on 7/1/2025, 3:04 am
CBR's Andrew Pogue is a Tarantino acolyte, tending to inflate the level of achievement in QT's later films as he mines his recent book CINEMA SPECULATION for the nuggets festooned in that rough-hewn volume--obscure action films from which he has borrowed sequences and scenes.
THE 'HUMAN' FACTOR (1975), the last film directed by noir luminary Edward Dmytryk, is another of these, a film with one foot in "movie of the week" territory and and the other in the "Italian revenge film" sub-genre of the 1970s.
As it happens, it's available at YouTube, so you can give it a look-see and determine for yourself whether Pogue (and QT) are on the money--or not...
IMDB critic B. Koganberg provides a fairly neutral summary that might determine whether or not you click on the link:
George Kennedy is our hero/protagonist who has his wife and three children executed by terrorists who made his the first targeted family of an extortion plan to kill an American family every three days if the USA does not pony up some large coin of the realm.
As Kennedy is a computer programmer working and living in Rome he has access to some real intelligence gathering machinery. Colleagues like John Mills and Rita Tushingham help. Kennedy upsets Italian police inspector Raf Vallone with his pro-active approach and doing his own investigation.
The Human Factor is a slow paced film, but it does have a nice action packed climax where Kennedy takes care of business the way Dirty Harry Callahan would. You'll enjoy if you can wait that long.
Responses