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Please join me in a moment of reflection on the fragile coolness of Frank Bullitt.

I’ve seen Bullitt a few times now and each time I get yawnish in the middle.
The problem with Bullitt is that it is famous for the wrong thing.
Don’t get me wrong, Frank Bullitt has the original low-angle high-speed car chase, but Popeye Doyle has a good one, too. So does that guy from The Seven-Ups. And it’s not that he’s a good cop who does bad things. Dirty Harry totally out-does him in that contest. (In fact, I don’t think Frank flouts the law even once.)

It finally came to me as I watched it the other day with my wife (she hadn’t seen it, horrors!).

It’s his face.

McQueen may be the coolest guy in the room, but it comes at a cost. He tends to play characters who epitomize cool.
This coolness naturally rubs off on Frank Bullitt and it’s hard to see past it.

For the most part, Bullitt’s face is deadpan (the antithesis of the bombastic Doyle), but there are moments when emotion pokes through the mask.

And when it does, I feel kind of bad for him. I don’t think he likes his job too much, and he’s not willing to blow off steam by blowing people away Dirty Harry-style

In other words, he lives in the same sort of tension you and I live in.

Frank Bullitt may be an original, but he’s certainly not as gangster as the guys he inspired.