The Confusing Moral Lesson of Dirty Harry

[Magus]

Like all Americans, my entire concept of the justice system is built around numerous viewings of the Dirty Harry movie series. But I've always been confused by a particular moral quandary presented by the films. The quandary (some might call it a contradiction) goes as such:

1. In Dirty Harry, Inspector Callahan shoots the serial killer Scorpio after taunting him into reaching for a loaded firearm nearby. The justification is that Scorpio deserves to die and that only the technicality of the law is preventing his proper execution (at the hands of Dirty Harry). If he went to trial he might get off for reasons of insanity. His extrajudicial killing prevents this eventuality.

2. In Magnum Force, Inspector Callahan chides a vigilante police officer who had previously shot several mobsters with the following line, "Briggs, I hate the goddamn system, but until someone comes along with some changes that make sense I'll stick with it." Callahan then proceeds to take out the titular "Magnum Force" group of vigilante killers, despite for all intents and purposes resembling Dirty Harry. The justification would probably be that the Magnum Force was responsible for killing cops attempting to stop them, but this merely brings us back to the earlier part of the system attempting to stop true justice. As such it remains a contradiction for Dirty Harry to oppose the Magnum Force's actions.

3. In Sudden Impact, Inspector Callahan investigates a series of murders. It is revealed that the murders are being committed by a rape victim on everyone involved in her rape several years earlier. While the only killings done by Callahan are in the process of stopping one of the rapists from killing the murderess, he ultimately lets the murderess go, feeling her actions were justified.

The only explanation for this series of contradictory moral messages would be my own ethical theorem, which goes as the following:

"It's okay when Batman does it."

Thoughts?

[Bells]

can you elaborate a bit further for those who are not well versed in the complex lexiconic tapestry that is dirty harry? I don't recall watching anything beyond a pair of scenes from the original a LONG time ago...

also, if you really wanna tackle this issue, you must take the timeline in account. Moral mindsets are not really fixed in space-time they can bend and turn over the course of time, and the more time passes between the points you analyse, more likely is that what you look at won't seem like a straight line of thinking.

Also, considering movie logic... are the director and writers consistent? Of course, this is a minor point when you mention... yes, Batman. Who had multiple writers and multiple versions while still having some sense of consistency in most of his history...

As for this Dirty-Conundrum (HA!) if i understood the laymen terms right...

In the first movie he wants to kill the bad guy while making sure the guy had the very minimal chance at all of self-defense, as a way to protect some sense of personal superior morality?

But on the second... he does not oppose people who don't do that. And on the third, he straight out allows someone to get away with their killings for it being justified in his mind.

Did i get that right?!

[Magus]

Yes, except I'm reading your double negative on the second one as the equivalent of "he opposes people who do that", "that" being what he did in the first movie which is extrajudicial executions of criminals.

And while Sudden Impact did come out a decade later, Magnum Force came out like two years after Dirty Harry. I actually thought in my mind that The Enforcer came out in in between, but nope, Magnum Force is the direct sequel to Dirty Harry.

It's like the series goes "fascist --> not (as) fascist --> fascist" in progression for no discernible reason.

I HAVE left The Enforcer out of this equation since it is more of a straight-forward action flick with Harry only facing criminals actively attempting to kill people at all times (on Alcatraz) (see the movie actually involves a hilarious send-up of the Manson family which basically starts with the idea "what if extremist hippies had access to bazookas, kidnapped the mayor of San Francisco, and holed up on Alcatraz?" in a plot that The Rock clearly did not rip off years later because Michael Bay is a genius who would never rip off another film). If I remember correctly.

Oh, and in the first movie Scorpio had no chance of reaching the gun, IF Dirty Harry had a bullet left. The only chance Scorpio (and the criminal in a very similar situation at the beginning, both with the rather famous "You got to ask yourself one question, 'Do I feel lucky?' Well, do you, punk?" line) had was if Dirty Harry had fired six rounds from his revolver instead of five in the previous firefight. Obviously he had only fired five. The presumption is that Dirty Harry himself didn't keep track, but ostensibly we know he did because he's Dirty Harry and Dirty Harry knows exactly how many bullets he fired.

The explanation of having different writers and directors might explain this conundrum...the first movie had about six screenwriters (the Wikipedia page on it is pretty crazy, since they also had about 8 actors in mind who either rejected the part or died before they settled on Eastwood), not sure how many were on the second one or if they were the same, or if the director was the same.

I just think it's a rather stark contrast with the Death Wish series. For people who have actually watched the original Death Wish it is actually an anti-vigilante message, with the following four films then proceeding with a pro-vigilante message. The progression is "not fascist --> fascist --> really fascist --> super fascist --> Charles Bronson is too old to kill anybody but like two people in an hour and a half movie how have we come to this terrible state of affairs?"

(Seriously watch Death Wish 5 I swear only two people die in that movie. One by being slowly wrapped in plastic clingwrap, oddly enough)

[CABAL49]

It is why I like the Korean film "The Man from Nowhere." Protagonist goes vigilante justice on mobsters. Murders the fuck out of all of them and goes to jail cause he killed about twenty people.

Still has a happy ending to it though. And overall a great action movie. The protagonist's haircut in the first half of the movie bugged me to no end though.

[Magus]

Man that one is on Netflix I think, in my instant queue. I gotta start watching more of those. I have like ten Korean gangster movies on there right now, beckoning me...

[CABAL49]

I haven't been disappointed with them yet.

[Jagos]

I think I started with Oldboy and it just surprised the daylights out of me. I gotta find "The Man from Nowhere". That just seems awesome from a karmic standpoint.