Gran Torino

Looking around at reviews, a lot of people seem to have liked this Eastwood movie. I guess it does have its charms, the biggest of which is the crotchety old hardass himself. It was entertaining enough to watch him playing a grizzled, embittered war veteran slinging racial epithets left and right, and of course, what's a Clint Eastwood role without a couple of awesome macho showdowns? The slow, measured pace, intended I suppose to lead viewers to get inside the main character's head, was also a refreshing change. For these things and a few others, I think I didn't entirely waste my movie ticket money. 

But I found the movie as a whole, in a word, clunky. (You know, like this haphazard review, but this doesn't really deserve proofreading and editing, does it?) The plot never really comes together smoothly, and what you get is instead a series of events happening one after another. Character development seemed a little forced and unreal. And, oh, the acting, apart from Clint himself, was more or less horrible.

Okay, so bottomline, some things were likeable, but as a whole, clunky clunky clunky.

Had dinner and a couple of beers at Chili's afterwards. Food was good enough, and the portions (too) large. Then coffee near one of the performances in the Philippine International Jazz Festival, but unfortunately all the outside tables were taken and we weren't really able to listen. Exciting times.

In other news, I just need to write my abstract and do some final proofreading of my draft. Enough time for that tomorrow morning. (Looking forward to post-draft-deadline-week celebration, guys, okay? :P)