The Harder They Come (1972, Perry Henzell) (Patreon)

62/100

Second viewing, last seen 1994. I'd vaguely remembered it as a sturdy outlaw story elevated by a vibrant milieu and a killer soundtrack, which is broadly accurate but resulted in my making an unexpected all-caps note: THIS IS ABOUT PAYOLA!! The film's most interesting non-musical, non-atmospheric element is the explicit parallel that Henzell and co-writer Trevor D. Rhone draw between music-biz corruption and police involvement in the drug trade; while Ivan eventually starts killing people in response to the latter, there's definitely a "not again!" vibe at work. I do wish more had been made of the title track's ironic rise up the charts in concert with Ivan's criminal notoriety—we get a few sharp moments, e.g. Hilton asking the police chief to let Ivan record one more song before the state executes him, but there's little sense of a man who's either driven to further violence by commercial ambition or haunted by the reason for his abrupt success. On the other hand, going that deep probably would have required casting an actor rather than a musician in the lead, which isn't necessarily a worthwhile trade-off. As is, Cliff does terrific swagger, looks genuinely dangerous when necessary, and allows the movie to be built around one of the greatest reggae songs of all time—written on demand with a casual "Okay, you need a stone masterpiece called what now?" genius that I submit outdoes Lennon dashing off "A Hard Day's Night." Film qua film is mostly functional imo (though I quite like Henzell's creative solution for depicting a cop being shot off of his motorcycle, a stunt that he apparently couldn't afford to actually stage), but just seeing Kingston onscreen and hearing copious dialogue in Jamaican patois often holds your attention even when the narrative flags. Patchy but singular.