Synopsis:
When an Arizona sheriff (Clint Eastwood) arrives in New York City to chase down a fugitive (Don Stroud), he encounters surprising resistance from a police detective (Lee J. Cobb), and woos a social worker (Susan Clark) to help track Stroud through one of his followers (Tisha Sterling).

Genres, Themes, Actors, and Directors:

• Betty Field Films
• Clint Eastwood Films
• Don Siegel Films
• Fugitives
• Lee J. Cobb Films
• Sheriffs and Marshals
• Susan Clark Films

Response to Peary’s Review:
Peary points out that while “Clint Eastwood still wore a cowboy hat in Don Siegel’s taut, violent film” (their first of five movies together), “it was his first attempt to move into contemporary times.” He adds, as “a predecessor to Dirty Harry Callahan, Coogan was Eastwood’s first character to be upset by the hedonistic decadence and crime of the cities, and frustrated by the ineffectiveness of urban police departments, where everything must go through proper channels.”

Because he gets “no help from the NYPD, he employs roughshod tactics used by lawmen in the west since the 19th century and, though he ruffles a few feathers, is able to carry out his mission.” Naturally, “along the way he is charmed by” and/or beds various women, including a social worker (Susan Clark) and “the bad guy’s girlfriend (Tisha Sterling).”

Peary doesn’t provide much more critique of this film in his GFTFF — but DVD Savant bluntly refers to it as “a wince-inducing fossil that nevertheless struck a solid chord with 1968’s ‘silent majority’,” noting that it “was beautifully engineered to cut through the socio-political confusion of 1968, when conservatives feared that riots, assassinations, protests and a wild new youth drug culture were spelling an end to Western civilization.”

Meanwhile, poor Susan Clark’s Julie is “a sad character indeed;” she’s terribly used here (both by Eastwood and by the script). Faring somewhat better is Sterling’s pixie hippie, and Betty Field in a bit role (her last) as Stroud’s sassy mother.

Notable Performances, Qualities, and Moments:

• Good use of location shooting across New York
  
• Luminous Tisha Sterling as Linny Raven
  
• Betty Field in a tiny role as Ellen Ringerman
  
• The exciting motorcycle chase sequence
  
• Lalo Schifrin’s score

Must See?
No; this one is only must-see for Eastwood fans.

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