Cry Macho Review

Clint Eastwood understands his age. At 91, he's not running around like a machine gun blasting away baddies, even if that's what we all really kinda want to see him doing. "Cry Macho" is his latest director-staring role, is tailored around the decrepitude of an actor who's, well, 91 years old.

Let me get this out of the way: this is NOT an action movie! Our hero throws one punch, and I counted two violent confrontations and no gunshots, a far cry from the westerns where our star starred and didn't have a name, but that's fine. This is squarely a drama who can only be called a western if the definition dictates that, yes, men ride horses and yes, they wear ranch hats.

Eastwood plays Mike Milo, a sober hasbeen of a cowboy who's past his expiration date. He owes his boss (Dwight Yoakam) for keeping him on the payroll for so long, and now it's time to get even. The mission? Bring back his son Rafael (Eduardo Minett) from his allegedly abusive mother's care over in Mexico City. Superficially, the plot resembles Liam Neeson's "The Marksman" from earlier this year, though "Cry Macho" comes from a decades old novel of the same name by N. Richard Nash. The point? This is an overly familiar tale, but hey, at least it's got Clint Eastwood, and sometimes that's all a production needs.

Mike finds the kid cockfighting, living on the streets but covered in bruises he says is from his mother's palace. Do we believe him? Mr. Rodeo does, and they form a rather sweet relationship over a few weeks of stealing cars, getting girls and some underage drinking. If that's not macho, I dunno what is.

Well, actually Macho is the name of the son's pet rooster, a prize-winning bird who inspires some amusing lines about Milo wanting to roast him over an open fire. I'm not sure if it's legitimately funny writing or only humorous because Eastwood says it. His face aged like an arid sponge, so wrinkled, weathered and shrunk that he's able to command the screen with merely a glace, and that brings a certain level of classy professionalism to this musty story.

In truth, he doesn't get a lot to do here except looking stereotypically macho, and for long stretches, he doesn't do a lot other than snarl. But there is a genuinely good feeling when we watch him eventually smile, particularly at the hands of local grandmother Marta (Natalia Tavern). He also has a poignant piece of dialogue about the true meaning of the word, where we watch him break down the harsh realities of a man who's been so long characterized by the adjective. In the movie, it's about his descend into the vices of drugs and alcohol after he breaks his back and loses his family, but one has to wonder how much of the speech has to do with his own life.

There's a lot to like in "Cry Macho" that you've probably also liked when it was done in other movies; feeling like a thematic follow up to 2008's "Gran Torino" and 2018's "The Mule." Whether that's an observation or a criticism depends on one's tolerance for what is essentially his "Angry White Guy" series.