Magnum Force

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For the Heltah Skeltah album, see Magnum Force (album).

Magnum Force
Magnum Force theatrical poster
Directed by	Ted Post
Produced by	Robert Daley
Written by	Characters: Harry Julian Fink Rita M. Fink Story: John Milius Screenplay: John Milius Michael Cimino
Starring	Clint Eastwood Hal Holbrook Mitchell Ryan David Soul Felton Perry Robert Urich Tim Matheson
Music by	Lalo Schifrin
Cinematography	Frank Stanley
Editing by	Ferris Webster
Distributed by	Warner Bros.
Release date(s)	December 25, 1973
Running time	124 min
Country	United States
Language	English
Preceded by	Dirty Harry
Followed by	The Enforcer
All Movie Guide profile
IMDb profile

Magnum Force was the first of the sequels to the film Dirty Harry, starring Clint Eastwood as maverick cop 'Dirty' Harry Callahan. The film was released in 1973 and directed by Ted Post, who also directed Clint in TV's Rawhide and the feature film Hang 'Em High. The screenplay was written by John Milius and Michael Cimino.

Contents [hide] 1 Plot 2 Comment 3 Controversy 4 Trivia 5 External links

[edit] Plot

What is probably the most violent Dirty Harry film, and one of Clint Eastwood’s most violent motion pictures in general, Magnum Force, the second movie featuring the character Dirty Harry Callahan, literally starts out with a bang after the opening credits with another pulse-pounding score by Lalo Schifrin. The opening scene shows a known organized-crime kingpin driving away from a court case where he was declared not guilty. Soon after, a motorcycle patrol cop stops the crime boss’s car and begins to write out a ticket for the driver, saying he had crossed the double-line. The cop soon follows up by pulling his service revolver, a .357 magnum, and empties it into the bodies of the passengers, then calmly drives off. Harry and his new partner stop by to check out the crime scene, but Harry is no longer working in homicide, and so he and his new partner, Early Smith (Felton Perry) have to bide their time until Dirty Harry gets called back on the case.

Next the audience is treated to the ever-present Harry-must-establish-his-credentials-for-the-audience-scene by having him just happen to be eating at the airport when a hijacking is taking place. In the unforgettable scene of Dirty Harry’s answer to airplane hi-jackers, Callahan manages to get on board disguised as a pilot and fools everyone until the co-pilot asks, “Can you fly?”, to which Harry devilishly replies, “Nope. Never had a lesson.”, and then proceeds to put the brakes on the whole hijacking, literally. Through all of this, Harry is butting heads with his new superior, Lieutenant Briggs, played by Hal Holbrook. It is to Briggs early in the picture that Harry utters his signature line for this movie: “A man has got to know his limitations.”

While Harry is waiting to be put back on homicide detail, he encounters a new group of motorcycle police officers, fresh from the Airborne Army Rangers, Special Forces, and out of the police academy: Sweet (Tim Matheson), Davis (David Soul), Astrachan (Kip Niven), and Grimes (Robert Urich). He also runs into an old friend, Charlie McCoy (Mitchell Ryan), a frustrated veteran motorcycle cop who is going through a rough time lately, having separated from his wife. More killings ensue, including a black pimp (played by Albert Popwell, the “I gots ta know” bad guy from Dirty Harry) and a host of underworld folks at a private house party, who include a topless Suzanne Somers with a new engagement ring. Harry and his partner are called in, and from the clues he finds, Harry thinks it’s a traffic cop, namely Charlie McCoy. Unfortunately, during a stake-out and arrest operation, courtesy of Frank DiGiorgio (John Mitchum, also from Dirty Harry), Charlie McCoy is killed. And so Harry begins to look elsewhere. He finds his suspect(s) in the four motorcycle rookies he met earlier. Harry then sends a message to the motorcycle cops during a pistol shooting competition wherein Harry purposely hits a police-man target during the combat competition with Davis. He checks ballistics and confirms that bullets from Davis’ gun match ones found at the crime scene involving the kingpin.

