Clint Eastwood: A Biography

Several folks here have given this book a bad review simply because the author and subject are friends. So what? Clint will not write an autobiography so this is the next best thing. He simply chose to focus on the film making process that Clint uses and stay on the positive side of his personal life. He admits in the book that he cheated on his wife numerous times but doesn't go into great detail about it. We all know this anyway, why should we hear the details? Reading this book gave me great insight on Clint's life growing up, his family, his Army days, behind the scenes of "Rawhide" and all his greatest movies. I know Clint was not a saint in his personal life but that's not what I want to read about anyways. I want to read about his work which is why I'm a fan to begin with. If you want to read the gossip which may or may not be true, read the enquirer or Pat McGilligan's book which paints Clint as just a step above Hitler!

This is an excellent book about the life and work of a legend. Richard Schickel gives us a close look at the free spirited man that's living inside of the veteran actor. Very detail work about Mr. Eastwood's movie making process and his no bulls**t attitude toward the studio execs and anyone who stands on his way. Ms. Pauline Kael should just say it out loud that she's begging for the legend's attention or just shut the hell up. Any Eastwood fan will really appreciate the author's work.

There's plenty of opportunity to gripe about this biography: The writing style is ponderous and sometimes downright clumsy, there's not enough details about Clint's private life, there's too much trivia about incidental movie roles (i.e. Witches.) But that aside it is nice to see a serious examination of Clint the Film Maker, which I might add does offer good critical examination of his movies, pointing out many of the movies' weaknesses as well as their strengths, and offering solid reasons for why the theme or story appealed to Clint. Pigeonholed early by narrowminded critics for his supposedly anti-establishment, brutal movies, he had to wait another twenty years for the critical tide to turn and for there to be a re-evaluation of his contribution to cinema (at least here in the U.S. -- in other parts of the world he'd long been recognized as a great director and actor.) And still some of the best movies he's done (whether he directed them or not) are not given the credit they deserve by self-important critics: Beguiled, Play Misty for Me, Thunderbolt and Lightfoot, The Outlaw Josey Wales, White Hunter Black Heart, Bird all come to mind as well as many others. In forty years of making movies beginning with A Fistful of Dollars, most of the time coming out with a movie a year, he's been involved in less than a handful of mediocre movies, none of them ranking as truly bad. The Rookie and City Heat come to mind as truly mediocre movies, certainly bordering on bad, and there's a couple of others that had good potential but turned out to be bad decisions on his part, but I consider that a fantastic track record. He knows story and he knows how to get the most from out of a movie, and it's the reason he's stayed at the top of the box-office for all these decades despite the fact that he's never done just what "the audience" wants from him. I recommend the book Interviews, for those interested in Clint the film maker, which is an excellent collection of interviews in which Clint very articulately discusses his ideas of film making. I can't help but add that I have to wonder about one of the reviewers who wrote that whether Unforgiven was a great movie was "questionable." Then does there exist a unquestionably great movie?

Tells it like it is! A must read!

The perfect subject for the perfect writer. Schickel writes with an extremely muscular language, and his sensibilities are perfect for Eastwood. Yes, the book reads more as an "appreciation" than as objective biography. But, so what? The point is that it yields tremendous insight. Of particular interest is Schickel's insights into areas of Eastwood's career that are not commonly examined. Examples: the role of music (in particular, jazz) in Eastwood's life and work; and the significance of such "smaller" films as Honkytonk Man, Bronco Billy, Beguiled, and Bird. (Interestingly, these are among Eastwoods own favorites; but they are all too frequently given short shrift). In short, Schickel has written a magnificent work on one of America's most interesting artists