Before Martin Riggs, before Jack Cates, before Marion Cobretti….
I know what you’re thinking, punks….
And you’d be right.
Detective Harry Callahan. Clint Eastwood.
Frank Sinatra was the original choice for the role in a script that was originally titled DEAD RIGHT and was almost going to be shot, according to online research, in New York, before director Don Siegel and Eastwood decided to relocate it to San Francisco.
A killer called ‘Scorpio’ is threatening the city after shooting a woman in a rooftop swimming pool and will continue to do so unless the Mayor coughs up $100,000.
Detective Harry Callahan is assigned to the case, but the Mayor (John Vernon) warns against excessive force after an incident in the city’s Fillmore District the previous year. Callahan is not too happy with the way things are panning out – and becomes even more so when he is assigned a new partner, Chico Gonzales (Reni Santoni)
After a shootout designed to trap Scorpio (Andy Robinson), the killer blackmails the Mayor again by kidnapping a young girl, Anne Mary Deacon and Harry becomes the cash bag delivery boy. The case has become a race against time….
Still king of the one-liners – and the film contains one of the most iconic passages of dialogue of all time – DIRTY HARRY, which spawned four sequels, is a tight and taut action thriller, with a terrific score by Lalo Schifrin (BULLITT)