Every cop movie I’ve ever seen I saw in Bullitt -one of the handful of ‘catalyst films’ I’ve somehow made it this far without watching. But to watch Bullitt for the first time in your thirties in 2024 is to see the Rosetta Stone for almost all of the cop movie clichés that have come to be worn-out staples of the genre; and that’s something that must be considered in assessing Bullitt, which can feel fairly banal and predictable at times. In 1968 it was fresh, and in a very revolutionary way beyond even just the cop movie stuff.
For one thing, it’s kind of the solidification of Steve McQueen’s star identity. He’d been at the forefront of popular ensemble movies like The Magnificent Seven and The Great Escape -epitomizing the cool upstart in both. And he’d had starring roles in The Sand Pebbles and Nevada Smith -but those still kind of had the smell of old Hollywood on them, which was sharply going out of style by the late 1960s -when actors of McQueen’s generation who may not have had quite the same early start, were defining themselves through radical new kinds of movies like Bonnie and Clyde and The Graduate. Bullitt finally gave him his starring New Hollywood vehicle, a chance to maintain his ‘King of Cool’ persona for the counterculture.
And it was a properly ambitious New Hollywood movie, bringing a level of grit to the cop movie genre not seen before, by even just the simple virtue of shooting on location throughout San Francisco rather than on sound-stages or controlled sets. Director Peter Yates aimed for an atmosphere of grounded realism to give the action more of a punch, characterized his protagonist as an anti-hero, driven by a highly specific and personal interpretation of justice, and the result was a revolution in the way American cop movies are conceived and executed. As much the origin of the American 'copaganda' phenomenon as an innovator of more dynamic filmmaking.
Granted, the titular Bullitt isn't as corrupt a figure as his successors -he's no Dirty Harry or Martin Riggs. In fact he's based specifically on a real San Francisco officer, Dave Toschi -famous at the time for his colourful personal style and attitude, and afterwards for being one of the primary investigators of the Zodiac Killer. But Frank Bullitt isn't any kind of upstanding officer either, casually tossing the rulebook aside when he's personally affected and professionally humiliated. He and his team are tasked at the beginning by local Senator Walter Chalmers (fellow Magnificent Seven alumnus Robert Vaughn) with protecting a witness being targeted by the Chicago mob. Both the witness and one of Bullitt's colleagues are assassinated, so he fudges protocol to keep the investigation open until he can catch or kill those responsible.
The latter point is merely implied but it is what the audience is primed to want. Yates tells the story in a very objective way, never touching much on personal details or personality to keep it as apparently grounded as possible and suggest Bullitt’s inherent rightness. It accommodates McQueen very well -whose sure and silent attitude is tailor-made for a movie like this as he embodies a man on a mission, though with a certain coldness to him in that unflinching expression, those vacant blue eyes. Much as he may have lost a colleague he seems incapable of grief or emotional response. There’s some of this in his minimally glimpsed relationship with his girlfriend Cathy, played by Jacqueline Bisset -among the most thankless love interest parts in a long history of those for women in cop movies. She is concerned for his safety, perhaps subtly resents his emotional distance, and expresses her frustrations in one scene on the side of the road -but again Yates keeps the camera far, not wanting the audience to really feel much for her or this relationship in general beyond its mere masculine significance for Bullitt. There’s a minor question of if she will leave, but of course she doesn’t.
It’s easy to approach the movie with a cynical lens, it perhaps unintentionally has one built in. Bullitt is an emotionless movie that is difficult to detach from the legacy of cop movies it directly inspired. That doesn’t mean it isn’t interesting or even exhilarating at times. Though one-on-one confrontations are rare, the movie is famous for having one of the most iconic car chase sequences, seemingly done entirely practically, through the streets of San Francisco to beyond the city limits. It is certainly a masterfully composed part of the movie, and one where all of the familiar beats still retain an essential freshness. Breathlessly edited, it is as thrilling and electrifying as these things come -that consistent authenticity still the driver of tone, allowing it to convey its danger and urgency. Though it’s had many imitators, nothing can really compare to those two cars bouncing over those sloped streets in hot pursuit and the distinctive way that Yates shot it. It’s the only scene most people remember from the movie and I’d venture it was designed with that in mind. Certainly setting it up, with all of its moving parts and obstacles, real people in cars and in the bustling thoroughfare of a real city, it was an extraordinary undertaking, and in execution an equally extraordinary success. And of course it ends in an explosion as only the best car chases can, followed on cue by an aftermath of no accountability for any of that glorious destruction.
There's also the really expertly built tension of the final sequence through the airport, as Bullitt endeavours to find and apprehend his target after discovering a conspiracy around the man and that the guy he was guarding was merely a decoy. The bustle and anonymity of the real airport adds to the element of danger -especially compared to similar scenes just earlier in the decade, such as in North by Northwest, which is rendered primitive by these choices. It also goes for the scene at the start of the movie of the mobsters escaping Chicago behind the movie's credits. The movie demands you admire its confidence, and its slickness of style, attached to those very things in Bullitt.
Bullitt really is the archetype in its purest form, and McQueen certainly deserves some credit in figuring out that exact chemistry in how to the play the part -even if it’s not any kind of a dynamic role. He has to be tough and uncompromising but not completely inhuman -he does his job with an often concerned expression on his face. Though he goes outside the law, there’s never any acknowledgement of his actions as vigilantism. And there’s a brooding troubled nature to the guy, but it’s specificities are left fully off-screen in favour of honing in on his procedural talents. Of course, he can’t do it alone -he has Don Gordon for a sharp sidekick and a commissioner played by Simon Oakland who likes him enough that he’ll let him get away with anything. And of course his only ideological opponent is the decidedly uncool senator -and Vaughn sadly has plenty experience making McQueen look better by comparison. The movie has a couple other interesting casting choices -Norman Fell, who’d done The Graduate just the year before but will only ever be recognizable as Mr. Roper from Three’s Company is Chalmers’ loyal stooge of an officer; and in a slightly bigger than a cameo role is Robert Duvall just ahead of larger supporting roles in movies like True Grit and M*A*S*H as a cab driver who may just be on Bullitt’s payroll.
The investigation that the plot is centred around isn't particularly engaging, which in addition to its often modest pace and lack of interest in its own characters makes for a movie occasionally prone to dullness when detached from its time-sensitive novelties. I feel most of this comes from the impersonal aesthetic Yates is so keen to express. And though chilled, there's not so much style to the movie broadly. The script can be light on dialogue in preference of atmosphere, but there's only so far that atmosphere goes, aided as much as can be by the jazz score of Lalo Schifrin -another eventual staple of the genre for the next decade-plus.
But that's really the thing -as innovative as Bullitt is, most of its components have since been done better, and the original film without them can still be impressive through a handful of highly exceptional sequences, but mediocre just as often. It's likewise fascinating for its touchstones on cop movie devices and the American culture of policing more broadly, but these of course aren't things the movie ought to be celebrated for as much as tacitly acknowledged. It had significant influence and palpable artistry that made a difference to the emerging New Hollywood. But against the other major classics of that era, Bullitt I don't think stands on its own so surely.
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