Thursday, August 18, 2022

Dirty Harry (1971)

IMDb plot summary: When a madman calling himself "the Scorpio Killer" menaces the city, tough-as-nails San Francisco Police Inspector "Dirty" Harry Callahan is assigned to track down and ferret out the crazed psychopath.
Directed by Don Siegel. Starring Clint Eastwood, Andrew Robinson, and Harry Guardino.

Dirty Harry stars Clint Eastwood as Harry Callahan, a cop who doesn't like to play by the rules. We follow his attempts to catch a serial killer despite the bureaucratic red tape holding him back from doing it the way he'd like. This probably shouldn't be a surprise, but I mostly hated this film. I hate how this character is set up as a hero despite doing a lot of truly despicable things. I especially hated when they deliberately set him up in the first twenty minutes as someone who supposedly protects women (by being violent toward their attackers) and then, just a few scenes later, peeps at a nude woman in her apartment while muttering something along the lines of, "You deserve to live a little." I hate this trope, I hate this character, I hate this movie. The mystery itself would be fine in any other movie but here it just seems mocking and sadistic when put against this protagonist. I understand people love this movie. It is not for me.

How it entered my Flickchart:
Dirty Harry < Closer
Dirty Harry < 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea
Dirty Harry < Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde (1931)
Dirty Harry < Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End
Dirty Harry > Interview
Dirty Harry > Harriet the Spy: Blog Wars
Dirty Harry < Aquamarine
Dirty Harry < Sahara (2017)
Dirty Harry > G.I. Joe: The Rise of Cobra
Dirty Harry < 10,000 B.C.
Dirty Harry > The Odd Life of Timothy Green
Final spot: #3482 out of 3664, or 5%.

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