Review of Dirty Harry (1971) by Aaron V — 13 Aug 2013

"Dirty Harry" appeared in the early part of the conservative revival of the late '60s and early '70s, but the tropes of that movement are already fully manifest in the movie. The backlash against the counterculture, the preoccupation with supposed sexual deviance, the fine-tuned racism, the belief that the government is too soft on crime, the certainty that the only real justice is that which is dispensed through the barrel of a gun: it's all here, in almost the exact form that it still exists on AM talk radio, in misspelled Facebook posts, and in the jeremiads of right-wing politicians.

But while the ideology of the "Dirty Harry" universe is an unintentional charicature, the movie is undoubtedly well-made and well-acted. Andrew G. Robinson is playing society's stereotype of a serial killer, but he's doing it marvelously.

Clint Eastwood isn't working outside his comfort zone, but like John Wayne or Arnold Schwarzenegger, he doesn't need to. "Dirty Harry" follows in the footsteps of hard-boiled detective movies of Hollywood's yesteryear, and points the way to future buddy-cop potboilers.

Although it launched a mini-franchise, the original is in many ways its own sequel, with clearly defined acts that allow for a substantial amount of call-backs and self-references within a relatively short runtime.