Gran Torino in 2008 was probably the last great Eastwood film as a director. Between now and then, we have had the over-rated but still decent Invictus, the o.k. but pretty slow and boring J. Edgar and decent but unremarkable Jersey Boys.
Now, we see Eastwood back to where he usually succeeds, and that is a war story centering on an American hero. This time, it is a true one.
When you see the trailer, you are probably anticipating the same thing as everyone else. A powerful story about one of America's modern day heroes and have a highly engaging tone. To be honest, that is a lot to live up to.
Well, it has a pretty amazing opening. Then afterwards, it's takes a while to get back to where we began. I was still engaged, but not gripped enough to find it immerse viewing. In the end, I had some questions about the film as I was walking out of the screening. However, I felt pretty satisfied with my viewing experience.
Eastwood's direction may not have been ground-breaking, but it still had that Clint feel to it. He is a very 'nuts and bolts' director that makes a film as if it was fitting cogs into a machine. His style is very precise and almost militarised. He tells the story well and showed the world a hero that the whole world should know about.
One thing is for sure, he has created a big performance out of Bradley Cooper playing are main character. Cooper seems to have given the right amount of respect to the heroics and achievements of our character, but with also enough controversial moments to make us question him. The longer the film went, the more I saw the character rather than Cooper which is one asset of a performance that has to be achieved.
Everything about Cooper's performance was believable and it is almost as good as his effort in American Hustle.
There are problems with the movie however. Despite that amazing opening, the rest of it felt largely slow and towards the end it started going places I do not think it should have. There is also a huge error that I could tell others noticed. It is an error that I could not shy away from and I hope everyone else notices it, because it just pulled me out of the escapism, and it is never a good thing.
Despite Eastwood showing us an eerie look into a world that we are so far away from, there are still problems with it.
Cooper however is great, his mix of heroic and controversial characteristics is highly intriguing. It is nice to see Sienna Miller pull another top performance.
Sadly, it is not a Best Picture nominee in my opinion. It seems more like the patriotic entry for the Oscars, which is not the first time we have seen this.
Rating: 7/10
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