Completely overrated

Rating: 6/10 (3 March 2011)

Gran Torino is the story of the friendship between Walt, a retired soldier and widower, and a Laotian family living next door, and the struggle of the youngest siblings not to be swallowed by the street gangs in town. It is an ode to peaceful coexistence and the right to have a better future, a non pre-conditioned racial one.
The story has all the elements to be successful, since it has a lovely story of interracial friendship, initiation to maturity, migration, and of good people who want to live in peace. I liked the history of the Laotian neighbors as depicted the reality of immigration and survival in a new racial and cultural environment.
I loved the performance of Ahney Her as Sue and Bee Vang as her brother Thao, which are very expressive, sincere and sensitive. I liked the sub- story of the punishment that Walt gives Thao to pay for his fault. I also liked the unexpected end, an example of sacrifice for the welfare of others, which surprises the spectator because the film is quite violent, even the poster seems to indicate that.
These good elements were not enough to me because of the tempo of the film, which doesn't't have a crescendo or doesn't demarcates what is important from what is superfluous. The story sometimes gets lost in the superfluous, forgetting those elements of the story that were more interesting and important; for example, all the sub-stories of Walt's family don't add anything to the story or serve to draw Walt's character better. Some characters are badly drawn (Walt, for example, looks like an ailing Dirty Harry, a repetition of past roles) while others are too stereotypical and predictable (such as the Asian boys band.)
The film is just OK. I thought it was a commissioned one, the kind of film that some directors have to direct to make money and finance more daring projects.