Movie Details
| Title: | The Laughing Policeman | |
| Director: | Stuart Rosenberg | |
| Year: | 1973 | |
| Genre: | Cop | |
| Times Seen: | 1 | |
| Last Seen: | 04.11.07 |
Other Movies Seen By This Director (2)
- Cool Hand Luke
- The Drowning Pool
| Date Viewed | Venue | Note |
| 04.11.07 | Netflix | Another solid cop crime drama, this one starring Walter Matthau in San Francisco where he's investigating a busload of people mowed down with a machine gun. Literally, a guy gets on a bus one night, sits in the back, and takes everyone out. One of the victims is Matthau's partner so he, along with his new partner Bruce Dern, has to figure out what the hell happened and who the hell did it. I'm on the verge of not buying Matthau as a cop here but since he's clearly of the "i'm gettin too old for this shit" variety where he doesn't have to actually physically exert himself too much, I buy him as being cynical and demon-driven. The movie has some anti-hippie overtones which is always good for cop movies. It seems like a statement against the term "pig" that I guess was new back then, and all the Miranda crap that kept cops from doing their job (i.e. beating the living hell out of punks and deadbeats until they tracked down the bad guys), and Bruce Dern is great with all the un-PC statements (not to mention his mustache). I liked this a lot more than Rosenberg's The Drowning Pool but suspect that's just because I was more into the gritty SF cop procedure than I was with Newman's mystery. Still maybe not the best cop movie I've ever seen, and maybe it feels a bit overt in the Bullitt-isms, but it still held solid enjoyment for me. |
