Not brilliant (#82?!?), but well made enough to warrant merit

Rating: 7/10 (1 March 2009)

STAR RATING: ***** Saturday Night **** Friday Night *** Friday Morning ** Sunday Night * Monday Morning
Walt Kowalski (Clint Eastwood) is a cynical, grumpy, unfriendly older gentleman whose wife has just died and whose family he has little time or respect for. He has even less time for the hmong family who live next door, with his racist thoughts always simmering to the surface. Things aren't helped when a young boy who lives next door is forced into a gang initiation by trying to steal Walt's prized 1972 Gran Torino car, which fails miserably. When Walt saves the girl next door from being attacked, a truce begins to form between them all and when the boy offers to do chores to make up for what he tried to do, it sets him and Walt on a bonding exercise where he teaches him how to approach people and things in life (often not in the most positive of ways!) But the relentless quest of the gang to get the boy to join them threatens to tear this new unity apart.
You can't seem to keep Clint down. Acting, screen writing and directing (and now, it would seem, song writing) seem to be in his blood and have no sign of leaving there. We're dealing with a natural movie star here, and one who shows no signs of going down. Also, unsurprisingly, a more old fashioned star who refuses to move with the times. Whose films still seem and feel as though they were made maybe thirty years ago. But who still gets a big fuss made whenever a new film comes out. Gran Torino is the latest such film and, well not as perfect as (some?) seem to think, is still competently made and surprising enough to hold your attention.
Despite being presented as more of an action/thriller? kind of film, it emerges really as more of a drama. Unfortunately, some of the writing and dialogue is so clunky and clumsily executed it can come off as a bit of a comedy, most notably by Eastwood himself. His racist slang, insults towards the young boy and funny muted growling whenever you sense he's about to get angry here seem to have you in guffaws of laughter rather than any sense of anticipation or edginess, not to mention the ridiculous scene where he confronts the gang who are about to attack the girl with a make believe gun made from his two fingers. I don't think it was meant to come off this way and it's a failing of the script that it does. And yet, the big man carries it off with such aplomb you can't help but admit it's at least fairly well written and made. Despite a first half that's become bogged down in unintentionally funny and steadily more boring drama, things pick up with some shock dramatic events at the end, some surprising emotional human drama from Clint before a shock ending no one was expecting, before the end credits where you could swear down it's Clint singing the title song (but it's actually Jamie Callum!)
Gran Torino is an unremarkable film that mostly doesn't do anything you don't expect it to but Clint is such a pro he carries it all off with enough flair and substance to make it all that bit more enjoyable. ***