Clint Eastwood--who, it should be noted, turns seventy-eight this year--just signed to direct a hush-hush project called Gran Torino. This is in addition to Changeling, a drama about an abducted child he directed for release later this year, and The Human Factor, a biopic on Nelson Mandela(!) he's scheduled to direct next year.
Impossible to know if any of these will be any good, but Eastwood is certainly a role model for aging with grace. Coming off such recent strong work as Mystic River, Flags Of Our Fathers and Letters From Iwo Jima, I'd say his work as a filmmaker keeps getting better and better, but since his first two efforts as director were Play Misty For Me and High Plains Drifter, he's been knocking 'em out of the park for a long time. Sure, he's made some bum efforts--but even they're fascinating. (Is The Rookie a bad buddy-cop movie or a deadpan spoof of same? Given the casting of Raul Julia and Sonia Braga as Germans, I gotta go with the latter. I'm also possibly the only Eastwood fan on earth who actually likes The Eiger Sanction. On the other hand, I didn't care much for Million Dollar Baby. Go figure.)
Anyway, Gran Torino. Absolutely nothing is known about this, but the interweb is already chock foll o' rumors--based, it must be said, on the thinnest of evidence--that this will be a new Dirty Harry movie. While this strikes me as unlikely...man, that would be awesome. Think about it: A new Indiana Jones, James Bond, Star Wars and Dirty Harry, all in the same year?
The geekiest imaginable part of me just wet himself. Metaphorically, of course.
