A Masterpiece of Embarrassment

Rating: 5/10 (23 January 2009)

The film Gran Torino culminates a feeling that has been growing within me for roughly the past decade or so. A last straw of sorts. Although this view goes against the prevailing tide, I believe Clint Eastwood has officially become the most over-rated director working in Hollywood today. Every one of the films he's made since Unforgiven, except perhaps Mystic River, has played with the melodramatic 'umph' of a bowl of chicken noodle soup. Hold the salt. If Mystic River stands out of the crowd, it is in large part due to the stellar performances of the three protagonists. I wonder if Eastwood has become Hollywood's darling simply on the basis of his being such a true Mr. Nice Guy. Or is it that the themes he chooses to deal with are generally so noble. Yet, film after film we are treated to the same directorial auto-pilot mode, unimaginative camera angles, rhythm-less editing and dialogue worthy of a Spiderman episode. Every now and then he is saved by his director of photography (Iwo Jima, Changeling), but in general we remain forever in the Land of the Bland. Nothing particularly bad about his work, but nothing really remarkable either. Until Gran Torino.
Eastwood had come off the uneven Changeling. A fantastic true story of multiple plots and complex angles that was given a botched by-the-numbers treatment. With Angelina Jolie's over-the-top portrayal and her one-note Jack Torrance line of dialogue, "I want my son...", instead of a viewer's heart going out to a mother's loss, one wished they had kept her locked up in a soundproof cell and tossed the key. But I'm getting sidetracked.
Gran Torino is one terribly bad movie. From the opening church scene, we hear an invisible growl. Is it a dog, or a ghost? Linda Blair about to emerge from under the pews? No, Clint the ventriloquist wants us to know that Dirty Harry is back, and has hardly mellowed with age. Some more growling and then we are treated to a non-stop parade of racist invectives for the remaining 110 minutes. The fixed furrowed brow, and the curled lips that never unfurl. Cute, if you're a fan of Little Red Riding Hood. But as drama...we feel nothing for Eastwood's character. Anger mode can only dig down so deep. Ultimately, we find it impossible to get under the skin of his demons. Kowalski is no Frank Fitt, the ex-marine from American Beauty. In that film Chris Cooper was credible, here Clint is INcredibly...unbelievable.
Who are these people? A family of light-hearted indifference at a funeral service, stereo-cast against the bitterly respectful old man. Macho gangs of neighboring hoods who stir up serious trouble but melt when a half-limping septuagenarian with a 'finger' pistol shows up on the scene. And there's the jovial barber who pulls a shotgun on a kid over an off-color joke. Every time Clint spits (which is often) it seems the entire Asian community shows up on his front porch with a catered banquet decked out in ethnic ceremonial garb. And even then, so to speak, Clint spits in the soup. A turning point is forced upon us in which a persecuted Hmong boy helps Clint raise a freezer up the basement stairs. As the hard-boiled Kowalski softens to the kid on the sidewalk, we learn that now he wants to sell the appliance. Hmm, maybe he could have put an ad in e-bay and saved himself the gymnastics. As coincidence would have it, he finds an unlikely buyer there on the spot. Later, his teenage neighbor tells him he's (suddenly) become their role model. He answers by rudely dispatching this 'dragon lady' to fetch him another beer. When she innocently utters the F-word, he reprimands her. The irony is self-conscious, and we wince rather than smile. Contrivances and trite predictability follow all the way to, and especially at, the end.
It's hard to say what clicks the least in this film. Eastwood establishes his shots alright, but rarely do we feel a sense of place. There is some attention to detail. A chewing out in the Hmong tongue, a token roast pig, the native costumes. But these elements seem plugged in and do not breathe much life into the overall scene. Perhaps the comparison is unfair, but unlike the ethnic zest that springs from Danny Boyle's Slumdog Millionaire, Gran Torino's Thai/Vietnamese context seems dead, sterile. Characters are clumped together in claustrophobic compositions. All trees and no forest, as the sets jump abruptly from one scene to the next. This is no seamless movie. The tiny hanging threads individually seem trivial, but in the end build to a source of irritation.
Gran Torino is drama that will, at best, jerk tears from a crocodile. Some have seen it as comedy. I can only snicker. If GT wants to be taken for a satirical spoof, it certainly hits all the wrong buttons. With a cast pulled straight from the streets Clint's trademark hands-off stewardship is ever in evidence. Rushes to rough cut. This is one film that will never see a director's cut.
Clint Eastwood. A West Coast Woody Allen-Lite? Or an American Eric Rohmer past his prime. Will the decline finally unmask the naked Emperor?