Like The Man With No Name, one of his most famous roles, Clint Eastwood has always had an aura of tight-lipped mystery. He has long been an internationally famous star, first of television and then of the movies, and he has more recently joined a select group of Oscar-winning actor-directors, including Orson Welles, Charlie Chaplin and Woody Allen.
But the real Clint has always been an enigma-until now. With this gripping and scrupulously researched biography, Patrick McGilligan, one of America's top film writers, has revealed the man behind the indelible image.
Throughout his remarkable near-half century career, Eastwood has tended to play characters who are cold, hard and morally ambiguous-from Sergio Leone's "spaghetti westerns" through Hang Em High and Dirty Harry to In the Line of Fire and Unforgiven. No star is more the hero to his audience: a symbol of simple solutions, law & order, and rebellion against bureaucracy. But offscreen, Clint Eastwood has always been an arch manipulator: of women, friends and colleagues, publicity and finance.
Always even-handed, managing to steer clear of both fawning over and unfair excoriation of its fascinating subject, this biography sheds definitive light on Clint as actor, director and human being.
Amazon.com: As celebrity biographer McGilligan tells it in Clint, Eastwood's career is the classic tale of power and fame corrupting: a small-town boy (who actually grew up in San Francisco) comes to L.A. with a wide grin and an easy manner; is remade by agents and directors (Sergio Leone said, that at first, "Eastwood had only two expressions: with or without a hat"); becomes one of the richest stars in Hollywood; and stops smiling--except wolfishly. McGilligan depicts him as a master of betrayal, casually discarded friendships, and alleged extramarital affairs (which seem to shock the author), complete with alleged children out of wedlock.
Readable though kiss-and-tell breathless, McGilligan's book sometimes overlooks Clint's full significance as a crafter of classics. He should remember the sage words of the French critic who observed, "If you love the films, nothing else matters." --Gregory McNamee
a true biography its ironic that this biography received such poor ratings when it is the only true Eatwood biography among Eastwood books. the reality is people don't want to accept or consider that one of their favorite cinimatic personalities might actually be human with human failings. I read this biography 6 years ago when it came out and recently bought another copy it was so good. if you want to keep thinking of eastwood as a "good guy" don't buy the book. if you want a real picture of the man this is a fantastic read and book. the author goes to painstakign detail to capture eastwood and paint a fascinating picture of the hollywood lanscape. a must read for those willing to look beyong the vail.
What a legend! Clint is still a great guy! This book tends to slam a big screen legend. Don't we all have something in our past that we aren't proud of? Clint isn't perfect, but he is one of the most gifted people in Hollywood.
How could anyone compare to his entertainment artistry? Clint is an enormously talented person and a great actor, director and writer. Buy this book if you want to read about the dark side of a great American. It makes for good reading, but it is an unauthorized biography.
An Amazon friend CLINT BRONSON takes pride in saying Clint Eastwood is one of his favorites and owns DVDs of nearly all his movies. So, this is an important book for Eastwood fans to read which shows a different side of the legend.
But, this other great American I mentioned, CLINT BRONSON, is also talented, funny, clever, a fantastic friend, tequila aficionado, caring and thoughtful individual and Amazon bud is celebrating a birthday on December 26th. HAPPY BIRTHDAY my dear friend and let's all have a shot of the best tequila for him! We all love you!
No Million Dollar Bio If this biography was a boxing match, the author, Patrick McGilligan, would have been disqualified in the first round for low blows for its condescending tone and tabloid style. Being that as it may, I came into the book thinking there would be major revelations based on the other Amazon reviews I'd read. Hardly. A major Hollywood star of Eastwood's caliber had affairs behind his wife's back? Shocking! Eastwood's style of acting is "wooden"? No way! The only juicy tidbit is that Eastwood was physically abusive toward women. One story depicts him smacking his wife around in front of some friends. The only problem is, this isn't backed up by multiple sources, as the other reviews would have you believe. It's the word of one person, as are the majority of quotes and anecdotes from this biography. Some attributions even have an US Weekly feel to them, saying things like, "A friend added..." Contradictions abound as well. McGilligan claims Eastwood wouldn't allow the characters he played to be badly injured or beaten up to give his screen persona a sense of invincibility. Yet a few pages later he discusses, at length, Eastwood's first major American film "Hang `Em High," where Eastwood's character Cooper is hanged from a tree and left for dead "before the credits roll" and then later shot so many times in a bar fight that the director said it was rather preposterous that Cooper survived. Not to mention Cooper spends a rather long sequence of the film recuperating from the shooting with the aid of, say it isn't so, a woman! This is invincibility, Patrick? I am an Eastwood fan and I hope McGilligan's claims about physical abuse toward women are false. Since he provides little evidence to support these claims, and since Eastwood's films have always championed strong female characters---long before mainstream Hollywood caught on to this idea---I will choose to believe that this wasn't the case. It's true no Eastwood biography written prior to this one was the least bit confrontational or critical of the star, so I understand McGilligan's angle. But if you come to challenge an American icon like that, you better fight a good, clean fight. You can't put lead in your gloves or repeatedly punch someone in the groin and expect to be taken seriously by anyone other than the casual fight fan.
Clint Fans Beware ! Patrick McGilligan's book "Clint: The Life and Legend" presents the reader with a negative account of the life of Clint Eastwood from beginning to end.
One can't help but wonder what was the motivation for McGilligan's vilification of one of the most popular living movie giants.
Little is said of the millions of moviegoers to whom Clint has given unquantifiable enjoyment in timeless works.
McGilligan's biography is unauthorised, which is no surprise after the first few pages.
The attention given to movies varies from too much information to very scant detail. "Where Eagles Dare", for instance, hardly gets a mention.
What a pity to waste an obviously good writing talent in such an unbalanced criticism.
Clint fans should definitely give this a miss.
Truth or Fiction If you really like Clint then don't bother with this bio. McGilligan paints Eastwood as a total bastard with no positive character attributes whatsoever. It's pretty much a total character assasination. There is some interesting info about his early career but there is an aweful lot of negative. Maybe that was McGilligan's intention to focus only on the negative and present Eastwood as a sod.
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