*A*S*H (1970), Kelly's Heroes (1970), Klute (1971), Don't Look Now (1973), 1900 (1976), Casanova (1976), The Eagle Has Landed (1976), Ordinary People (1980), A Dry White Season (1989), JFK (1991), Outbreak (1995), Fallen (1998), Virus (1999), Fierce People (2005), Pride & Prejudice (2005), Lord of War (2005), The Hunger Games (2012), The Undoing (2020, miniseries) and many more. He passed away at age 88. R.I.P.

Roger Corman has passed away

Born in Detroit, Michigan, Corman had a sprawling, intellectually hungry life as a youth and young man before arriving with his first film in 1955, Five Guns West. He would follow that with titles such as Apache Woman, It Conquered the World, Attack of the Crab Monsters, Teenage Cave Man, A Bucket of Blood, House of Usher, The Little Shop of Horrors, The Pit and the Pendulum, The Intruder, The Raven, The Terror, The Masque of Red Death, The Tomb of Ligeia, The Wild Angels, The Trip, Bloody Mama and many more. As a producer he was behind almost 500 films. Arguably among the most important filmmakers of the 20th century, Corman passed away at age 98. R.I.P.

William Friedkin has died

Born in Chicago, Friedkin accrued TV credits prior to his advance to the big screen as the director of Good TImes (1967), The Birthday Party (1968), The Night They Raided Minsky's (1968) and The Boys in the Band (1970) before his major breakthrough, The French Connection (1971), for which he won his only Oscar. He followed it up with the even bigger smash, The Exorcist (1973), arguably the best horror film of all time, for which he was Oscar-nominated. Later credits include Sorcerer (1977), Cruising (1980), To Live and Die in L.A. (1985), Rampage (1987), Rules of Engagement (2000), Killer Joe (2011) and The Devil and Father Amorth (2017, documentary). Friedkin passed away at age 87. R.I.P.

Louise Fletcher has passed away

Born in Alabama to deaf parents, Fletcher got her first credits in late-1950s TV-series.She took a 10 year-long sabbatical to devote her time to motherhood after the release of A Gathering of Eagles, but then came back and soon saw her career's most important part, as Nurse Ratched in One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest (1975), for which she won her sole Oscar. Later credits include Exorcist II: The Heretic (1977), The Lucky Star (1980), Brainstorm (1983), Two Moon Junction (1988), Cruel Intentions (1999), A Perfect Man (2013) and many more. Fletcher passed away at age 88. R.I.P.

Jean-Luc Godard has passed away

Born in Paris, France, Godard lived much of his life in Switzerland. He wrote for French film criticism magazine Cahiers du Cinema and became foundational for the New French Wave that inspired new waves in scores of other countries across the world with his Breathless (1960). Later credits include A Woman Is A Woman (1961), Vivre Sa Vie (1962), Le Petit Soldat (1962), Contempt (1963), Alphaville (1965), Pierrot le Fou (1965), 2 or 3 Things I Know About Her (1967), Weekend (1967), Every Man for Himself (1980), King Lear (1987), Century of Cinema (1995, documentary), Goodbye to Language (2014) and many more. Godard died of assisted suicide at age 91. R.I.P.

Wolfgang Petersen has died

James Caan has died

Caan was born the son of Jewish immigrants from Germany in New York. He got his start on TV in the early 1960s. His credits include El Dorado (1966), The Rain People (1969), Brian's Song (1971, TV movie), The Godfather (1972), - for which he earned his only Oscar nomination, - Slither (1973), The Gambler (1974), Funny Lady (1975), Rollerball (1975), Silent Movie (1976), Hide in Plain Sight (1980), - the only film he also directed, - Thief (1981), Misery (1990), Honeymoon in Vegas (1992), Bottle Rocket (1996), Eraser (1996), Dogville (2003), Elf (2003), Las Vegas (2003-07), Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs (2009) and many more. Caan passed away at age 82. R.I.P.

Jean-Louis Trintignant has died

Born in Vaucluse, France, Trintignant's theatrical debut as an actor was in If All the Guys in the World... (1955). Later credits include ...And God Created Woman (1956), The Seven Deadly Sins (1961), Inferno (1964), A Man and A Woman (1966), My Love, My Love (1967), A Man to Kill (1967), The Great Silence (1968), Z (1969), The Assassination (1972), Three Colors: Red (1994), Amour (2012), Happy End (2017) and many more. He also wrote and directed two films in the 1970s. Trintignant passed away at age 91. R.I.P.

Ray Liotta has died

Adopted from an orphenage at a young age, Liotta got hooked on acting in high school. He had various TV credits in the late 1970s and early 80s, with his film debut in The Lonely Lady (1983). Later credits include Something Wild (1986), Field of Dreams (1989), Goodfellas (1990), Cop Land (1997), Hannibal (2001), Blow (2001), Narc (2002), John Q (2002), Identity (2003), Observe and Report (2009), Youth in Revolt (2009), The Details (2011), Killing THem Softly (2012), The Place Beyond the Pines (2012), Shades of Blue (2016-18), The Simpsons (2018, TV-series), Marriage Story (2019), The Many Saints of Newark (2021), Black Bird (2022, TV-series) and many more. Liotta passed away at age 67 in his sleep while on production in the Dominican Republic. R.I.P.

Philip Baker Hall has died

Born in Ohio, Hall didn't start acting until he was 30. His long list of credits include Zabriskie Point (1970), Miami Vice (1987, TV-series), Midnight Run (1988), Ghostbusters II (1989), Cheers (1993, TV-series), Hard Eight (1996), The Rock (1996), Air Force One (1997), Boogie Nights (1997), Seinfeld (1991-98), Rush Hour (1998), The Insider (1999), Magnolia (1999), The Talented Mr. Ripley (1999), Bruce Almighty (2003), Dogville (2003), The Zodiac (2005), Zodiac (2007), Curb Your Enthusiasm (2004-09), Mr. Popper's Penguins (2011), Modern Family (2011-12) and many more. Hall passed away at age 90. R.I.P.

Film Excess - Free Ukraine - Stop Putin - End the war NOW!!

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3/24/2015

Dirty Harry (1971) - Eastwood's great, signature renegade cop character comes to life

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