One Of My Favourite Eastwood Movies

Rating: 9/10 (9 April 2017)

Heartbreak Ridge (1986)
Plot In A Paragraph: Tom Highway (Eastwood) a hard nosed, hard drinking Marine gunnery sergeant clashes with his superiors and his ex-wife as he takes command of a spoiled recon platoon with a bad attitude.
Clint took time out from his busy schedule or being the Mayor of Carmel, to direct and star in another of my favourite Eastwood flicks. Marine Gunnery Sergeant Highway may be politically incorrect and out of touch with modern techniques (How many times has a Clint character being called a dinosaur, a relic, a caveman?? It's a label often threw at him) but he is a hoot!! And boy does he get the job done!! Talking a lot more than your standard Eastwood character, Highway backs up his foul mouthed gravel voiced words with actions too. One of my favourite Eastwood characters hands down.
Of the supporting cast Mario Van Peebles is brilliant as Stitch, he had a great chemistry with Eastwood and I'm surprised he never used him again. Tom Villard gets the laughs as Profile, Everett McGill is suibtably annoying as Major Powers, as is Moses Gunn as Sgt Webster whilst Arlen Dean Snyder stands out as Sgt Major Choozoo.
The professional relationship between Clint Eastwood and longtime producer/associate Fritz Manes came to a bitter end during the making of this movie. This was the last film Manes ever worked on. Rumour has it, Clint had his secretary fire him by telephone!! He was a trusted Malpaso regular (every movie he produced was Clint related, with the exception of Ratboy with Sondra Locke) so it must have been something big!!
Despite a flat trailer and one of the worst posters of Eastwood's filmography, Heartbreak Ridge grossed $42 million at the domestic box office to end 1986 the 18th highest grossing movie of the year.