Star-studded casting cannot make up for a deplorable movie (The Cannonball Run series attests to this). Raul Julia was abysmal, and Clint Eastwood seemed like he was just going through the motions. Add in Charlie Sheen, could not live up to top-billing with Eastwood, and Sonia Braga, who arguably had the best scenes in the movie, and this effort still could not get off the ground. It almost felt like the script was originally intended to be a sixth installment of the Dirty Harry series, but Clint Eastwood probably didn't want to destroy the legacy of his iconic Inspector Harry Callahan, and decided before filming to change the names of the characters around so as to not leave fans of the former series left with a bad taste in their mouths. In any case, The Rookie was arguably Eastwood's poorest outing.

An embarassment, indeed. Recalling Sonia Braga's turn near the end, you even come to question Eastwood's sanity. This one is best forgotten.

Probably Eastwood's weakest effort. It smacks of a bad script and has a quite awful Charlie Sheen (in a terrible stroke of casting) as a cop. It's bad Hollywood shite. A rare clunker for Eastwood.