Not a bad movie, just pedestrian, predictable and two-dimensional

Rating: 5/10 (28 January 2011)

That's it really. I admire Clint Eastwood for his early acting and directing work, but Gran Torino fell woefully short of those.
The first speech you hear, unless you count Clint snarling (which is what passes for his acting until over halfway through the movie), is expositional dialogue, which only sets the pace for the rest of the film. It is tediously obvious, and heavily signposted throughout.
Aside from the two young Hmong actors, every single character is totally one-dimensional, and the film commits the same disgrace as The Cider House Rules in attempting to portray the problems of racism, but never bothering to develop the 'foreign' characters beyond a stereotype. That the two non-actors who portray Thao and Sue manage to infuse their performances with both sincerity and believability goes some way towards saving the film, but only some.
Overall, it isn't a terrible movie, and if you can put up with some serious flaws, there's a simply-drawn but probably honestly intended morality to the piece. It's just not very good.