Supercop

Dirty Harry may well be the ultimate Hollywood movie about cops and killers. Its hero, the quintessence of the cool keen-eyed loner with a badge, sets himself against the epitome of evil, a psychopathic blackmailer who loves to murder. These two types have fought it out before, but never with such violent abandon. Dirty Harry may have its flaws with logic and over-simplification, but its sheer brute force kicks aside all discrepancies as it hurtles towards the final confrontation of primitive good and evil.

"Dirty Harry" Callahan (Clint Eastwood) has earned his nickname by succeeding at the hardest, ugliest jobs in the police department. Single-handedly he stops a bank robbery, and when everyone else fails, he talks down a suicide attempt. Harry goes on while his partners lie dead or maimed. So naturally, he leads the search for Scorpio. San Francisco's mysterious sniper-extortionist. And after frustrating set-backs and a trail of mutilated victims--one expects nothing less--Harry gets his chance with what has become his private devil.

In his efforts to create the pluperfect detective, director Don Siegel leans the movie on a steep right-wing bias. Harry is more than a policeman, he is an avenging god. He has the strength and endurance of ten because his heart is pure law-and-order. Harry succeeds in tracking down the killer, only to see him slip away under the cloak of snivelling libertarianism. The district attorney, backed by an intellectual judge from Berkeley, informs Harry that the criminal's rights were violated. This inverted bit of deus ex machina gives Scorpio time to terrorize a busload of children and sends Harry off again on the righteous pursuit of his maniac.

Because the movie deals in archetypes, it occasionally threatens to parody the genre it is honoring. Harry is so cool, so invincible, he almost flattens into one-dimensionality. Irrelevant references to his deceased wife and some cute banter about his nickname fail to fill out his personality. And because of Dirty Harry's oversimplification, Scorpio's vicious insanity (brilliantly conveyed by Andy Robinson) becomes a mere caricature of evil-an archenemy of Batman playing for keeps.

The difficulty comes from the script, by Harry and R.M. Fink, which fails to disguise its Hollywood origins. More legend than plot, the story fumbles when it wanders away from its central combat. The cops speak a special kind of cinematic tough talk. Exit lines sound like clever phrases the messieurs Fink have spent weeks sweating out. The speech of a policeman's wife takes a few perfunctory swipes at social commentary, but the film's heart is elsewhere, splashing in the gore.

Whenever Dirty Harry plunges into violence--which is most of the time--its own irresistible force massacres any lingering qualifications. With civilized society tangled in procedural dogma only raw power can destroy the menace. And Harry Callahan is not exactly gun-shy. The carnage is lovingly detailed: a swimming pool filling with blood, machine-gun fire splattering the city, knifings, beatings, kidnappings, and more. Much more. Siegel excels at wrapping his audience in horror. The bank robbery is a virtual ballet of gunfire and blood. The methodical irrationality of Scorpio's sniping blasts away one's logical defenses; the killer evokes instinctive terror.

Clint Eastwood has made a career out of blood and guts, and his switch from spaghetti westerns to ultra-detective will disappoint none of his fans. In fact, he has managed to keep his portrayal both serious and believable. As his quickly sidelined partner. Reni Santoni deserves praise for making his lines sound less hackneyed than they were written. Andy Robinson's performance should corner him the market on psychopaths. His demonic laugh would warm Edgar Allen Poe's blood and curdles everyone else's. Adjectives like "bone-chilling" were invented for eyes like his. And the controlled delirium of his voice completely confirms his satanic presence as Harry's ultimate foe.

The real stars of Dirty Harry are the special effects and make-up men. Without their genius, Siegel would have been unable to send off his audience furtively checking the roof-tops. The film's proportions are so mythic, one expects to shake off the horror. Not so, For three nights running one particularly gruesome close-up has starred in this reviewer's nightmares. Dirty Harry is compelling, though not exactly pleasant, entertainment that rides high on the new wave of violence films. Hopefully Siegel and his film-making colleagues will ebb back to their other obsession. Sex is so much better for one's sleep.