Posted on 01/31/2009 7:09:46 AM PST by this is my country
What are we to make of a movie that is named after a car? If it's The Solid Gold Cadillac (1956), The Yellow Rolls-Royce (1964), Chitty Chitty Bang Bang or The Love Bug (both of 1968), Cadillac Man (1990) or, simply Cars (2006), we can expect comedy or romance or kiddie fantasy but nothing of serious purport. Back in 1989 Clint Eastwood starred in Pink Cadillac, supposedly a screwball comedy though I wouldn't know. Like an overwhelming majority of movie-goers, I didn't see it. Now Mr. Eastwood is back, this time as director as well as star, and he's got a much bigger success with Gran Torino. But even though there are lots of jokes in it -- most of them racial slurs transformed into comedy by passing through the gums of the lovable but now very old Clint Eastwood -- it's not supposed to be a funny movie. If only it were! Instead, like most of the later Eastwood -- since, say, Pink Cadillac -- it sinks under the weight of its own moral portentousness. Perhaps the centrality of the car has something to do with the animistic religion practiced by the Hmong neighbors of Clint's character, a curmudgeonly widower and retired Ford worker named Walt Kowalski, in his run-down neighborhood of Detroit. As in Million Dollar Baby there is a Roman Catholic priest (Christopher Carley) meant to serve as Mr. Eastwood's foil who, though the latter describes him as an "overeducated 27-year-old virgin who likes to hold the hands of superstitious old ladies and promise them everlasting life," gets off a lot easier than the priest in the earlier movie. Like him, however, he stands for the director's disgust with conventional Western religion. By contrast, a Laotian shaman who tells his fortune is treated with respect, as are
(Excerpt) Read more at spectator.org ...
Was broco Billy a drama then
Not for nothing but you did not have a clue how it was going to end? Clearly from the get go it was not going to be Clint wins in gun battle with scumbags.
You’re right about not winning the battle with the gang, but I kind of wanted him to go down swinging.
One of the very few movies that I attended where the audience applauded at the end of the movie.
I liked it a lot. First movie I have been to in a long time that I could sit thru. Let’s see that Buttons movie was tortue, Australia, I liked. Most movies try to be so politically motivating that they are repulsive.
Excellent movie. Josie Whales meets William Muny in urban Detroit.
Try Defiance. It was pretty good and didn’t involve any politics that I noticed.
I’m not sure the reviewer actually watched the movie - almost sounds like he wrote this column based on the negative observations of others.
I though the ending was perfect.
Have not seen the movie. Unforgiven was OK but the last good Eastwood movie I remember was the last Dirty Harry. The one where he played the reporter out to save the poor criminal was right up there with Play Misty for Me.
Yes, the bad guys did get it in the very end. Also, Clint knew he was going to die anyway so I guess he chose his own method.
The new film Definance was very good as well..tells a true story of the The Bielskis brothers "Four Jewish brothers in Nazi-occupied Eastern Europe escape into the Belarussian forests, where they join Russian resistance fighters and endeavor to build a village in order to protect themselves and about 1,000 Jewish non-combatants who join them." (movie is over 2 hours)Wonder why many of the Jews were sheep lead to slaughter, or became easy prey to the Nazis--they voiced they were academics-studied Music, Literature and one talked about his buddies in the socialist movement would not believe it if they saw him "learn" how to work with tools to build shelters. Says something about academics who would not survive without those like the ditch digger or the carpenter /tradesmen or "lower class" who were not as educated . The women became requested being equal in carrying weapons. They also learned, if your humanitarian heart says let the enemy go (ex.,milkman), then he will lead the enemy back another day to kill you and everyone around you. Many lessons to be learned in this film. Makes a statement! Very Good!
Both films address: "protect and teach the weak to survive so others may become inherently strong.
#13..
I know and have known men like Walt Kowalski. I found how the movie played out as believable. It was not entertaining in a Hollywood sense. In was not preachy in a Hollywood sense.
In his ‘sacrifice’, I feel he won the battle.
Sacrifice is a good way of describing it. Yes, the good guy won.
Hey, it was a Clint Eastwood movie - One of the few remaining conservative voices in that s**t hole place called Hollywood.
I did have to think after the ending why he was getting a fitted suit...I finally (duh!) put 2 and 2 together...
Hey, it was a Clint Eastwood movie - One of the few remaining conservative voices in that s**t hole place called Hollywood.
I did have to think after the ending why he was getting a fitted suit...I finally (duh!) put 2 and 2 together...
Clint Eastwood will go down as another John Wayne. Only he directs too. He is one of my heros. He would have made a lot more movies like the “Outlaw Jose Walles” but Hollywood stopped him.
With that said. Governor Grandholm; you gave a tax break to movie companies and they came to Michigan. DUH?! Why not give a tax break to businesses too?
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