Hail Gran Torino. Hail Eastwood.

Gran Torino. Sounds like a racing game when in fact it's Clint Eastwood’s latest export - to our isolated shores anyway - naturally, the seps have already seen it. I like to write about films the public haven’t seen or those that aren’t even in production, usually. But this one is special. Firstly, it is by all accounts is an excellent film and the trailer seems to back this up.

(Yeah I hear you, David 'kettle' Yates. But this is the king of the 'pots' blogging and I'm blacker than Arthur Scargill's favourite canary, Dirty Harry. Unlike your pasty Potter friend.)



Secondly, it is Clint’s last as an actor. He can’t really be denied a rest, the man turns 79 in May, but his films as a actor and/or director have been brilliant. Unfortunately, director and actor career paths all too often resemble those of boxers: some retire too early, some way too late and some insist on doing an embarrassing comeback when we've all suffered far too much at their hands already. I’m looking at you, Evander Holyfield and Woody Allen.

Besides, none of the aforementioned earned my utmost respect by telling the gobby Spike Lee where to shove it. Yes. Eastwood, my exception to the rule, will continue to dodge his dotage by directing a biopic of Nelson Mandella next. I hope it won’t be his last. I hate seeing people I admire reach the end of their career. It took me about three years to get over Ian Wright retiring.