A classic

Even though I have watched many times the Spaghetti Westerns starring Clint Eastwood when I was a kid with my dad, I discovered his Dirty Harry flicks much later on in my life. Eventually, even though I still prefer his Westerns, I still enjoyed his famous cop features as well. The interesting thing with this franchise is that the sequels were actually pretty decent but, obviously, this first installment was the only one which became a real classic. Indeed, Harry Calahan must be one of the most notorious police characters ever created, very often copied but never matched. At the time, Clint Eastwood was pretty much in control of his career. He picked up 4 different drafts of the script (one written by no one else than Terrence Malick). made sure that Don Siegel was hired to direct this movie and he was also responsible for hiring Andy Robinson to play Scorpio. When it was released, it was a critical and commercial success but there was also some controversy as it displayed and almost glorified police brutality. Basically, the Scorpio killer was pretty messed up and, eventually, Harry Calahan was not much better, he just happened to be on the right side of the law. To conclude, I really enjoyed this flick, it is a classic and it is definitely worth a look, especially if you like the genre.

8/10