Clint Eastwood laments 'era of remakes, franchises,' urges filmmakers to 'do something new'

Los Angeles, June 2 (IANS) Four times Oscar winning filmmaker-actor Clint Eastwood has lamented about the era of “remakes and franchises”.

The venerated actor and director recently gave an interview to Austrian newspaper Kurier, urging fellow filmmakers to come up with original ideas and bemoaning the “era of remakes and franchises.”

“I long for the good old days when screenwriters wrote movies like Casablanca in small bungalows on the studio lot. When everyone had a new idea,” the Juror #2 director said, reports deadline.com.

“We live in an era of remakes and franchises. I’ve shot sequels three times, but I haven’t been interested in that for a long while. My philosophy is: do something new or stay at home.”

The 95-year-old behind Oscar winners like Million Dollar Baby and Unforgiven, both of which he also starred in, added in the interview that he has no thoughts of retiring and planned to keep working “for a long time yet,” reports deadline.com.

When asked how he remains energetic, he replied, “There’s no reason why a man can’t get better with age. And I have much more experience today. Sure, there are directors who lose their touch at a certain age, but I’m not one of them.”

Eastwood added that throughout his half-century-long career, he has been pushed to adapt, which enabled him to pick up new skills.

“As an actor, I was still under contract with a studio, was in the old system, and thus forced to learn something new every year, and that’s why I’ll work as long as I can still learn something, or until I’m truly senile.”

Eastwood achieved success in the Western TV series Rawhide. He rose to international fame with his role as the "Man with No Name" in Sergio Leone's Dollars Trilogy of spaghetti Westerns and as antihero cop Harry Callahan in the five Dirty Harry films.

These roles, among others, have made Eastwood an enduring cultural icon of masculinity. Elected, Eastwood served for two years as the mayor of Carmel-by-the-Sea, California.

Eastwood's greatest commercial successes are Every Which Way but Loose and its action comedy sequel Any Which Way You Can.

Other popular Eastwood films include the Westerns Hang 'Em High, The Outlaw Josey Wales and Pale Rider, Where Eagles Dare, Escape from Alcatraz, Heartbreak Ridge, In the Line of Fire, and The Bridges of Madison County. More recent works include Gran Torino, The Mule, and Cry Macho.

--IANS

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