A Look Back At Director Don Siegel's Crime Thriller 'Madigan'

I’m a huge fan of Don Siegel’s films, especially Dirty Harry and Coogan’s Bluff, two crime thrillers he directed with actor Clint Eastwood. 

Don Siegel, who died in 1991, made several good crime films, including another two crime thrillers I like, Charley Varrick, with Walter Matthau, and Madigan, with Richard Widmark, Henry Fonda and Harry Guardino.      

Raymond Benson offers a review of the Blu-Ray Special Edition of Madigan at Cinemaretro.com.

The filmmaker who made the iconic Clint Eastwood vehicle, Dirty Harry in 1971 also made something of an early test-run three years earlier in the form of a crime picture called Madigan.

Starring Richard Widmark as a tough, cynical, and world-weary police detective in New York City, Madigan displays the same look, feel, and grit that the later Eastwood police procedural exhibits. And, like Harry Callahan, Dan Madigan doesn’t always follow the rules.

Don Siegel (credited here as “Donald” Siegel for some odd reason, for he had been “Don” in earlier films) had been a solid craftsman since the 1950s, responsible for such works as Riot in Cell Block 11 (1954), the original Invasion of the Body Snatchers (1956), the admirable remake of The Killers (1964), and Coogan’s Bluff (1968). Likewise, Madigan is a well-made thriller with a hard-boiled plot and realistic characters portrayed by an excellent cast that includes Henry Fonda, Inger Stevens, and James Whitmore.

The tale begins when Madigan (Widmark) and his partner Rocco Bonaro (Harry Guardino) screw up while attempting to bring in hoodlum Barney Benesch (Steve Inhat) for questioning, unaware that he is wanted for murder in Brooklyn. Benesch gets the upper hand on the pair and runs away with their guns. Police commissioner Russell (Fonda) isn’t happy about this, but he has other problems on his mind.

You can read the rest of the review via the below link:

https://cinemaretro.com/index.php?/archives/10670-REVIEW-MADIGAN-1968-STARRING-RICHARD-WIDMARK-AND-HENRY-FONDA;-KINO-LORBER-BLU-RAY-SPECIAL-EDITION.html

Happy 89th Birthday To Clint Eastwood, Director And Star Of 'The Mule'

Happy birthday to Clint Eastwood. The film director and actor turns 89 today.

I've been a fan of Clint Eastwood since I watched him on TV as Rowdy Yates in Rawhide when I was a kid in the 1960's. 

Over the years I've also enjoyed watching him in crime films like Dirty Harry and Coogan's Bluff  and in westerns like The Unforgiven and Hang Em' High. 

Clint Eastwood has also directed such fine films as Mystic River and Gran Torino. 

My wife and I recently watched him in The Mule, an interesting and compelling crime drama that he directed and also starred in. The film, about an elderly drug smuggler, was based on a true story. 

Clint Eastman remains a good actor and a fine director.  

On This Day In History Clint Eastwood Was Born

As History.com notes, on this day in 1930 actor and director Clint Eastwood was born.

You can read about his life and work via the below link:

http://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/clint-eastwood-born

Note: As a kid in the 1960s I watched actor Clint Eastwood on the TV series Rawhide as the young ramrod Rowdie Yates (I'm rewatching the shows now on MeTv) and I later enjoyed his crime and western films like Coogan's Bluff, Dirty Harry and Joe Kidd. I've also enjoyed the films he directed like Mystic River and Unforgiven. 

Clint Eastwood, Don Siegel, And The Great Anti-Hero

I'm a huge fan of Don Siegel's crime films with actor Clint Eastwood, such as Dirty Harry and Coogan's Bluff.

So I was interested in reading Aliya Whitely's piece at the web site denofgeek.com on the films of Clint Eastwood and Don Siegel.

Between them, director Don Siegel and Clint Eastwood created some classic movie anti-heroes, including one Dirty Harry...

Let’s start at the end of this story.

Unforgiven (1992) is a film that builds on the groundwork of others, and takes the ideas of the past to a new level. In it, Clint Eastwood plays a once-vicious killer, William Munny, who chooses to return to the role of bounty-hunter in his old age.

It's no wonder that the film is dedicated to the two directors who shaped the public image of Eastwood to such an extent that we can view Unforgiven as an extension of the mythology of his classic role- the anti-hero. One is Sergio Leone, who turned Eastwood into the Man With No Name. The other director is Don Siegel.

Siegel directed five films that starred Eastwood and was a great influence on him when he started to direct his own films, even playing a small part in Eastwood's directorial debut, Play Misty For Me (1971). The movies they made together relied heavily on Eastwood's silent sneer (Leone said of Eastwood – “As an actor, he has two expressions: with, and without the hat”) but also began to stretch him as an actor in interesting directions.

These films shaped the crime movies and the Westerns that followed, and are still incredibly entertaining and iconic today.

You can read the rest of the piece and watch video clips via the below link:

http://www.denofgeek.com/movies/clint-eastwood/27287/clint-eastwood-don-siegel-and-the-great-anti-hero

A Look Back At Don Siegel's Great Crime Films

I'm a big fan of the late film director Don Siegel.

I often watch his films again whenever I catch them on TV, especially his great crime films, like Madigan, with Richard Widmark and Henry Fonda (seen in the above photo with Don Siegel on the left), Coogan's Bluff  and Dirty Harry, both with Clint Eastwood, and Charley Varrick, with Walter Matthau.

Siegal also made a good spy thriller with Michael Caine called The Black Windmill and he directed John Wayne's last film, a great Western called The Shootist. 

Oliver Lyttelton at indiewire.com takes a look back at Don Siegal and five of his notable films.

In the credits to his masterpiece "Unforgiven," Clint Eastwood included a dedication: "for Don Siegel and Sergio Leone." Leone was a no-brainer, one of the great filmmakers who worked with Clint on a trio of films ("The Good The Bad And The Ugly," "A Fistful Of Dollars" and "For A Few Dollars More"). But Siegel was less beloved of cinephiles. A cosmopolitan Chicago native who studied at Jesus College, Cambridge, he started directing montages at Warner Bros. (including the opening scene of "Casablanca"), before breaking into features, with a string of B-movies with everyone from Robert Mitchum to Elvis Presley (the latter on 1960's "Flaming Star"), but became most notable for his work with Eastwood on five pictures from 1968's "Coogan's Bluff" to 1979's "Escape From Alcatraz."

You can read the rest of the piece via the below link:

http://blogs.indiewire.com/theplaylist/the-essentials-the-films-of-don-siegel-20120420