Only Betty White has more energy than Clint Eastwood. Still bucking those broncos at 91, Eastwood just keeps churning out film after film after film. Quality ones too! Cry Macho in an inferior director’s hands would have been lethargic garbage. But in Clint’s hands Cry Macho is merely a slow burn with an occasional great moment or two. In addition, Clint finally no longer has the biggest cock in the room: that is the rooster accompanying him on a road trip through Mexico.
How does Clint end up on a rooster road trip? Well, he plays Mike Milo, a semi-retired, former horse rider/trainer. Lackadaisical and basically going through the motions of his last years, Mike doesn’t really care if his boss/buddy Howard (Dwight Yoakam) fires him or not, going to and from work as he pleases. One day, Howard comes to Mike with a request. Howard can’t cross into Mexico, so he asks Mike to return his teenage son Rafael (Eduardo Minett) to him. Mike agrees, and searches some local cockfighting rings to find Rafael and bring him to the US, provided Rafael or his mother Leta (Fernanda Urrejola) lets him go.
I guess this is Clint’s movie version of a travelogue. As the director, he initially puts you on edge as we venture down to Mexico, setting up a kerfuffle of a situation Mike has walked into. And then Clint promptly…takes his foot off the gas, content to take the long road back to the US Border. As a character study, Mike’s evolution through this trip is a delight, as we see him slowly assimilate into a culture previously foreign to him, but one he takes a liking too. His relationship with a local restauranteur Marta (Natalia Traven) contains some of the best scenes of the movie, as Mike maybe finds some long term purpose after he delivers Rafael to Howard. Plus, the closer we get to the border, Clint shows he’s great at generating tension from those years of experience.
It’s only natural that Clint might slip a little as he nears 100 years old (he’s currently 91). I don’t think he can multi task any more; he’s either got to be an actor or a director, not both. The last film Clint cast himself in as the lead, he made himself the center of the movie’s universe. Granted, his screen presence still kicks ass today as it did 60 years ago, but he’s the only compelling character usually in his movie. The same is true for Cry Macho. Recently, there’s this condescending use of Latino/Latina characters, where none of them have any real agency; they’re just there to help Mike out. Rafael and Mike’s love interest Marta have brief moments here and there, but most of their time is spent attending to the needs of Mike to prop him up. Hell, Rafael spends pretty much the entire last hour translating for Mike so he can flirt across languages. Another icky trend Eastwood does when casting himself is every female character in the movie throws themselves at him; there’s no reason Leta would be attracted to Mike, but Eastwood directs himself rejecting her advances to make himself look like the hero and her to look like a helpless romantic insatiably attracted to Mike, completely ignoring her power position in Mexico. Even the lovely Marta goes hilariously out of her way for this sketchy 91 year old white guy (federales come multiple times to the town) and his young accomplice with his rooster.
I hope Cry Macho teaches Clint to maybe stop double dutying his movies, and sticking to either directing or acting. But some small part of me hopes he doubles down, and goes BIGGER. You’ve had women throwing themselves at you, you had a 3 way with 2 twentysomething Mexican ladies. Let’s do an orgy next time! Maybe on a pub crawl, with 10 or so women from all over the world, 22 years old, just delighted that a 91 year old curmudgeon looked at them. Also, every time Clint walks past a woman, a button on the blouse pops off, symbolizing that raw Eastwood sexual appeal