cult film freak: MORGAN PAULL, JUNE FAIRCHILD & TARA STROHMEIER 'DIRTY O'NEIL'

year: 1974 cast: Morgan Paull, June Fairchild, Tara Strohmeier, Art Metrano rating: ***1/2

“Caught in the act,” says one of many vixens in Officer O’Neil’s path. “Take me alive… How should I plead?” Well for this guilty pleasure exploitation film, the answer should be obvious.

Title character Dirty O’Neil lives up to his name – and not because his uniform’s unwashed. Whether he’s arresting hitchhikers, going undercover as a nurse to bust perverts, coaching a girl’s basketball team, or following up on random complaints from citizens, sly cat Jimmy O’Neil, played by the late

Officer Dirty O'Neil on the beat in a bar with a babe

Morgan Paull, always winds up with another (and yet another and another) beautiful lady.
But he’s not only in it for the good times. He digs his job… Protecting the small town where he resides… and when three grimy criminals attack one of his girlfriends, he has to step up and really take action.

Paull, in a Cult Film Freak podcast interview, and who played the Tyrell agent Harrison Ford replaces in BLADE RUNNER, noted: “So that’s the chance of the business. Harrison Ford was up for several movies, including DIRTY O’NEIL. He got the hit, I got the bomb… What can I say?”

Art Metrano with Morgan Paull in DIRTY O'NEIL

Alright so it’s no STAR WARS... But DIRTY O’NEIL satisfies from beginning to end. Art Metrano, the antagonist in several POLICE ACADEMY films, plays O’Neil’s scruffy partner. But the true highlights on this seventies gem (available for streaming on Netflix) are all the lovely vixens including June Fairchild, Tara Strohmeier, Kitty Carl, Jeane Manson and Katie Saylor...

Because no matter what happens, there’s always another pretty face around each and every curvaceous corner...

SELECTIONS FROM AN INTERVIEW WITH THE LATE MORGAN PAULL
I’ve never been to jealous watching a film than DIRTY O’NEIL: you wind up with the most amazing women…

Well let me tell you, I was happily married at the time so it was the greatest waste of talent in my life... My wife checked every night… She called the set to say, “Have they rapped yet, have they rapped yet?” She wanted to know everything, so those girls – we had our scenes and that was the end of it.

Morgan Paull as the sexually-motivated police officer DIRTY O'NEIL
Okay, so, what do you personally think of DIRTY O'NEIL?

It’s the lowest budget movie in history, believe me… I mean our lunch was whatever they could find at a local hotdog stand... But it was a lead role and it was supposed to be funny, a takeoff on all the cop movies that were going on… And it had potential of being funny...

Art Metrano was funny and I was trying to be somewhat funny… And the premise was funny. But you know – it was what it was.