Eastwood’s appeal wilts in `True Crime’

TRUE CRIME, directed by Clint Eastwood. Written by Larry Gross, Paul Brickman and Stephen Schiff. Based on the novel by Andrew Klavan. Running time: 127 minutes. Rated R (for violence, sexuality and language).

At some point — one hopes soon — somebody in Hollywood will do the right thing and take Clint Eastwood to his favorite smoky bar and buy him his favorite bottle of Scotch.

They’ll pour, touch glasses and salute his past. They might even dare to laugh about his “Every Which Way But Loose” films, or even his decision to date Sondra Locke. But then, eventually, the tough talk will have to begin. The 69-year-old actor needs to be informed that his appeal as a ladies’ man has run as thin as the skin on the back of his frail-looking hands.

Eastwood, after all, is pushing 70, and seeing him shake down beautiful women young enough to be his granddaughter — as he does in “True Crime” — or watching him take off his shirt and bed beautiful women young enough to be his daughter — as he does in “True Crime” — doesn’t quite get the heart fluttering — or give itself over to any kind of realism — as it may have 25 years ago, when Eastwood was living every which way he could in his heyday.

To be sure, while Eastwood’s vanity may want to remind us that his gun is still somewhat cocked and marginally loaded, what he’s really telling us is something a bit more deflating: His Dirty Harry has become just another dirty old man.

“True Crime,” which Eastwood produced and directed, is based on Andrew Klavan’s novel, and like the novel, it rushes quick to formula: The film’s premise has been done so many times, we know the outcome going into it.

In the film, death row inmate Frank Beachum (Isaiah Washington) has just hours to live before being put to death by lethal injection. His crime? Allegedly murdering a young woman. Frank swears he’s innocent, but no one listens until Steve Everett (Eastwood), a grizzled, self-destructive, recovering alcoholic newspaper reporter stereotype, comes on the case and tries to do in minutes what no one else in six years of litigation has been able to do: set Beachum free.

Anyone reading this review who has a breath left in their lungs knows how “True Crime” will turn out, so it’s up to director Eastwood and his three screenwriters to spark the film with the unpredictable.

They didn’t, or couldn’t, or wouldn’t; the film lies there like an old prostitute — its heart, while weak, could have been in it had it been given something more exciting to work with.

Still, the film does have it moments, most of which come from its supporting cast. Washington is affecting as Beachum, Diana Venora has a terrific scene as Eastwood’s wife, and James Woods as Eastwood’s fiery editor-in-chief redeems himself after his embarrassing turn in “John Carpenter’s Vampires.”

As for Eastwood, well, his lackluster performance and uninspired direction only reminded this critic of another death row film: dead man walking, indeed.

Grade: C-

THE GENERAL, written and directed by John Boorman. Running time: 129 minutes. Rated R (for violence and strong language). Nightly, March 22-25, Railroad Square Cinema, Waterville.

John Boorman’s “The General” may have been shot in black-and-white, but it hardly lacks color.

The film is the life story of Martin Cahill, Ireland’s infamous thief and outlandish gang leader who stole an estimated $60 million before the IRA gunned him down in 1994.

There’s no question that his story is compelling, but what’s equally as compelling is the story behind the film: Boorman was actually robbed by Cahill years before the director chose to write and direct a film version of the man’s life. Clearly, that robbery was the impetus for this film, but the real surprise here is how Boorman, the celebrated director of “Deliverance” and “Beyond Rangoon,” chose not to vilify Cahill, but to celebrate him.

Intriguing? Yes. Effective? At times. Entertaining? With Brendan Gleeson delivering an excellent performance as Cahill and John Voight superb as Cahill’s police-inspector nemesis, it certainly can be. But the film’s romanticization of Cahill is disconcerting: Cahill was a savage, sometimes brutal man who stole only for himself while living in a menage a trois with his wife and sister-in-law. For this Boorman celebrates? Maybe he was envious.

Throw yourself into the mix and enjoy.

Grade: B

Christopher Smith’s film reviews appear each Monday in the Bangor Daily News. Each week on WLBZ’s “News Center 5:30 Today” and now on “News Center Tonight,” he reviews current feature films (Tuesdays) and what’s new and worth renting at video stores (Thursdays).