we know he has far more acting credits, but each of his directed movies feels like an event. especially nowadays. his directing is top notch. he's won Oscars. he's starred and directed himself. he's done it all in his career. and I know other actors also direct, but not to the capacity of Eastwood.

so, do you like him more as an actor or director?

I went with actor. he's an amazing director, but his early movies, his westerns, are what I grew up on.

I prefer his stand-up comedy. Remember that hilarious talking to a chair routine?

His best performances he directed himself (Unforgiven, Gran Torino, Million Dollar Baby) and in some of his best directing efforts, he didn't star (Mystic River, Letters from Iwo Jima, American Sniper). I guess I prefer him as a director a little bit more, but it's close. Gran Torino should have been his last time acting. The Mule wasn't more than solid and Cry Macho, sadly, is one of his worst movies. Clint Eastwood as a director gets the best performances out of strong actors, but he can't work with people who can't act very good. The kid in Cry Macho was terrible and The 15:17 to Paris or the Jersey Boys didn't really work, because the actors weren't very good or even actors.

Sean Penn in Mystic River
Tim Robbins in Mystic River
Morgan Freeman in Unforgiven and Million Dollar Baby
Angelina Jolie in Changeling
Bradley Cooper in American Sniper
Kevin Costner in A Perfect World
Forest Whitaker in Bird
Gene Hackman in Unforgiven

They all gave Oscar worthy performances under his direction and so did he, but he never did so in a movie directed by somebody else.

I just think his acting range is limited. For the most part, a soft spoken, curmudgeon. Every Which Way But Loose, Heartbreak Ridge, Bronco Billy, Firefox, In the Line of Fire, Dirty Harry, Honkytonk Man, even in Bridges of Madison County. Granted it works for him.

I prefer him as an actor. He’s directed some really good movies but over the years they turned into feeling like they rolled off an assembly line. Recently he’s made a few duds (Cry Macho, The Mule, 15:17 to Paris) but I thought Juror #2 was fantastic!

His westerns in the late 60s-early 70s are peak Eastwood. He also turned out some really good performances in the 90s (Unforgiven, In the Line of Fire, A Perfect World, and Bridges of Madison County).

His Sondra Locke era really dragged him down though. And surprisingly, I’ve never found his Dirty Harry movies all that interesting.

Probably more as an actor, but I think he’s a fairly good director too. Although really looking at his filmography particularly for directing there are a handful of his films I like and lot I’m kind of meh on or have no interest in.

I think he is a good director but as an actor, the guy just oozes coolness.

He is a believable badass in all the Dirty Harry Movies, basically every Western he was in and movies where he wasn't supposed to be that kind of character (think Play Misty For Me or Honkytonk Man). Hell, he was cool as the dorky cowboy Broco Billy and playing opposite an orangutang in two movies. Who else could have pulled that off?

Even as an old fart in Cry Macho or Gran Torino, the guy still comes across that he could believably kick someone's ass. (Well, sure it was stretching it in Cry Macho, but I believe he could probably still kick my ass).

He has a great face with some hilarious expressions and has good comic timing in using them. Some of the looks he gives in any movie will make you laugh out loud and it isn't because he looks stupid but how he looks at stupid people incredulously.

I love him as an actor and can find something to like in his entire body of work. I can't say that about many actors.

Now as a person, I know he isn't the best, but I am just discussing his movie work.

When he and Paul McCartney dies, it will be a solemn day for me. They are my personal favorite elder statesman in movies and music.

I need to go back and just start a rewatch of everything he has done. I know I have missed several flicks.

I think he's a solid but slightly bland director, and a better actor.

I'm going with actor for two reasons:

1. I generally enjoy his acting roles.
2. I generally find his movies to be boring.

I thought Juror No. 2 was an excellent courtroom thriller and an excellent way to end Eastwood's career if it is indeed the end. I mean he's pushing 95 now.

But, as far as him as a director goes, I think he's kind of hit and miss. He doesn't write any of his movies like Ridley Scott, so I don't really think he has a really distinct style or voice to his movies that he directs,

But, I think he's a solid actor and I don't recall a movie of his that I outright thought sucked. I admit I haven't seen all of his movies (mostly followed his work from the 70s onwards) But, the guy basically had a 6 decade career as an actor.

That was the low point of his worst movie. I hated the scene. It's totally unbelievable.

I think I posted this in that movie thread way back, but I always considered the story of Cry Macho as a delusion or dream from a once "macho" guy that is no longer such in his old age. So, he has this fantasy of going on one last adventure, beating up thugs, being the hero by saving the kid and getting the girl in the end. It matches that with the exception of the movie showing him waking up or dying on a death bed at the end which I am glad they did not go that cliched route.

I honestly thought it was a nice way to go out for him, a once true macho man. Well, it's nice as long as you view it through a non-reality lens.

I buy your theory, but the movie is still ruined by the kid who couldn't act to save his life.

Both but director since you could never say he was equivalent to Brando or Daniel Day Lewis when it comes to acting.

There was a period there from about 1968 to 1980 where I went to see every Eastwood movie in a theater. That stopped after ANY WHICH WAY YOU CAN and I saw some in theaters and some on cable but not all of them. After IN THE LINE OF FIRE and PERFECT WORLD, the only film of his I've seen at all, whether actor or director, is MILLION DOLLAR BABY which was in a theater, but nearly 20 years ago. I do have a DVD of GRAN TURINO, though. I definitely found him more interesting, personally, as an actor than as a director.

Eastwood is not a great actor in the sense that he has a lot of range, but he's an incredible movie star who has a complete grasp on his persona and how to employ it.

He's also a very good director and one of the all-time great director/stars, but the Dollars Trilogy, Dirty Harry, the Beguiled, Escape from Alcatraz and In the Line of Fire (none of which were directed by Clint) would all be in my Eastwood top 10. On the flip side, I'm not sure any of the movies he directed but didn't star in would even crack my top 20. His star presence is far more important to me than his direction.

I'm gonna lean towards director, just because of the range and depth he's shown behind the camera.

Hard to separate when he directs and acts in the same film a lot of the time.

The Good the Bad and the Ugly is probably his best film on either side of the camera.

Mystic River is probably his best film that he directs but doesn’t appear in.

Either Unforgiven or Outlaw Josey Wales when he’s wearing both hats.

Tough one because of the overlap but I’d probably
have to go with actor.

Flags of Our Fathers, Juror #2, Sully, and Richard Jewell were not that bad.

Close but ultimately went with him as an actor.

Mystic River and Letters from Iwo Jima are his best movies, he didn't act in. Mystic River is one of his best movies overall.

I still wouldn't put any of them in my top 20 Eastwood films.

Neither.

I'm not really a fan of Eastwood. I find the movies he directs to be bland, and, as an actor, he really on plays the same character over and over again in different settings.

Like rocket said above, he's very much a very star more than he is a serious actor (as opposed to a chameleon like Gary Oldman) who has a persona that he runs with. He's a lot like John Wayne in that regard; you watch a movie he's starring and you know what you're going to get and he isn't going to surprise you.

Director. I'm 10 or so years too young to have seen his prime as an actor and he never interested me enough to go back and check any of that stuff out really. The only Dirty Harry I've ever seen for example was The Dead Pool and that was only for Jim Carey and Guns and Roses. I've enjoyed him well enough in the stuff I have seen him act in but half or more of that he directed as well so went with that.