Clint Eastwood’s somebody who I’ve always had mixed feelings on as a filmmaker, until recently. A couple of years back, I checked out some of his most popular efforts from recent years, such as Gran Torino and American Sniper, utterly bewildered by the love and admiration that he had as a filmmaker, and it resulted in me completely dismissing so much of his work for many years.
Late last year, Clint released his 39th feature, Juror #2 and it blew me away, offering one of the biggest surprises of the year for me and it made me curious on if I was too harsh on the films I’d initially checked out. So, early in 2025, I decided to revisit Gran Torino with a friend, who had never seen it and ended up quite liking it. Since then, we’ve collectively been going through Eastwood’s work, checking out titles such as Mystic River, Richard Jewell, Million Dollar Baby and our aim is to check out every feature that Eastwood has directed, eventually.
When I caught wind that Warner Bros were releasing three of Eastwood’s classics on 4K UHD for the first time, two of them directed by Eastwood himself, I knew I had to cover them for Blueprint: Review. The three films were Dirty Harry, Pale Rider and The Outlaw Josey Wales. The best part about all of this? They’re all first time watches for me! As a genre fan, I know, it’s sacrilege that I hadn’t seen Dirty Harry before now but hey, better late than never, right?
Dirty Harry
Director: Don Siegel
Screenplay: Harry Julian Fink, R.M. Fink and Dean Riesner
Starring: Clint Eastwood, Harry Guardino, Reni Santoni, Andy Robinson and John Larch
Country: United States
Running Time: 102 min
Year: 1971
Starting off the new UHD releases is the Don Siegel classic Dirty Harry, the film that gave Eastwood his second successful franchise, after Sergio Leone’s The Man with No Name trilogy. I’d always been eager to check Dirty Harry out, primarily due to its reputation as one of the great 1970s thrillers and director Don Siegel is somebody who’s always interested me too.
The film, for those who aren’t familiar, follows Inspector Harry Callahan (Clint Eastwood) as he’s hard at work tracking down the elusive Scorpio killer, somebody who’s targeting a series of random individuals while taunting the police, asking for $100,000 before he murders more people. It’s notable that Scorpio’s M.O is similar to the real life Zodiac killer, mirroring his patterns in a way that ended up being fairly controversial when Dirty Harry released back in the early 70s.
Dirty Harry is a solid thriller that excels in most areas, with an iconic and excellent lead performance from Eastwood, claustrophobic and eerie cinematography, great direction from Siegel and most importantly, a compelling and engaging narrative that keeps you engaged from the opening frame to the last.
It’s packed full of great suspense sequences too, feeling more akin to a horror film rather than your typical police thriller. In many ways, it’s one of the first examples of a serial killer film, and while it’s made in a professional and classy way, is undeniably an exploitation feature. As someone who’s a sucker for great exploitation cinema, I was on board throughout the entirety of Dirty Harry. The Scorp
If I had to compare the film to anything, it’d probably be Michael Winner’s Death Wish, another film that felt reactionary to the political climate of the early 70s, although Dirty Harry is leaps and bounds better in almost every way. It’s a classic that I’m glad I’ve finally been able to check off of my bucket list, and it’s a damn good film at that. If you somehow haven’t seen Dirty Harry before, get on it now!
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The Outlaw Josey Wales
Director: Clint Eastwood
Screenplay: Phil Kaufman and Sonia Chernus
Starring: Clint Eastwood, Chief Dan George, Sondra Locke, Bill McKinney and John Vernon
Country: United States
Running Time: 135 min
Year: 1976
After Dirty Harry, Clint ended up going back to the genre that he originally gained popularity in, the western. The early to mid 70s included Eastwood efforts such as Joe Kidd, High Plains Drifter (which he both directed and starred in) before making his fifth directorial effort, The Outlaw Josey Wales.
Adapting the novel The Rebel Outlaw: Josey Wales, the film follows the titular character Josey Wales, a quiet farmer who loses his family after an attack. Wales goes on a journey, seeking revenge and eventually finds himself in more trouble than anticipated, resulting in him going on the run.
