Customer Reviews

Magnum Force: The Original Score by Lalo Schifrin

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After contributing what many, including myself, believe to be one the absolute greatest cop film scores of all time for Dirty Harry, it was no surprise that jazz buff Clint Eastwood would want composer Lalo Schifrin to return to score the sequel to the trendsetting cop thriller. Magnum Force was a very different movie from Dirty Harry, this time the villains are Harry's very own - rogue police officers that have grown tired of the legal loopholes criminals use to escape justice and have become Judge, Jury AND Executioners. The tone of the movie was far less serious and placed greater emphasis on over the top action. The body count is the highest of the series, with spectacular gun fights seeming to breakout every ten or fifteen minutes. Ted Post's direction also differed from Don Siegel's raw documentary style, making Magnum Force, as the soundtrack's liner notes point out, a more mass market action movie than its predecessor had been. Schifrin's score reflects this change in tone, being larger, louder, and far more involved in the movie than Dirty Harry's sparse score had been. Magnum Force was my introduction to Dirty Harry and Lalo Schifrin's music. The Force's military theme (heard to excellent effect in The Cop, Magnum Force, Rogue Gun and others) remains my all time favorite film cue. As far as I am concerned, this is Schifrin's best score and it is an essential for his fans and any and all lovers of film music. Highest recommendation.

The score from Dirty Harry was one of Lalo Schaffrin's best. The explosive funk and creepy interludes created quite a powerful album, never mind a soundtrack.

Magnum Force's score works differently. It does contain some of the funk elements of its pedessesor. In fact, it often repeats the theme from the first movie. But here, the emphasis is on the dark, quiet, suspenseful interludes.

These work in the film, and to a degree, on the album. But Magnum Force as a soundtrack album lacks some of the bite of Dirty Harry's score. With the funker elements downplayed, it does not have a consistent intensity.

But it is not bad, particularly if you like Schrifin's experments with dynamics. As ever, these are top notch. Just be ready for a much more subtle, atmospheric album

'Magnum Force', the 2nd Dirty Harry film, was scored - like the first - by Clint Eastwood's personal friend Lalo Schifrin. Like the first one, it retains a distinct 70's flavor, though it seems to use darker, heavier strings more often than its predecessor. Harry's theme is portrayed largely using the deep strings; it's only heard once or twice, most notably in 'Stakeout', as Harry enters a liquor store that is about to be robbed. The appropriately named track 20, 'Briggs', starts off slowly enough as Harry's traitorous boss reveals his crooked allegiances as he pulls a gun on Harry. An ominous percussion/flute motif - the one of the crooked motorcycle cops - takes over, followed by a trumpet salvo as Harry overpowers Briggs, knocks the gun out of the car, and slams his crooked boss violently against the dashboard of his car, knocking him out. The ominous music returns in 'Confrontation', as Briggs appears again, menacing the inspector & threatening to prosecute Harry after the inspector has eliminated the vigilante cops. This is part of the much darker trend throughout the movie, which overall had a bit more of a darker theme than the first (not that the first was all that bright). This may have been in keeping with Clint Eastwood's desire to pose the question - 'What if police became their own executioners?'.

This still has a lot in common with the original score, but I found it to be my personal favorite of the Dirty Harry scores. Highly recommended.

It took some time, but all of the Dirty Harry soundtracks eventually saw the light of day with proper releases. This is the 1973 sequel to Dirty Harry, and would be Lalo Schifrin's second of four scores for the franchise (he would return to do Sudden Impact and The Dead Pool after Jerry Fielding scored The Enforcer).

Excellent disc, the opening theme and The Cop are two of the standouts, setting the tone with memorable motifs. The score is every bit as menacing as the original, appropriate given the story of a squad of vigilante cops terrorizing the San Francisco underworld. Plenty of tension, and plenty of jazzy interludes to break up the suspense. While most of the score is completely new and written for the film, the moody end theme of the original returns on Finale (similar to Dawn Discovery and End Titles from the first score).

I don't believe this was ever released on vinyl, and this is certainly the only complete version of the score that ever appeared. A compilation disc from a while back culled tracks from all of the DH films, but contained only a fraction of the material available here. These discs are a real treat and are all highly recommended.