This Oscar winning film from 1968 was fast-paced for its day, but would move slowly for the Millennial moviegoer. I much preferred it to the unrealistic hyperactive pace of our current films.
The crime is realistic.
The hero is not out to save the world, but simply to do his job.
Violence is not based on Hong Kong kung fu conventions.
There is not a huge videogame body count.
The bad guys are bad dudes; but human, nervous, doing a job of their own, not gloating over the dead with witty lines to build dislike in the mind of the viewer. About the only real criminals I’ve seen in recent video is The Wire, and that’s ten years old. It was refreshing to see a human villain.
Most of all, after the ridiculous level of automobile acrobatics enabled by moviemaking technology over the past 40 years it was refreshing to see a real car chase, with the lead actor driving a real car at high speed.
I picked up this DVD for a few bucks at the corner store, and it sure was worth it.
