Dirty Harry novels of the four first "Dirty Harry" films as tie-ins. Author and screenwriter Phillip Rock wrote the novelization of "Dirty Harry" in 1971, based on an early draft of the script. Mel Valley wrote the sequel, "Magnum Force", in 1973. Wesley Morgan novelized "The Enforcer" in 1976. The "Sudden Impact" novelization was written by Joseph Stinson, one of the screenwriters. Stinson, who had rewritten the originally independent script as a "Dirty Harry" vehicle for Eastwood, adapted the novel in 1983. Following "The Enforcer", Eastwood announced that he would not make any further "Dirty Harry" films (he eventually returned to the role
Clint Eastwood Power", alongside Gene Hackman (with whom he had appeared in "Unforgiven"). Eastwood played the role of a veteran thief who witnesses the Secret Service cover-up of a murder. The film received a mixed reception from critics. Later in 1997, Eastwood directed "Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil", based on the novel by John Berendt and starring John Cusack, Kevin Spacey, and Jude Law. The film met with a mixed critical response. Eastwood directed and starred in "True Crime" (1999). He plays Steve Everett, a journalist and recovering alcoholic, who has to cover the execution of murderer Frank Beechum