Ranking The Dirty Harry Movies
2) Dirty Harry (1971)
This was a groundbreaking movie in every way imaginable. It scared John Wayne and it blew off the procedural norm of cop thrillers that hitherto dominated TV and cinema. Here was a cop who wore shades, carried a hand cannon and assaulted nuisance civilians threatening to kill themselves.
Get out of the way, hammerhead!
Don Siegal’s near-masterpiece had Eastwood’s blunt, no bullshit cop track Scorpio, the nut based loosely on the Zodiac Killer. In a way, this was the genesis of John McClane, Martin Riggs and all of those deadpan one-liners Schwarzenegger spouted from Raw Deal to Eraser (Arnold admits as much).
Arguably, Dirty Harry and Clint Eastwood were even cooler than Steve McQueen himself or any movie he did.
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