The Laughing Policemen

After watching the wonderful Charlie Varrick a week or so ago, I decided that it was time to check out some of the other crime films that the late great Walter Matthau, so I went ahead and rented copies of The Laughing Policeman

The Laughing Policeman, starring Matthau, Bruce Dern and Louis Gossett, based on a series of Swedish detective novels, but for the film, moved to San Francisco.

Honestly it was a decent enough police procedural with crackling performances from everyone involved, but the ending wasn’t all it could have been and there were definitely sections that dragged on like a dinner at grandma’s.


Still I recommend it if only for Matthau’s patented world weary performance and of course the always spectacular Mr. Dern.

In fact I think I should take another look at some of Dern’s movies, after all between Black Sunday, Silent Running and Hell’s Angels on wheels, he’s a B movie God all on his own.