It’s not uncommon for on-screen tales of crotchety old men finding redemption to seem like Hallmark cards thinly disguised as Lifetime Channel movies, but Clint Eastwood’s Gran Torino feels much, much more like watching Dirty Harry in his twilight years. Eastwood finds himself pulling double-duty here, both directing the film and starring as heavily grizzled Walt Kowalski, a recent widower who spends most of his time drinking beer and mowing the lawn, while trying hard to pretend the asshats that are his offspring don’t exist. His story is told with as modest a production as you might find in a major release, and is unfortunately pock-marked with a few questionable actors, but it is also as ridiculously enjoyable as they come.
Leave it to Eastwood to make racism damn entertaining. Normally, bitter old bigots are the kind of people you want to help wander into traffic, but somehow he makes this ancient jerk someone you not only like, but find yourself rooting for, as he feebly tries to come to terms with a world he no longer understands. Sure, you won’t be surprised when Walt, called upon to protect the Asian neighbors he claims to despise, finds himself begrudgingly liking them, but Eastwood turns every single second of the role into something far more memorable than the sum of its parts. It’s almost frightening how perfectly chisled the man is at his age, and he looks practically etched onto the film like some ass-kicking monument to testosterone. He doesn’t speak, so much as growl out every line, his face looks like it forgot every setting other than ‘scowl’, and there’s no way being on the receiving end of either is a very comfortable place to be. Simply put, it’s Eastwood being a hardass as only he can, and the entire performance is as fitting a send-off to his monumental action movie career as I can imagine. If you have to say goodbye, this is the way to do it.
I thought the movie was great! I only have a few gripes to air:
1) I thought for sure he the movie would take an unforeseen turn and that Walt would abduct Short Round, in order to make him a sex slave. I think his name was Dong or something Asian like that.
2) I was under the impression that it was a love story, yet there was only one rape throughout the whole movie. What’s that about?
3) The fake Asian accents of the Bung people were offensively Americanized. When you think Eastwood, you think authentic. I sat down expecting to hear Hong Kong Phooey and instead got B.D. Wong!
4) There’s a guy in the gang of Bung thugs that has a baby thumb growing out of this big boy thumb…(wretch)…Nothing make me wanna go home and beat my genitals like they owe me money – like seeing a freak. I’m not talking the “good” freak (a.k.a. Shauna Vick, my first high school girlfriend) I’m talking full on carny folk. This baby thumb even had a manicured fingernail. CRIMENY!
All in all, great flick.