Checking out The Outlaw Josey Wales for the first time was quite the experience, as it’s the earliest Eastwood directorial effort I’ve seen yet. As previously mentioned, most of my experience with Clint as a director is for his later efforts, so seeing something that feels so early into his career was a delight. I’m still relatively new to the western genre, with most of my favourites being Italian, such as The Man with No Name trilogy, or the work of Sergio Corbucci (Django, The Grand Silence) and I found myself having quite a good time with The Outlaw Josey Wales.
It’s extremely well-directed, highlighting Clint’s prowess both in front of and behind the camera, with solid action, a compelling narrative that immediately hooks you with its premise, but also differentiates itself from other Eastwood efforts from this era. He’s not playing Harry Callahan or The Man with No Name again, and it highlights Eastwood’s versatility as an actor, which always impresses me.
Another element of Josey Wales that’s incredibly commendable is how overtly anti-war the entire picture is. While the action is great, the best moments of the film are entirely dialogue focused. The dynamic between Josey and Lone Watie (Chief Dan George) is one of my favourite elements of the film, it’s great stuff.
It’s by no means one of the greatest westerns I’ve ever seen, and I think it’s a little too long, running for almost 140 minutes, but it’s something that I could see growing on me with time. It’s another solid film that I’m glad I was finally able to check out.
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Pale Rider
Director: Clint Eastwood
Screenplay: Michael Butler and Dennis Shryack
Starring: Clint Eastwood, Michael Moriarty, Carrie Snodgress, Christopher Penn and Richard Dysart
Country: United States
Running Time: 116 min
Year: 1985
The Outlaw Josey Wales was quite the success for Clint, garnering great critical reviews and making a decent profit at the box office too. Nowadays, it’s considered one of Clint’s best films, and during the following years, Eastwood’s directorial efforts highlighted his versatility and variety as a filmmaker. There’s the action film The Gauntlet, the musical comedy Honkytonk Man, and although he was only a producer, the psychological neo-noir thriller Tightrope. So, to the surprise of most people, in the mid-80s, after the notorious failure of Heaven’s Gate, Clint returned to the genre that he was most familiar with once again, with Pale Rider.
Pale Rider follows Clint’s Preacher, a mysterious man who appears in a town close to California, who decides to help a handful of residents who are being harassed by a local gang affiliated with a mining company.
As far as western narratives go, this is easily one of the more traditional efforts I’ve seen before, but as expected, it’s elevated entirely by Clint’s contributions as the lead actor and director. Preacher is a character that’s incredibly watchable, offering a level of intrigue that keeps the viewer hooked throughout the entire film. It’s also more laid back than the western work I’ve seen from Eastwood before, having the moments that you’d come to expect but in ways, feeling like a hangout movie at times.
All of the technical elements impress, it’s a stunning looking film (enhanced greatly by the UHD release and this new 4K restoration), a fantastic score from Lennie Niehaus and cinematography from the always excellent Bruce Surtees (who lensed all three titles in this review) so there’s lots to admire on a filmmaking perspective too.
Out of the three titles, this is probably my least favourite of the bunch but it’s by no means a bad time. It continues to highlight why as a filmmaker, Eastwood might have one of the most consistent track records out there (well, excluding American Sniper…) and it might be one of his most gorgeous looking films too.
If you haven’t seen this one yet, it’s a good one to throw on during a Sunday afternoon that won’t blow you away, but will offer you a pretty good time. Not a terrible way to round out the three films.
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Dirty Harry, The Outlaw Josey Wales and Pale Rider released on 4K UHD via Warner Bros on April 28th. Each film is sourced from new restorations, with Dirty Harry being a rare 8K restoration, sourced down to 4K for this release. Each of the three films looks absolutely mind-blowing on UHD, even with them being first time watches for me. I’d say the standout was easily Dirty Harry, but the other two films look equally excellent. Harry’s emphasis on moody, atmospheric lighting is the type of thing that HDR was made for. I can’t imagine a Blu-ray competing with the image quality here, and it’s probably one of the most impressive UHD releases I’ve seen in quite some time.
Each film comes with remastered Dolby Atmos audio mixes, as well as the original theatrical audio for those who aren’t fans of studios tinkering with greatness. I flipped between the remastered and theatrical mixes for each releases and while the theatrical mixes are great inclusions, ended up sticking with the remastered tracks for each of the three films. Optional subtitles are included in multiple languages, as this is a studio release, so you should be covered there which is great to see.
