Clint
Eastwood often argues jazz and westerns are America’s two great indigenous art
forms. Inadvertently, he thereby makes a
strong case that he is one of America’s most preeminent artists. Tribute was paid to the actor-director
composer at the 2013 Tribeca Film Festival yesterday with the world premiere of
film critic and biographer Richard Schickel’s Eastwood Directs: The Untold Story, followed by a special Tribeca
Talks interview with Eastwood conducted by Darren Aronofsky.
Eastwood Directs
will
be included in Warner Brothers’ upcoming Clint
Eastwood 40-Film Collection on DVD and the similarly titled 20-Film Collection on Bluray. It will also air on TCM. As one might expect, it combines talking head
interviews with brief film snippets from Warner’s Eastwood library. However, it is hard to begrudge the
hagiographic treatment for an icon like Eastwood. Clearly, he is a serious figure if he attracts
commentary from the likes of Martin Scorsese, Steven Spielberg, Brian Grazer,
and Meryl Streep. It is especially nice
to see Gene Hackman reminiscing about the film Unforgiven. Someone like
Eastwood ought to find a part interesting enough to get him back in the game.
Directs largely focuses
on Eastwood’s special talent for directing his fellow actors, giving
considerable attention to his big Oscar winners, for obvious reasons. There are some nice stories and testimonials,
especially from Streep, his co-star in Bridges
of Madison County. While Schickel
does not spend much time on Bird, he
still covers Eastwood’s longstanding passion and support for jazz in reasonable
detail. Though not exactly a jazz film
per se, Play Misty for Me gets its
due, even though it is not a Warner property (the picture of Eastwood with Erroll
Garner is a nice touch).
In
fact, Misty provided one of the more
telling anecdotes during Eastwood’s post-screening conversation with
Aronofsky. When asked about technology,
Eastwood (who still prefers film but is resigned to digital’s inevitability)
spoke of his brief use of “instant replay” capabilities on his directorial
debut, but quickly banished it from the set when he saw the cast and crew obsessing
over it.
In
Eastwood Directs, Scorsese identifies
Eastwood as the living link between old school Hollywood and the modern age. It is easy to see what he’s getting at. Unfortunately, Aronofsky’s skills as an
interviewer did not match the insights of Shickel’s interview subjects. However, Eastwood did his best to fit
anecdotes to the broad, open-ended questions and generally just offered up his
gravelly-voiced Zen master-blues piano player persona to the appreciative
audience.
There
is something truly American about self-reinvention. Again, this is something Eastwood exemplifies. From Rawhide
through the Leone westerns and critically underappreciated Dirty Harry
films to his Cannes and Oscar celebrated films as a director, Eastwood has
charted an independent course, while remaining within the studio system and
maintaining his popular appeal.
Recommended for his fans, Eastwood
Directs will be included on Warner Brothers’ collections releasing June 3rd
and will run on TCM May 30th. The
Eastwood interview is also available for streaming for those unable to attend
the 2013 Tribeca Film Festival in-person.