A Lei de Newman

"Newman's Law" is not one of classic cop movies of the 1970s but it's still a good one. The second half of this movie, when Newman goes to war, is really good. I don't know how it happened but I saw this movie in the theater (Floral Park, NY) when I was nine years old and my brother was seven. We saw it by ourselves as part of a double feature with "My Name is Nobody". I took me decades to see it again. The only scene that I remembered was the "rent a camera" scene. I wonder why? "Newman's Law" is a well acted, good looking movie. I'm glad that I caught up with it. Honorable mention: the very good DVD commentary by Peter Tonguette.

"Newman's Law" was a movie originally intended as a pilot for a television series...a series that was never to be. It seems that George Peppard had just finished filming his "Banacek" series and was looking for another TV project. And, after seeing the film, I can understand why the networks passed on it. After all, the movie was about an L. A. cop...and played NOTHING like "Dragnet" or "Adam-12", series that glorified policework AND tried to portray them realistically. Instead, it was more like "Serpico" and "Dirty Harry"....pretty potent stuff for TV.

VInce Newman (Peppard) is a detective working the Narcotics Division. He and his partner just uncovered a big crime...with a dead man, a thief and a whole lotta illegal drugs. But the best part is that the mobster Falcone is implicated in all this and now the D. A. has enough evidence to have him extradited to the US to face charges. In order to muddy the case, the mob starts paying off cops and making it look like Newman is on the take. Now this set-up really makes no sense--he and his partner just located the biggest stash of drugs the department ever confiscated and he helped the case against Falcone...and now suddenly every cop seems to believe he's dirty?! This just didn't make a lot of sense. But then, this is an action-oriented script and believability didn't seem high on their agenda.

This show would never play well if it was made today. It's not the violence level but the glorification of vigilante style police work and a complete disregard for the Bill of Rights (such as Newman working over folks he arrests as well as shooting up the mobster's compound for kicks). In other words, the show seems to say that the best way to fight evil is to ignore the law and bust heads....or worse.

The bottom line is that this is a movie featuring lots of shooting, things exploding and the like...with very little in the way of realism or characterization. I especially had to laugh at the execution scene at the nursing home...it was utterly ridiculous and made "Dirty Harry" look like the height of realism!

Personal favorite Peppard film. It's such a dark flick. Newman lives in a world that is completely against his existence. It becomes abundantly clear that Newman is fighting a losing battle as the movie progresses. No matter what he does or how he moves the world is against him. The loner we know in Peppard is stuck in a word where more than anything he needs a friend. I love the way Peppard carries himself given the circumstance. Yes things are dark. Yes I wish this world was better, but I'm here and I'm going to make the best of it. I'll always love him for doing that.

George Peppard and Roger Robinson play a pair of rugged and honest LAPD detectives who get themselves caught up in a world of corruption. It's his very integrity that brings Peppard down

Even like normal gratuities that police often get Peppard scorns. When he and Robinson sniff out a major drug dealing operation and a mafia kingpin is hooked the two get kudos.

But the bad guys aren't stupid and they set up Peppard with planted money and drugs. Even when he's offered a way out with honor reasonably intact he refuses. He just becomes a rogue and a lot of people go down.

Peppard's title character is compared to Dirty Harry and they sure have some of the same biases. But I get the feeling that Harry Callahan was a lot craftier than George Peppard's Newman.

Note in the supporting cast Eugene Roche as a cop who has some very bendable integrity and Teddy Wilson a dope pusher who is busted by Peppard and Robinson which starts the whole story off.

A Peppard film that should be better known.

After a long waiting finally I found Newman's Law at Youtube whereof I had watched in far off 1989 aired on TV, it strangely disappears from program schedule for good, neither in VHS advent either, now my hope lies on DVD only, due I saw a restored print on Youtube therefore the next step is an upcoming release?

Newman's Law is a sort of forgotten cop flick, mixing countless black actors that reaches near of blaxploitation offering in mid-seventies where this genre was in the peak, however it essentially is a drug smuggling story operated by international boss Lo Falcone, that is the target for Newman (George Peppard) and his black partner Roger Robinson, actually Newman is off-pattern Cop due his tough behavior and not for sale whatsoever, it somehow upsets their fellows cops, nonetheless living alone in a tight house eating frozen foods, shinning his own shoes and didn't has enough money to afford the overdue bill of his sick father.

Worst when Newman catches a large amount of drugs of Falcone he becomes a ladder for the greedy district attorney Jack Eastman (Jack Pinsent) throwing him into spotlights to get later a chamber at senate, when Newman is criminally framed by the mobster Eastman forsakes him to its fate, due the his goal already consummated, now Newman out of equation perceives how dirty is system, then strikes back.

The outcome is Hollywoodian quite sure, nonetheless it doesn't erases the awesome premise carried out on first half of story, someone wrote here that it was Peppard's personal favorite picture, it isn't small feat, what great sequences Newman and Garry dealing damages to small dealer Jaycee (Teddy Wilson) at your fancy house, what a priceless acting.

Thanks for reading.

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First watch: 1989 / How many: 2 / Source: TV-Youtube / Rating: 7.