All in all, it’s some of the best catalogue work I’ve seen from one of the main studios in quite some time, making these UHD releases the definitive way to watch these films at home. Magnificent work from Warner Bros here.
The following extras are included:
Dirty Harry
Audio commentary with film historian and Eastwood biographer Richard Schickel
Generations and Dirty Harry
Lensing Justice: The Cinematography of Dirty Harry
Clint Eastwood: Out of the Shadows
Clint Eastwood: The Man from Malpaso
Clint Eastwood – A Cinematic Legacy: Fighting for Justice
Interview Gallery
Dirty Harry’s Way
Dirty Harry: The Original
The Outlaw Josey Wales
Audio commentary by critic Richard Schickel
An Outlaw and An Antihero
The Cinematography of an Outlaw: Crafting Josey Wales
Clint Eastwood’s West
Eastwood in Action
Hell Hath No Fury: The Making of The Outlaw Josey Wales
Reinventing Westerns
Pale Rider
The Diary of Sydney Penny: Lessons From the Set
Painting the Preacher: The Cinematography of Pale Rider
Reinventing Westerns
Eastwood Directs: The Untold Story
Starting with Dirty Harry, there’s a fantastic selection of extras included here.
The audio commentary by Richard Schickel is ported over from the old Blu-ray, recorded in 2008 is a solid analytical track. Schickel dives into Eastwood like any biographer would, giving fans plenty of information about the production, but I wish it resulted in a more engaging listen. It’s not a bad track by any means, but it’s far from one of my favourite listens. Still, it’s nice to see it included for the amount of information included on it, just don’t expect a track that’s awfully exciting.
Generations and Dirty Harry is a brand new featurette, produced exclusively for this release, diving into how Dirty Harry has stood the test of time. It offers a range of interviewees of differing age ranges, talking about how the film influenced those around the era it released, how they perceive it now and more. It’s brief, only running for 6 minutes but I quite enjoyed it for what it was. Great to see newly produced extras for a legacy title.
Lensing Justice: The Cinematography of Dirty Harry is a brand new featurette, produced exclusively for this release, this time looking at the visual style of Dirty Harry. Running for 8 minutes, it’s a continuation of the interviews included on the prior featurette, and offers an interesting dive into Bruce Surtees’s iconic cinematography, as well as Siegel’s direction. Another great new extra!
Clint Eastwood: Out of the Shadows is an 87 minute archival documentary from 2000, offering an appreciation of Eastwood as both a filmmaker and an actor. There’s interviews from countless figures he’s worked with in the past, such as Martin Scorsese, Gene Hackman, Forest Whitaker, Rip Torn and to top it off, it’s narrated by Morgan Freeman. Out of the two archival documentaries on this release, this is by far the more compelling of the two. There’s some great interviews with Eastwood and his wife, offering a more personal look into his life. It’s one of my favourite documentaries included on any of the three releases, and it’s worth your time.
Clint Eastwood: The Man from Malpaso is an archival documentary from 1994 running for just under an hour, focused on Clint’s early life all the way up to the making of Unforgiven, which was released two years prior to this documentary. It’s fairly standard stuff, nothing exceptional on a filmmaking level and consists of Clint discussing his career, while others gush about him. A decent, insightful watch.
Clint Eastwood – A Cinematic Legacy: Fighting for Justice is a segment of a documentary on Eastwood’s career, released in chunks throughout a now out of print Blu-ray collection of his films. This segment, running for 17 minutes, focuses on Dirty Harry and the following sequels. There’s interviews with Arnold Schwarzenegger, Gene Hackman, Eastwood himself and more. It’s a fun retrospective piece, although I would love to see the entirety of A Cinematic Legacy back in circulation at some point, so I could check the whole thing out.
27 minutes of interviews are included, featuring Clint Eastwood, Arnold Schwarzenegger, Robert Urich, Patricia Clarkson and John Milius, as well as many others who briefly discuss Dirty Harry. They’re not incredibly in-depth, but it’s great to see these included.
Dirty Harry’s Way is a delightfully dated featurette, made to promote Dirty Harry back in the early 70s. It’s 7 minutes long and features some fairly humorous narration, but it’s an entertaining watch. Highly recommended.
Dirty Harry: The Original is an archival featurette that runs for 30 minutes, focusing on the Dirty Harry franchise as a whole. Made back in 2001, it has the typical range of interviewees, many of who were present for the prior documentaries, such as Eastwood, Schwarzenegger, Clarkson and more, but it’s a pretty good watch overall.
