Computer Age

Bullitt (1968)
Director: Peter Yates
Cast: Steve McQueen, Robert Vaughn, Jacqueline Bisset, Don Gordon, Robert Duvall, Simon Oakland

There are dozens of films that have gone down in the annals of film history by a sequence or scene in particular instances in which these scenes / sequences have come to overshadow the tapes which included up to a point where the majority of people are not even able to remember something as basic as is their argument. This starts with one of the endearing Harold Lloyd hanging from the clock (belonging to the man fly) or the legendary "scene of the cabin of the Marx Brothers" (A Night at the Opera).

There is no doubt that Bullitt is and always will be remembered by the persecution of cars on the steep streets of San Francisco (which, incidentally, continues for a long time on the roads surrounding the city). All of a prodigy of planning and mounting technique that even today, at forty years of his first pass, is kept current and fresh, which gives an idea of its quality. The director of the film, Peter Yates, wanted the maximum realism possible and decided to forget completely the trucajes until then tended to apply for standard car rolled persecution. The result is a "total immersion" of the viewer within a sequence in which the vehicles involved reached 180 km / hour at times. Sure that in such circumstances the best what happened during the filming was thorough Steve McQueen. The actor was a lover of speed ends up almost suicidal, atestiguaría himself as Bruce Lee, a good friend of his in real life. The legendary martial artist, after going with Steve to take a drive to test his brand new sports, vowed that never again would climb to McQueen with a car and driving. During the filming of Bullitt, and true to his custom, the Indiana worked to make himself the scenes at risk, although in the end had to give way and allow the reputed specialist Bud Ekins will double in the most delicate shots, as had done five years earlier in another scene mythical: the motorcycle jump in The Great Escape. One detail that it certainly was not cited in the "production notes" included on the DVD of the film, which suggests that Steve McQueen participated fully in the filming of the sequence. Curious.

That pursuit is undoubtedly the crowning moment of the film, and in fact happens towards the middle of the footage, when it took nearly an hour of viewing. Fortunately Bullitt is much more than this persecution and has more points of interest, as a sequence at the airport that at times seems to have helped inspire Michael Mann for the final sequence of Heat. The plot, circumscribed within the canons of the usual black cinema, is well established and developed. The talks have spark and the splendid music of the great Lalo Schifrin (particularly inspired on this occasion) wraps the film to a certain extent, providing it with an unmistakable touch. On top of all this emerges a hero of luxury: a Steve McQueen at the height of his career, although I have never considered a great actor in the strict sense, exudes a charisma and a "learn to be" in front of the cameras that it wanted to practice all current Hollywood stars, who this gentleman might be a mouthful of tea with minimal effort. He is the absolute and undisputed protagonist, to the point that while I write this I find it no longer remember any scene, if no one takes of the film that does not leave. His omnipresence practice, not tired at all, is well supported by an enigmatic Robert Vaughn and a beautiful Jacqueline Bisset, both in a very secondary role in comparison, but important for the development of the plot.

In short, Bullitt is a good detective thriller with a sequence of almost revolutionary court, which set up schools for hundreds of films and continues to do so later today. The modern bill of the film shows up in the credits start, and the assembly process (an Oscar winner) should take note that the mob today is devoted to "steer" action movies, led by mentally retarded the caliber of Michael Bay or Stephen Norrington. I am surprised that has not been issued only on TV, given that this is a film to fix a perfect evening for a weekend at home, and taking into account the usual bad habit of replenishment, such that has led to more than a memory to know the dialogues of Poly Nursery (glaps!). But the mysteries of the "idiot box" (less and less "box" and "stupid" by the way) are inscrutable.