The Enforcer (1976)

Dirty Harry must foil a terrorist organization made up of disgruntled Vietnam veterans. But this time, he's teamed with a rookie female partner that he's not too excited to be working with.

Director:

James Fargo

Writers:

Harry Julian Fink (characters), Rita M. Fink (characters) (as R.M. Fink)

Stars:

Clint Eastwood, Tyne Daly, Harry Guardino

2 nominations.

Cast

Cast overview, first billed only:
Clint Eastwood	...	Harry Callahan
Tyne Daly	...	Kate Moore
Harry Guardino	...	Lt. Bressler
Bradford Dillman	...	Capt. McKay
John Mitchum	...	DiGeorgio
DeVeren Bookwalter	...	Bobby Maxwell
John Crawford	...	The Mayor
Samantha Doane	...	Wanda
Bob Hoy	...	Buchinski (as Robert Hoy)
Jocelyn Jones	...	Miki
M.G. Kelly	...	Father John
Nick Pellegrino	...	Martin
Albert Popwell	...	Mustapha
Rudy Ramos	...	Mendez
Bill Ackridge	...	Andy

Storyline

Picking up three years after the events in Magnum Force, a threatening terrorist group called, The People's Revolutionary Strike Force declare war to the city of San Francisco and demand a ransom to be paid, otherwise they plan to blow the city apart. While Inspector 'Dirty' Harry Callahan is at a limbo following his unorthodox method during a robbery, he's at it to dispatch the terrorist group, by playing their game by being more dirty than ever. But this time, he's got a new partner, which might prove the task to be somewhat more difficult than ever, unless the two can work together.

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Plot Keywords:

woman murders a woman | female villain | female gunfighter | maverick cop | tough girl | 

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Taglines:

The "dirtiest" Harry of them all!

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Genres:

Action | Crime | Thriller

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Certificate:

R

Details

Country:

USA

Language:

English

Release Date:

22 December 1976 (USA)

Also Known As:

Moving Target

Filming Locations:

1470 Pine Street, San Francisco, California, USA

Box Office

Budget:

$9,000,000 (estimated)

Gross USA:

$46,200,000

Company Credits

Production Co:

Warner Bros., The Malpaso Company

Technical Specs

Runtime:

96 min

Sound Mix:

Mono Dolby Digital (5.1)

Color:

Color (Deluxe)

Aspect Ratio:

2.35 : 1

Did You Know?

Trivia

Stirling Silliphant was already working on a screenplay idea for a third film in the series, entitled "Dirty Harry and More" involving a female partner for Det Harry Callahan - an Asian-American called More. Clint Eastwood liked the idea of a female sidekick but felt that Silliphant's script lacked action. He showed him the spec script from Gail Morgan Hickman and Silliphant agreed to rewrite it. Silliphant's subsequent draft still lacked action so he drafted in his frequent collaborator Dean Riesner with whom he'd worked on Coogan's Bluff (1968), Play Misty for Me (1971) and Dirty Harry (1971).

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Goofs

Early in the film the girl lures the two gas company workers to her home, where the bad guy kills the two men and keeps their truck for use in their heist. Later on, when investigating the heist, the cops finally figure out that the ruse must have been via a gas company truck and uniforms. There is no mention of why the gas company had not reported the disappearance of their two men nor their truck, a full two days earlier.

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Quotes

Harry Callahan: [speaking to the mayor & Capt. McKay] If you're talking about the Mustapha bust, nobody smashed anything. In fact, I made a deal with Mustapha - he was gonna help me find out who the people were!
The Mayor: [stunned] What's he talking about?
Harry Callahan: Doesn't it bother anyone that no weapons were found?
Capt McKay: We'll find them!
Harry Callahan: [to McKay] Meanwhile, the people are still out there and they're going to blow the HELL out of half this city. And meanwhile, you're telling everybody how great we are!
Capt McKay: All right, Callahan, button your...
[...]

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Alternate Versions

Norwegian cinema version was cut to get an 16 rating, later video and DVD versions are uncut.

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Connections

Referenced in Hey Jude! With Reggie Batts (2013)

User Reviews

Another Good Dirty Harry

This film was to be Dirty Harry's last outing in the seventies (do not worry though, he had two comebacks in the eighties). It is easy to compare this film, with the two previous Dirty Harry movies, because there some things have (still) not changed. First of all, Harry (obviously) kept his cheeky mouth, which again provides the viewer with the necessary laughs and his boss with the necessary headaches. This is not the only thing that has stayed the same though. Again some of the scenes could have been shorter, thus (theoretically) making The Enforcer a much tighter package. A perfect example of that is the scene in which Harry chases a bad guy to the rooftop of a building. Not only could this scene have been shorter, but it could also have been much more exciting had there been adequate use of music and cinematography. There is however one upside to this installment in the Dirty Harry series, which is, that it is far more stable than it's predecessors. It is not a decent or good film film, but it gets very close, mainly because of the good acting and the fact that the film remained interesting for the despite it's downsides. Best Dirty Harry film until then. If you want to know if it is the best in the series, check my comment for Sudden Impact