Next up is The Outlaw Josey Wales, which houses an equally excellent range of bonus features.
The audio commentary by critic Richard Schickel is more of the same, offering tons of insightful, factual information about Eastwood, The Outlaw Josey Wales and more but again, failed to fully captivate me like I was hoping for. I can’t call Schickel’s commentaries bad, per se, but they’re not really for me, due to how dry and static his delivery can be. Still, fans and enthusiasts will surely find something to enjoy here.
An Outlaw and An Antihero is a brand new featurette, produced exclusively for this release and focuses on Eastwood’s portrayal of outlaws and antiheroes in media, in particular with The Outlaw Josey Wales. It’s a brief featurette, running for 7 minutes but like the extras on Dirty Harry’s release, they’re fun watches that I only wish were longer!
The Cinematography of an Outlaw: Crafting Josey Wales is a brand new featurette, produced exclusively for this release and focuses on the visual style of The Outlaw Josey Wales and why it was so integral to Eastwood’s filmography going forward. Bruce Surtees is the primary focus, like the cinematography featurette on Dirty Harry and it results in another fascinating watch. Again, it’s only a brief watch, running for 8 minutes but it’s worth your time.
Clint Eastwood’s West is an archival documentary from 2011, running for 29 minutes, focusing on Eastwood’s time in the western genre. There’s interviews from plenty of figures, such as Eastwood himself, Frank Darabont, James Mangold, Kevin Costner and more, and covers a lot of the same ground that the other documentaries dive into. Still, it’s not a bad watch and seeing some new interviewees offers some new perspectives.
Eastwood in Action is a brief, archival featurette from 1976, created to promote The Outlaw Josey Wales, and similarly to the featurette for Dirty Harry, it’s quite dated which adds to the charm. It’s nothing special, but there’s some nice behind the scenes footage of Eastwood directing.
Hell Hath No Fury: The Making of The Outlaw Josey Wales is an archival making-of documentary, narrated by director John Milius about the production of The Outlaw Josey Wales, the inspiration behind the film and tons of anecdotes from Eastwood and others associated with the production. It’s a solid little piece.
Finally, Pale Rider rounds us off with another solid series of supplemental features.
The Diary of Sydney Penny: Lessons From the Set is a newly filmed interview with actor Sydney Penny, who plays Megan in Pale Rider. Running for 7 minutes, Penny recounts her experiences working with Eastwood, his directing and acting styles and more in this fun interview.
Painting the Preacher: The Cinematography of Pale Rider is a brand new featurette, produced exclusively for this release, focusing on the visual style of Pale Rider. Like the other cinematography featurettes in these new UHD releases, there’s praise given to Bruce Surtees as a cinematographer and Eastwood’s contributions to making Pale Rider stand out amongst the crowd.
Eastwood Directs: The Untold Story is a 2013 documentary, focusing on, you guessed it, Clint’s time as a director. Thankfully, this documentary focuses on more than just his pre-2000s features, highlighting later efforts in this watchable documentary. Interviewees include Martin Scorsese, John Lee Hancock, Kevin Costner, Kevin Bacon, Eastwood himself and Steven Spielberg. It runs for 62 minutes and it’s a decent watch.
The Eastwood Factor is a 2010 documentary, focused on Eastwood’s long standing partnership with Warner Bros. It runs for 88 minutes and offers a different perspective on Eastwood. It’s a fun watch, with some neat highlights such as when he revisits the old Warner archives to see costumes from the countless films that he made with Warner. It’s also narrated by Morgan Freeman, like Out of the Shadows was. A solid watch.
The Reinventing Westerns featurette from The Outlaw Josey Wales’ UHD release is also included here for those interested.
To say that Warner went above and beyond with the bonus features would be quite the understatement, although there’s a lot of repetition throughout the numerous documentaries included across the three releases. Still, there’s so many other extras, including the commentaries, the newly produced featurettes for each film and interviews that it results in three great home media packages.
Fans of Clint’s work won’t be disappointed by any of these releases, offering stunning new restorations, hours upon hours of bonus features and both original and newly remastered audio options, which is greatly appreciated. It’s a no brainer recommending these releases.
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