For seven years at the start of his career, Clint Eastwood played a cattle drover in the CBS television series Rawhide. Between 1959 and 1965, he completed a total of 217 episodes, more than any other actor in the entire series. Maybe that record stint is a lesson in patience.
Almost half a century later, he’s not only a legendary actor but also one of the foremost filmmakers in Hollywood, nominated for 8 Best Director Oscars, and twice a winner – for Unforgiven and Million Dollar Baby.
Did he foresee such epic success while shooting his 216th episode as Rowdy Yates (a character he called “the idiot of the plains“)? He didn’t even secure his first serious film role until he was in his mid-thirties. According to film critic Roger Ebert, he went all the way to Spain to star in Sergio Leone’s Fistful of Dollars for the simple reason that “Hollywood wouldn’t hire him“.
The truth of that unlikely statement is born out by this vintage review from Time magazine, 1968:
Clinton Eastwood Jr., son of a California business executive, went into television after an unsuccessful try at breaking into movies… his acting—so far—has been consistently awful”
Luckily Clinton Jr. didn’t take such criticisms to heart. He went on to star in over 40 films, perhaps most famously Dirty Harry in 1971 and Unforgiven in 1992. Now in his late 70s, his latest – and, apparently, final – acting role is in Gran Torino, a film about racial intolerance, violence and redemption. It’s only the ninth feature he’s directed since 2000. My own favourite has to be 2003′s haunting, sombre Mystic River, a film that unravels its dark secrets with exceptional power and restraint. I don’t expect Gran Torino will replace it, if only because it doesn’t star Sean Penn and Tim Robbins, but then again, the reviewers are pretty keen, so I’m keeping an open mind.
Gran Torino is in UK cinemas from Friday February 20.
I thought Mystic River was excellent (though for Boston-based tales of dark morality and difficult dilemmas, Gone Baby Gone just pips it), but I thought Changeling was even better.
I’d go so far as to call Changeling as sublime masterpiece, no less.