Ben Shockley is the worst cop in Vegas - a drunken libertine, he is on the outs with his department and spiralling toward oblivion. And then he gets assigned to protect a witness (Sondra Locke).
When they are ambushed, Shockley realises that forces within the department want them dead. The pair go on the run, in an attempt to get to trial.
I read about The Gauntlet years before I watched it. When I finally did, my expectations were too high.
After watching a couple of Eastwood’s directorial efforts, I think I finally figured out why I never really bothered doing a deep-dive into his work.
Famously, Clint likes to move fast and do only a few takes. He also does not like to do too much work on the script once he is onboard. There is a looseness to his work that always bumps me - based on the types of movies he likes to make, it feels like the performances need some shaping, while there is always some clumsy camera-work and clumsy editing which throw me out. I am not into polish, but with Eastwood’s work I always want them to be more seamless on a technical level.
At a plot level, The Gauntlet is a straightforward man-on-the-run thriller. A couple go on the run together, and over the course of the movie they fall in love. It is a simple concept and going into the movie I thought that narrative simplicity would work for Eastwood's pared-down aesthetic.
I love the opening of the movie. We get some jazz playing over helicopter shots of the city s the credits play. The camera settles on a car outside the police station and we meet our hero.
Introduced spilling out of his car, Eastwood wants to hammer home how different Shockley is from his most iconic role. Ben Shockley is like Dirty Harry if he had no self-control and was more nihilistic. The characters are so close that it is easy to read this movie as an unofficial sequel.
I really enjoy this opening because it combines visual story-telling with exposition delivered on the move. In a series of tracking shots, we follow Shockley into the station as he pulls himself together and talks to his partner, played by Pat Hingle.
After this opening, we follow Shockley to his initial meeting with Sondra Locke's Gus.
At the time, Eastwood and Locke were in a longterm relationship. It has been well-documented that the relationship was rocky and their breakup ended with Eastwood effectively blacklisting Locke from Hollywood.
While this movie was produced years before, the pair have little chemistry. Their 'rapport' such as it is, is a warring back and forth that came off as tiresome and familiar.
I cannot help but think this was the result of Eastwood the director - he is famous for only doing a few takes, and I think that might be the reason why the central relationship never develops in an organic way. There is a broadness and lack of nuance to their dynamic which threw me out of the movie.
The movie features some impressive action sequences, particularly the destruction of Gus's home, and the final sequence - featuring the pair driving an armour-plated bus through a barrage of police fire - is impressively staged.
But in a chase movie like this, you need to care about the characters being shot at. And with The Guantlet, I never did.
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