We saw Gran Torino today and really enjoyed it. It's a solid performance by Eastwood and a typical great directing job from him. Apparently, all the Vietnamese actors in the film had never appeared in a film before (they put in an open casting call in the Detroit area), but you wouldn't know it from the polished performances. I've often felt that if I had a good script, I could point a camera at actors like Meryl Streep, Morgan Freeman or Gene Hackman and get solid performances out of them. The trick is to get good work from relatively inexperienced people in key roles, and, just as in his last several films, Eastwood has done that.
I also think the script, as well as Eastwood's character, is more subtle than it appears at first glance. He is a bitter, lonely guy who spouts out tons of racial epithets, but it's not out of a sense of hatred; it's a way of keeping people from getting too close to him (his own family is a collection of greedy snobs with kids who show up at their grandmother's funeral with bare midriffs, tee shirts and baseball caps). His character could easily be Dirty Harry thirty years later, with one big difference; he's carrying around a lot of guilt about things that happened in the Korean War.
Eastwood movies take their time moving from one scene to the next, and there's no hurry in this one to get to the big climax. This may be his last film as an actor (he's already working on his next directing project featuring Morgan Freeman as Nelson Mandela), but, if so, he's chosen the perfect vehicle to go out on.
SSS Goes Cruisin' in a Gran Torino
-
silverscreenselect
- Posts: 24614
- Joined: Mon Oct 08, 2007 11:21 pm
- Contact:
SSS Goes Cruisin' in a Gran Torino
Check out our website: http://www.silverscreenvideos.com
-
Ritterskoop
- Posts: 5892
- Joined: Thu Oct 11, 2007 10:16 pm
- Location: Charlotte, NC
Re: SSS Goes Cruisin' in a Gran Torino
I've been looking forward to this one for a couple of months, since I first read about it.
I like his directing style, a lot.
I like his directing style, a lot.
If you fail to pilot your own ship, don't be surprised at what inappropriate port you find yourself docked. - Tom Robbins
--------
At the moment of commitment, the universe conspires to assist you. - attributed to Johann Wolfgang von Goethe.
--------
At the moment of commitment, the universe conspires to assist you. - attributed to Johann Wolfgang von Goethe.
-
themanintheseersuckersuit
- Posts: 7635
- Joined: Mon Oct 08, 2007 6:37 pm
- Location: South Carolina
Re: SSS Goes Cruisin' in a Gran Torino
Saw this last night now that it is general release. I very much enjoyed it.
Suitguy is not bitter.
feels he represents the many educated and rational onlookers who believe that the hysterical denouncement of lay scepticism is both unwarranted and counter-productive
The problem, then, is that such calls do not address an opposition audience so much as they signal virtue. They talk past those who need convincing. They ignore actual facts and counterargument. And they are irreparably smug.
feels he represents the many educated and rational onlookers who believe that the hysterical denouncement of lay scepticism is both unwarranted and counter-productive
The problem, then, is that such calls do not address an opposition audience so much as they signal virtue. They talk past those who need convincing. They ignore actual facts and counterargument. And they are irreparably smug.
-
o-man
- Posts: 314
- Joined: Thu May 01, 2008 1:41 pm
Re: SSS Goes Cruisin' in a Gran Torino
Amen. Bonus: Actually laughing out loud more than a few times. My favorite line was the one that included the bit aboutthemanintheseersuckersuit wrote: I very much enjoyed it.
Spoiler
"Ding-Dong, Click-Clack and Charlie Chan"
Dallas is a rich man with a death wish in his eye
-
Thousandaire
- Posts: 1251
- Joined: Thu Apr 17, 2008 3:33 pm