Newman's Law

Hardnosed but rigorously honest detective (Peppard) finds himself framed and suspended when he gets too close to the big dope king. Despite the routine plot, Anthony Wilson's script (for the first half anyway) manages to establish with some feeling the routine and bureaucratic nature of policework. Unfortunately, Heffron's direction is incapable of sustaining the necessary momentum. Although he manages well enough with a supermarket shoot-up, things fall to pieces once Peppard goes on the rampage. Peppard's downbeat performance survives along with a few other fringe benefits: a gangster with a nice line in Nixonian answers; the all-pervasive, slightly suspect masculine relationships; and the way the film ends up somewhere between Dirty Harry and Serpico.