What was the first movie starring Clint Eastwood? What are the actor’s biggest hits? His best and worst films? Here are some details about the filmography of this legend of American cinema.
One of Hollywood’s great legends began working in the 1950s – and today, at 94 years old, Clint Eastwood is still not retired. AdoroCinema presents a retrospective of his career as an actor and analyzes the most memorable films of this legendary figure of the western genre over the years.
What was Clint Eastwood’s first role?
Clint Eastwood did not become the megastar we know overnight. Before achieving success in Hollywood, he started as an extra. In 1955, he played a series of uncredited roles, primarily in The Revenge of the Creature, as a young lab technician; as a pilot launching a missile at the monstrous arachnid in Tarantula; and as an archer in the historical film The Inn of the Sixth Happiness.
Universal International Pictures
In the same year, he appeared in Francis in the Navy, which marked the first time he was credited in a film, even if the role was anecdotal. And in 1956, he had his first supporting role in the comedy western Always Leave Them Laughing, where he played the suitor of Carol Channing’s character.
What is Clint Eastwood’s best role?
It is obvious, as the character is one of the most iconic in cinema: the Man with No Name is definitely Eastwood’s best role. This anti-hero, etched in the memories of numerous movie fans, is the main character in Sergio Leone’s Dollar Trilogy: A Fistful of Dollars (1964), For a Few Dollars More (1965), and the renowned The Good, the Bad and the Ugly (1966). Mysterious and cynical, yet with a good heart, this cowboy left a mark both on the career of his interpreter and in the history of cinema.
What is Clint Eastwood’s best scene?
Winner of four Oscars in 1993 (Best Picture and Best Director for Clint Eastwood, Best Supporting Actor for Gene Hackman, and Best Editing for Joel Cox), Unforgiven also left its mark. Besides being a dark western where the actor and director portrays the American West in all its complexity, sadism, and violence, the film also contains the best scene of his career as an actor.
Attention, spoilers! What follows reveals the (excellent) ending of the film.
This is the moment when his character, the feared outlaw turned farmer William Munny, fulfills the contract he agreed to return to service and heads into a stormy night to the bar where the film’s villain Little Bill Daggett (Gene Hackman) is, because his men tortured and killed Munny’s friend, Ned Logan (Morgan Freeman).
After declaring the most memorable line: “I have killed women and children. I have killed just about everything that walks or crawls at one time or another. And I’m here to kill you, Little Bill, for what you did to Ned,” he shoots at Daggett and his men.
From the hero’s silent entry into the establishment, to how he confronts his enemy and the ensuing shootout, to the way Clint Eastwood delivers the little dialogue he has, everything is perfect in this scene, which concludes the feature film in style.
What is Clint Eastwood’s funniest scene?
While you know, of course, that Clint Eastwood starred in many westerns, including some of the most legendary in the genre, what you might not know is that in 1969 he acted in a… musical western. Titled The Gold Seekers, this is the film where the actor is the funniest – despite the fact that to this day, he is embarrassed by this work and has once stated that he considered quitting the shoot.
You can check out a brief scene here:
What is Clint Eastwood’s saddest scene?
When two giants of Hollywood face each other, the result is one of the most beautiful (and impossible) love stories in cinema. We are talking, of course, about The Bridges of Madison County, directed by Eastwood, in which he stars alongside the great Meryl Streep. He is Robert Kincaid, a National Geographic photographer, and she is Francesca, a mother trapped in a passionless marriage.
The two have a passionate four-day affair that ends when Robert’s husband and children come home. Despite her love for Robert, Francesca is unable to leave her family, as shown in the scene below, in which, after shopping, she is waiting for her husband in the car when she sees Robert approaching in the rain. They gaze at each other affectionately. Finally, they smile at each other, and then Robert walks away.
A poignant and wordless farewell that must have left no viewer indifferent. In the remainder of the scene, when Francesca’s husband finds her in the car, she gets very close to opening the door and going to meet Robert, but she doesn’t, and she voiceovers how much she regrets not doing so.