What then follows is a series of events that leads Harry to the ultimate climax with the cop vigilantes. Sweet is sacrificed in a raid on a mob boss to throw any possible investigators off track. Harry next encounters the 3 remaining renegade cops in the parking garage of his apartment. When they give Harry an offer to join their cause, he sternly responds, “I’m afraid you've misjudged me.” Callahan then avoids having a bomb go off from his mailbox, left by the vigilantes in case he refused their offer. He calls Lt. Briggs to warn his partner, but Early Smith does not get the call from Harry before opening his own mailbox with a bomb that does explode. Briggs arrives and asks Harry to drive while he looks the bomb over more closely. After a short distance, Briggs pulls his service revolver and points it directly at Callahan. “You’re gun’s out of your holster, Lieutenant. First time?” Harry says sarcastically, in reference to a comment Briggs made to him earlier in the film. Harry is told to turn over his .44 magnum and his speed loaders, which are dumped in the back of the car and out the window.

A dialogue then ensues with Briggs explaining the cause of the vigilante cops, and that there is plenty more where they (the rookie vigilantes) came from. “You’re a good cop, Harry. But you’d rather stick with the system,” Briggs adds with a sense of loathing and malice. But Harry’s response is that although he hates the system, he will stick with it until some rules come along that make some sense. Here is a piece of dialogue, along with his earlier refusal to the renegade cops in the garage, that appears to have been aimed at the more liberal side of the movie-goers who saw the previous Dirty Harry film but chastised its apparent messages of policemen disregarding the law and due process. Briggs ends the repartee with a definitive statement, “You’re about to become extinct.”

Harry notices he is being followed by a motorcycle cop, but manages to not only knock out Briggs but also kill Grimes, the cop following him. On the run at the docks, Harry abandons his car as the remaining 2 vigilante cops show up. Harry runs aboard the hulk of an old aircraft carrier docked in a scrapyard and hides out through the ship, with no gun, waiting to find a way to elude his pursuers or neutralize them. Astrachan finds Harry first and tries to shoot him as he runs through the darkened ship. Before Astrachan can reload, Callahan surprises him and beats him to death. He tries to take the officer’s gun and reload but he doesn’t have time before Davis comes along, so Harry takes off. Davis finds Astrachan, and then hears someone trying to start a motorcycle up top on the ship's deck. He races to the top to get on his motorcycle and chase Harry. They both make some death-defying jumps across the upper decks of the ship until they run out of deck, after which Davis ends up sending his motorcycle and himself straight into the bay. Davis’ body comes floating up to the surface, dead. “Briggs was right,” Harry remarks. “You guys don’t have enough experience.”

Just as Harry and the audience thinks the whole mess is finally over, Briggs appears, bloodied, with a gun from one of the motorcycle cops in his hand, declaring he will prosecute Callahan with his own system, and starts to drive off. A few seconds the car is blown up with the letterbox bomb that had been left in the back of the car, which Harry activated just before backing away at gunpoint. Harry's final comment is,

“A man’s got to know his limitations”.

[edit] Comment

The film was based on a real life incident involving police in Brazil. ^{citation needed}

[edit] Controversy

The film received negative publicity in 1974 when it was discovered that a scene in which Drāno is used to murder a prostitute had allegedly inspired the infamous Hi-Fi Murders, with the two killers believing the method would be as efficient as it was portrayed in the film. However, the killers admitted that they had been looking for a unique murder method when they stumbled upon the film, and that had they not seen the movie, they'd have simply picked a method from another film. The drain cleaner reference was repeated in three other films, Lethal Weapon (1987), Heathers (1989) and Urban Legend (1998).

[edit] Trivia

• The film was also somewhat of an answer to critics that said the first Dirty Harry movie glorified violence toward suspected criminals. Harry's refusal to join the vigilante squad was to be proof that he was not above the law.

• Harry mentions to his new partner, Early Smith, that his previous partner was wounded on the job but is now a school teacher, in reference to Chico (Reni Santoni) from the previous film, Dirty Harry.

• At one point when Harry is in his apartment by himself, he looks at a photo of him and his wife, the only time the audience ever gets to see the late Mrs. Callahan who was mentioned in the previous film.

• The actress playing Sunny (Adele Yoshioka) had to stand on a box at times when filming scenes with Clint Eastwood due to there being over 12 inches difference in their respective heights.

[edit] External links

• Magnum Force at the Internet Movie Database
• Harry Callahan fan site

The Dirty Harry films
Official films Dirty Harry | Magnum Force | The Enforcer | Sudden Impact | The Dead Pool