The Dead Pool (1988)

Director:

Buddy Van Horn

Writers (WGA):

Harry Julian Fink (characters) and
Rita M. Fink (characters) ...

Release Date:

13 julio 1988 (USA)

Genre:

Action | Thriller | Crime | Drama

Frase comercial:

Dirty Harry Just Learned A New Game

Plot:

Dirty Harry Callahan must stop a sick secret contest to murder local celebrities, which includes himself as a target.

Plot Keywords:

Exploding Car | Cop | Irish American | Spiral Staircase | Impalement

Comentarios de los usuarios:

Pool Of Dead Critics

Cast

Clint Eastwood	...	Insp. 'Dirty' Harry Callahan
Patricia Clarkson	...	Samantha Walker
Liam Neeson	...	Peter Swan
Evan C. Kim	...	Insp. Al Quan
David Hunt	...	Harlan Rook / Ed Butler
Michael Currie	...	Capt. Donnelly
Michael Goodwin	...	Lt. Ackerman
Darwin Gillett	...	Patrick Snow
Anthony Charnota	...	Lou Janero
Christopher P. Beale	...	Dist. Atty. Thomas McSherry
John Allen Vick	...	Lt. Ruskowski
Jeff Richmond	...	Freeway Reporter #1
Patrick Van Horn	...	Freeway Reporter #2
Sigrid Wurschmidt	...	Freeway Reporter #3
Jim Carrey	...	Johnny Squares (as James Carrey)

También conocida como:

Dirty Harry in The Dead Pool (USA) (poster title)
Lista negra, La (Spain) [es]

Duración:

91 min

País:

USA

Idioma:

English

Color:

Color (Technicolor)

Aspect Ratio:

1.85 : 1

Sonido:

Dolby

Clasificación:

Iceland:16 | Germany:16 (re-rating) (2008) | France:Unrated | Singapore:NC-16 | Netherlands:12 | Finland:K-16 (cut) (1989) | USA:R (certificate #29247) | Canada:14+ (Ontario) | Singapore:PG (cut) | Finland:K-18 (uncut) (1988) | Spain:18 | Australia:M | Norway:18 | Sweden:15 | UK:18 | West Germany:18

Filming Locations:

1954 Mason St., North Beach, San Francisco, California, USA

Company:

Malpaso Productions

Trivialidades:

Permission was given to film in San Francisco, despite protests from citizens who thought Harry Callahan was not a good representative for the city.

Goofs:

Crew or equipment visible: During the chase with the remote controlled car, after Callahan's car makes it's second jump over a steep hill, you can briefly see a portable film camera on a mount in the back seat of the car.

Quotes:

Insp. Al Quan: It's like I was telling you, Harry. Celebrities, they always die in...
Harry Callahan: ...in threes.
Insp. Al Quan: At least the guy went out with...
Harry Callahan: ...a bang. Yeah, I know.

Movie Connections:

Featured in Eastwood... A Star (1992) (TV)

Soundtrack:

WELCOME TO THE JUNGLE

Pool Of Dead Critics

This was altogether too simple for the critics back in '88 -- the whole idea was to point the barrel of the joke right back at the criticism.

Whereas the previous Dirty Harry features sat on a platform of utter contempt for bureaucrats and political correctness, here it's expanded to contempt for journalists, and especially the subspecies of 'media critics'. As if they couldn't make it clearer, a 'movie critic' is murdered, and treated as an occurrence of 'death of celebrities by threes'.

Yes, this is explicitly about movie making; the previous four movies suffered from poor supporting casts that only got in the way of the narrative. Here Van Horn deliberately employs good actors to play bad genre roles and thus turns the series on its head.

Along the way, we get a nice comment on "Bullitt", this time deflating the over touted car chase with a gag: an explosives laden model '63 Z06 (instead of a fastback Mustang, to drive home the point).

By this time, the .44 Magnum is treated as a character, with a 'voice' that rolls off the cityscape like thunder...the bad guys run at the mere sight of it. To put the icing on the 'man with the biggest gun' motif, Clint dispatches the villain with an earlier one liner ("you're S.O.L.") and a movie prop harpoon. The elaborate conflation of sexual double entendre, humor and cowboy justice went soaring over many heads. Arnold wishes he was half this funny in "Last Action Hero".

Ah, we miss Harry...but his retirement to Carmel was both serendipitous and necessary. By the end of this, he's killed off every cartoon bad guy left in the movie universe, paving the way for both the dimensional villains of "Die Hard" and its ilk, AND the hosannas bestowed on "Unforgiven".