What are Clint Eastwood’s best films as an actor?
According to the readers of AdoroCinema, the highest-rated films of Eastwood as an actor are:
- Unforgiven
- Million Dollar Baby
- Gran Torino
- The Good, the Bad and the Ugly
- The Bridges of Madison County
In which series did Clint Eastwood act?
Early in his career, Eastwood appeared in several series for a single episode (Death Valley Days, Alfred Hitchcock Presents…), but the series that really put him in the spotlight was Rawhide.
In the 217 episodes of this western production that aired between 1959 and 1965, he played the young and grumpy cowboy Rowdy Yates, a part of a gang tasked with driving three thousand head of cattle from Texas to Missouri in the years following the American Civil War.
After becoming a movie star, Clint Eastwood never returned to the small screen, except for a few appearances in Mrs. Eastwood & Company in 2012, a reality show that followed his then-wife, Dina Eastwood, and their daughters. The couple divorced in 2014.
Has Clint Eastwood ever voiced an animated movie character?
In a career spanning almost 70 years, Clint Eastwood has never lent his voice to an animated movie character. Not even for The Spirit of the West, clearly inspired by his character in the Dollar Trilogy, in the animated western Rango. Although the voice of this mysterious cowboy sounds like Clint Eastwood’s, it is actually Timothy Olyphant’s voice (also a veteran of westerns).
Has Clint Eastwood ever directed a movie?
Clint Eastwood is as famous as a director as he is as an actor. Although he achieved great fame in front of the cameras in the late 1960s, he quickly moved on to direct his first film in 1971: the thriller Play Misty for Me, in which he also played the lead role. This dual role would repeat itself many times in the following decades.
To date, he has directed 39 feature films. The most recent is the moving Cry Macho: The Path to Redemption, released in 2021.
Who has Clint Eastwood made the most films with?
The actor with whom Clint Eastwood has worked the most is Geoffrey Lewis. From The Stranger and I to The Last Outlaw, passing through Any Which Way You Can, they reunited in the 1980s for Bronco Billy and Pink Cadillac. Clint Eastwood also gave him a role in one of his directed films where he did not act, Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil, from 1997.
Oscars, Césars, Cannes… What awards has Clint Eastwood won?
It is hard to believe, but as an actor, Clint Eastwood has never won an Oscar and has received very few nominations in that category, except for Unforgiven and Million Dollar Baby. Although these two films didn’t bring him luck as an actor, they allowed him to leave the ceremonies in 1993 and 2005 with two statuettes each: Best Director and Best Picture.
These features also earned him two Golden Globes for Best Director, an award he also received for Bird in 1989, while in 2007 his Letters from Iwo Jima was crowned with the Golden Globe for Best Foreign Language Film.
On the other side of the Atlantic, Clint Eastwood won three Césars for Best Foreign Film for Gran Torino in 2010, Million Dollar Baby in 2006, and Mystic River in 2004, as well as an Honorary César in 1998.
In addition, five of the star’s films and/or films with him were selected for the Official Competition of the Cannes Film Festival: The Lone Ranger (1985), Bird (1988), The Hunting Party (1990), Mystic River (2003, the year he received the Carrosse d’Or award) and Changeling (2008).
However, in 2008, just like Catherine Deneuve, he received the Lifetime Achievement Award at the 61st Cannes Film Festival, and the following year, he received the Palme d’Or.
What are Clint Eastwood’s future projects?
At 94, Clint Eastwood is working on a new film titled Juror #2, which tells the story of a man called to serve on a jury during a homicide trial. During the hearing, he realizes that he might be the true killer and faces a difficult dilemma: should he confess to the crime and obey the law, or should he use his position to manipulate the other jurors and go unpunished?
It seems that the filmmaker is not starring in this feature film, in which Nicholas Hoult plays the lead role. However, we will have to be patient, as a release date has not yet been announced.
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