Requiem for a vigilante

Eastwood packs heat once more in the
sentimental and disappointing Gran Torino

CHANNELLING HIS INNER DEMOCRAT? Eastwood

by MATTHEW HAYS

Clint Eastwood’s career has been on a strange arc, shifting dramatically since his iconic turn as a Magnum-toting renegade cop in Dirty Harry (1971). A truly entertaining feature, that film was also widely bemoaned as deeply fascist, with the heroic Harry blowing away criminals who often happened to be racial minorities. Cited by real-life vigilantes and quoted by Reagan, Eastwood became a cultural figurehead for the Right.

But lately, he’s seemed to offer some kind of apologies for Harry. His Mystic River (2003) was a cautionary tale about vigilante action, and perhaps only a director of Eastwood’s stature and ideology could have made a U.S. studio-backed film about WWII from the perspective of the Japanese (Letters From Iwo Jima).

People are now hailing Gran Torino as “classic, vintage Eastwood,” offering up the prospect of a return to Dirty Harry’s ways. It starts out that way, but Eastwood, now in the twilight of his career and life, is offering a quiet reflection on the vigilante mindset. He’s also become an alarmingly sentimental filmmaker—witness Million Dollar Baby—so Dirty Harry has morphed into Cuddly Harry.

Here, Eastwood plays a curmudgeon, burned by the recent death of his wife and irritated by his insensitive sons and their families. He is deeply alone, aside from his trusty dog. The neighbours, who are Asian, annoy him, and he spouts all sorts of racial epithets their way. But, just as Archie Bunker did in later seasons of All in the Family, Eastwood reveals that he’s a decent fellow, a curmudgeon with a heart of gold. Eastwood’s character is a Republican who’s getting in touch with his inner Democrat; he warms up to the Asian family, and staves off an attack by an Asian gang with his trusty gun, becoming a local hero by doing so.

Gran Torino is disappointing precisely because it’s so achingly predictable. We know that Eastwood’s heart will melt. We know he’ll come to the rescue of the Asian family. We know some bad things will go down. This is, at best, required viewing for stalwart students of Eastwood’s persona and oeuvre. Some are describing this as Oscar bait. The award he should get is for Least Subtle Director Ever.

GRAN TORINO IS NOW IN THEATRES