Paul Schrader hits out at Clint Eastwood’s new film that ‘fails in every area’

Get our free weekly email for all the latest cinematic news from our film critic Clarisse Loughrey Get our The Life Cinematic email for free Get our The Life Cinematic email for free SIGN UP I would like to be emailed about offers, events and updates from The Independent. Read our privacy policy Paul Schrader has hit out at Clint Eastwood’s latest film Cry Macho. Schrader concurred with the negative assessments of Cry Macho, writing on Facebook: “I can appreciate the inclination to give Clint Eastwood a pass but has an important American director made a film as bad as Cry Macho since Howard Hawks’ Man’s Favourite Sport?” Hawks’s romantic comedy was released in 1964 to similarly lukewarm reviews. “When, early on, Eastwood employs an under the car shot of a boot hitting the ground I thought, ‘Great, he’s going to riff on the stylisations of macho westerns’ – but that was the last interesting composition in the film.” “Sure, Clint is given a few cliché-ridden passages about the futility of machismo but these only have value because a shrunken Dirty Harry is giving voice to them. It was like listening to a criminal apologise to the family of his victims in hopes that the judge will cut him a lesser sentence.” In contrast to the reviews for Eastwood’s latest film, Schrader’s new release, The Card Counter – which stars Oscar Isaac as a war-veteran-turned-gambler – has been received mostly positively.