Me Me Me

I may be a liberal politically, but in the movies I like manly men who pull a gun on the bad guys and leave no doubt that they’d be perfectly willing to pull the trigger. We just saw Gran Torino, the super-fabulous new movie starring the incredible Clint Eastwood. Oh boy, I’ve loved Clint forever. Play Misty for Me? Ay-yi-yi, so scary. Dirty Harry? Loved him. I even enjoyed the silly comedies he did in the 80s with the monkey and Sondra Locke (from whom he parted unhappily; sorry Sondra).

Since winning the Oscar for Unforgiven, Clint has been unstoppable as a director, and I was so happy that my dear church friend Margo Martindale had such a wonderful part as the worst mother on earth in Million Dollar Baby. “They hate YUUU!” she said to poor dying Hilary Swank. Margo says that Clint is a sweetheart in real life. Of course he is! He even shut Spike Lee up, but that’s another story.

Anyway, the programmers of movie trailers must have realized that I was in the audience at Gran Torino, because they managed to show previews of four different movies starring four more of my favorite manly men: Russell Crowe (who is apparently NOT a sweetheart in real life, but I love him anyway), Christian Bale, Daniel Craig, and Clive Owen. MANLINESS!!! Who needs Tom Cruise strutting around in a Nazi uniform when you can wait for the latest from Russell, Christian, Daniel and Clive. And Christian’s movie is a new Terminator! Bonus, bonus fun.

Clint BETTER get a Best Actor nomination for Gran Torino. Nobody ever wins an Oscar for playing a regular person, so I’m quite sure Sean Penn or Frank Langella will win for their expert impersonations (just as Philip Seymour Hoffman’s Capote beat Heath Ledger, who should most definitely have won for Brokeback Mountain). Whatever — Clint, you are the MAN.