The Dominator reviews

Distributed by
Warner Home Video

Cert: 18

Running time: 98 minutes

Year: 1971

Cat.no: S015429

Released: 8th September 1997

Sound: Mono

Widescreen: 2.35:1 (Panavision)

Price: £12.99

Extras: Original Theatrical Trailer

---

Director:

Don Siegel (Two Mules For Sister Sara, Invasion of the Body Snatchers (1956))

Producer:

Don Siegel

Screenplay:

Harry Julian Fink, R.M. Fink, and Dean Riesner

Music:

Lalo Schifrin (Mission: Impossible (TV))

Cast:

• Inspector Harry Callaghan : Clint Eastwood (Unforgiven, A Perfect World, The Eiger Sanction, Absolute Power)
  
• Bressler : Harry Guardino (Capone, Houseboat)
  
• Chico : Reni Santoni (Cobra, Dead Men Don't Wear Plaid)
  
• The Mayor : John Vernon (Airplane II, Brannigan)
  
• Killer : Andy Robinson (Into the Badlands, The Last Days of Paradise)
  
• Chief : John Larch (The Fugitive (TV))

In Dirty Harry, there's a sadistic and ruthless sniper on the loose calling himself Scorpio killing women and anyone else who gets in his way. The police are on the hunt, but getting involved in the case is the most unorthodox of police officers the district has, namely Inspector Harry Callaghan, aka Dirty Harry.

This is the first of five films with Clint Eastwood taking the lead role, the rest being Magnum Force (1973), The Enforcer (1976), Sudden Impact (1983), and The Dead Pool (1988).

Why 'Dirty' Harry? According to one of his colleagues, "Harry hates everybody", before reeling off a list of all the racial insults under the sun. His new partner asks, "What about Mexicans?". I'll leave you to guess his reply. The new guy should worry though, as all of Harry's partners seem to either end up in hospital or dead.

Dirty Harry is one of the best crime thrillers ever made. The director Don Siegel has also filmed Clint in the western, Two Mules For Sister Sara, and has made other reknowned films, such as The Shootist, and the 1956 version of Invasion of the Body Snatchers.

It has a perfectly cast leading man as the sarcastic cop who does his job his way, and no-one else's. Even in the bank raid a few minutes into the film, as the robbers come out, he fires his gun directly, and with little regard for the fleeing public.

After shooting through the windscreen of the getaway car, which hits a fire hydrant and turns over, he approaches the first robber he shot, now lying on the pavement outside the bank. As Harry stops him from going for his shotgun, he points his gun and delivers the most well-known of all of Harry's dialogue :

Want another piece of classic dialogue? At the beginning of the film as Harry meets the Mayor, his reputation clearly preceeds him...

Mayor : "Callaghan, I don't want any more trouble like you had last year in the Fillmore district, understand?"
Harry : "Yeah well, when an adult male is chasing an adult female with an intent to commit rape...I shoot the bastard, that's my policy."
Mayor : "Intent? How did you establish that?"
Harry : "When a naked man is chasing a woman through an alley with a butcher knife, and a hard-on, I figure he isn't out collecting for the Red Cross..."

Then for another you could also have a singalong of Row, row, row your boat, gently down the stream...

This is the first time that Dirty Harry has been released in widescreen format, and it's much more impressive in its original ratio than any time you've previously viewed this one on television or video, this release capturing the panaromic views of San Francisco and the entire width of the director's vision.

Picture quality is very good indeed for a film shot in 1971, although there are occasional dropouts which come from the print used - certainly nothing to complain about though. The sound is only mono, so just proves functional. However, the music really stands out, and that can be put down to the fact that it was composed by Lalo Schifrin who composed the music for the television series, Mission: Impossible.

You just have one mission now though - to buy this excellent release, so go ahead, and make your day....

Film: 5/5
Picture: 4/5
Sound: 4/5

Review copyright © Dominic Robinson, 1997.