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(Credits: Far Out \/ YouTube Still)<\/p>\n
Mon 27 April 2026 20:15, UK <\/p>\n
Opinions, as everyone knows, are just like arseholes, and Clint Eastwood<\/a> sounded a lot more like the latter when he offered the former on a movie that endures as a masterpiece of the \u2018New Hollywood\u2019 era.<\/p>\n Obviously, anyone can say what they like about any film, no matter the consensus, and since he\u2019s Clint Eastwood, the four-time Academy Award-winning icon and living legend who conquered cinema on two fronts without looking as if he\u2019d broken a sweat, he\u2019s more entitled to his beliefs than most.<\/p>\n Then again, there\u2019s a whiff of self-aggrandisement in the air, with the actor and filmmaker suggesting that a picture he starred in<\/a> was superior to one that claimed five Academy Awards from nine nominations, including \u2018Best Picture\u2019 and \u2018Best Director\u2019, and there can\u2019t be too many folks who\u2019d agree with him.<\/p>\n First off, and in the interest of fairness, Thunderbolt and Lightfoot is not a bad flick, and it\u2019s one of the better light-hearted early forefathers to the buddy caper to emerge during the early 1970s, even if the preposterous way that Jeff Bridges eats his ice cream is something that can never be unseen.<\/p>\n He earned the movie\u2019s sole Oscar nomination for his performance as the back half of the title duo, and like most Eastwood-led genre efforts of the time, it was a hit among audiences. It was also Michael Cimino\u2019s feature-length directorial debut<\/a>, and he seriously upped his game for his second outing.<\/p>\n Now, while it\u2019s perfectly OK to enjoy both, in what world is Thunderbolt and Lightfoot a superior film to The Deer Hunter? One is an entertaining road-tripper, and the other is one of the decade\u2019s defining pictures, a haunting exploration of male psychology, trauma, the cost of war, and more besides.<\/p>\n In Eastwood\u2019s world, apparently, because he was adamant that he\u2019d headlined the better Cimino flick. \u201cIt was done in a much tighter fashion editorially, judging by The Deer Hunter,\u201d he ruminated. \u201cHe did a nice job on Thunderbolt and Lightfoot, and he should be proud of it. I personally think the other was rather indulgent.\u201d<\/p>\n In terms of writing and directing, there was still only one winner, as far as the \u2018Man with No Name\u2019 was concerned. \u201cIt\u2019s a far better script than the other one, and it\u2019s a far better executed job,\u201d he declared. \u201cIn The Deer Hunter, he got wrapped up in the lateral slide,\u201d which he likened to \u201cunmotivated camera-moving like you see in every commercial on TV.\u201d<\/p>\n How many people have compared The Deer Hunter to a TV commercial? At least one, and that one happens to be Clint Eastwood. As for the final scene? He didn\u2019t like that either. It\u2019s blatantly symbolic<\/a>, but from where he was sitting, \u201cIf you put enough of that stuff in a film you can fool half of the people half of the time and some of the people some of the time,\u201d so we can safely place him among the very few who think Cimino\u2019s indisputable classic isn\u2019t as great as it\u2019s been cracked up to be.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n
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<\/a> The Far Out Clint Eastwood Newsletter<\/p>\n