♪♪ -Carmel, California, late '70s.

As the sun sets on the Pacific and surfers catch a final wave, a man jogs in peace on the beach.

♪♪ ♪♪ Nobody takes any notice of him, even though he is one of the biggest movie stars in the world.

♪♪ With a film career starting in the 1950s and spanning 70 years of movie history, Clint Eastwood has played a vast array of cult roles over the years in every genre of movie, making him nothing of a legend.

From TV actor to cynical spaghetti Western cowboy... from surly Dirty Harry to respected filmmaker... -Action.

-From popular hero to star despised by Hollywood's elite... From giant of American cinema to aging workaholic... An epic career that seems to be written all over this face, etched with those extraordinary crisscrossing lines that gave him his trademark grimace so early on.

His is a timeless face, chiseled from granite.

And it's as if he has been around forever and has traveled through the history of America as if it were a country, a country of which he is the last legend.

♪♪ -Oh, there are various orphans that have been brought to us throughout the year.

This one, we think, was deserted because he's very small for his age.

He's already getting horns coming through.

Well, they eat grain, and they eat milk out of -- They were eating out of a bottle for a while.

Now they just drink milk out of a bowl.

-Home for Clint Eastwood is a remote and rocky peninsula overlooking the Pacific, inhabited by his daughter, Alison, aged 3, his 8-year-old son, Kyle, and the lady he married 25 years ago, Maggie.

He closely guards the privacy of his family, and he doesn't much like his house to be filmed, for Eastwood is a very rich man.

It's estimated he can now earn up to $10 million from every film he chooses to make.

♪♪ -He may well have projected the image of the quiet star, enjoying the outdoor life among his deer on his Carmel estate, back in 1977, when the BBC devoted a special to him.

But Clint Eastwood has never forgotten his roots.

It was a long and bumpy road.

Clinton Eastwood was born in San Francisco shortly after the Wall Street crash of 1929, and the Great Depression affected his whole childhood, with his family moving around constantly, stopping wherever his father found work.

-I was raised during a depression area in this country, and it was...

I never saw my father with a specific profession.

And so I never really -- I never really was raised with an idea of you grow up thinking, well, you want to be a physician or you want to be anything, a druggist, whatever, you -- and follow through with it.

♪♪ -The Eastwoods drifted around California all through the '30s, and Clint would never forget the small trailer onto which the family piled their belongings each time they hit the road.

This period has left its mark on his imagination and many traces in his films.

For his movie "Honkytonk Man," the tale of an enduring country singer on the road in the Depression era, he delved into his own family's photo albums, drawing inspiration from the costumes and atmosphere of that era.

-Here's our route, Hoss.

We just skirt right around Roscoe and head straight on out to Enid.

-Enid?

Ain't we going through Tallapoosa?

Long way out of the way.

-Don't worry, Mr. Wagoneer.

We'll make it to Tulsa, alright.

You wake me up, Hoss, when we get to Enid.

-And the road, the famous American road that has inspired so many writers and filmmakers.

This asphalt ribbon, stretching out across America's expansive landscapes, has played an important role in many of his films as actor or director.

Ever since the conquest of the West, history and geography have been intertwined in America.

And the road is time.

Eastwood has known this since childhood.

-Out there?

That's the future.

And back there.

Well, that's the past.

If life's moving too slow, you want to project yourself into the future, just step on the gas, right here.

See?

[ Laughs ] If you want to slow down, well, hell, you just step on the brake here, and you slow her down.

This is the present, Phillip.

Enjoy it while it lasts.

-Eastwood's America is not somewhere you settle down, but rather roam tirelessly.

-♪ If I knew the way ♪ ♪ I'd go back home ♪ ♪ But the countryside has changed so much ♪ ♪ I'd surely end up lost ♪ -During their Californian saga, and until the Eastwoods finally settled in Oakland in the late '30s, one piece of furniture accompanied them from town to town.

The old family piano, on which Clint learned to play at the age of eight, as he recalled years later on the widely popular show "Inside the Actors Studio," where he opened up as never before about those days.

[ Cheers and applause ] -That was on Grandma Andy's piano?

-Yeah, Grandma Andy's piano.

It's still around.

-Is it?

-It's still around.

Yeah.

The piano is.

Not Grandma Andy.

-No.

[ Laughter ] How did you learn to play the piano?

-Just by ear, just listening to records.

I got into the bebop craze in the mid '40s.

Kind of fell in love with that.

[ Jazz music plays ] -The word love is uttered, and it was not chosen at random.

Jazz was the first great love of his life, and it has never left him.

In those days, the San Francisco Bay Area was packed with clubs where the greats would come to play, and Eastwood had an epiphany.

Not only did he love their music, but he was enchanted by the jazz men's attitude, their absolute coolness.

♪♪ One of these musicians made a real impact on him, Charlie Parker, of course, who he discovered at the age of 16, the saxophone god, popularly known as "Bird."

♪♪ ♪♪ So strong was his passion for jazz, that for a while, he even considered music as a possible profession.

-I go into a nightclub down in Oakland and I'd play, and they give -- it wasn't really a nightclub.

It was just a saloon, but they had pizza there.

And so I could eat pizza and maybe even drink a beer.

-How old were you then?

-I was about 15 then.

[ Laughter ] -The other crucial discovery for a young man growing up in 1940s America was cinema, then in its golden age.

The two American heroes who impressed him most were Gary Cooper, standing tall and impassive in "Sergeant York"... ...and James Cagney, who he first saw in the Raoul Walsh movie "White Heat."

Lanky Westerner and the fast-talking little New Yorker may have nothing in common.

-Shut up!

-But young Clint loved Cagney's energy and immediacy.

What struck him and above all appeal to him was the fact that Cagney did not feel he had to come across as a good guy.

-How are you doing, Parker?

-Stuffy in here.

I need some air.

-Oh.

Stuffy, huh?

I'll give it a little air.

[ Gunshots ] -While studying in Los Angeles, Eastwood decided to take a shot at Hollywood.

After auditioning for several roles, he landed a contract with Universal Studios in 1954.

For $75 a week, he became another cog in the Hollywood machine.

-The second film I did was a film called "Tarantula."

I played the part of the jet pilot who came in and bombed this giant tarantula at the end, and I was enthusiastic when I read the part because I was enthusiastic about doing anything.

But I had goggles on and a mask on here and a helmet on.

So it could have been just somebody sitting there and somebody just dubbed in the words.

-Alright, fire two rockets on this first pass.

Dump them all.

-A number of dreary and repetitive bit parts followed.

-Plenty of guns.

-He was a 6'4" bean pole of a guy who always stuck out because of his height, the eternal background actor who tried his damnedest to look natural.

-Camp here.

They need a rest.

-They need a rest?

Johnny Willis could lay down and sleep for a week.

-It's a good spot here.

Lots of good cover.

-They used to have a guy who looked like all their current guys, and I didn't look like anybody who was a current contract star, to use that word.

So they finally dumped me, figuring I wasn't headed anywhere.

-But salvation and fame did not come from cinema but television, which in the late '50s had become a big part of American life.

-And here it is.

The greatest advance in television since color television itself, so beautiful it enhances any decor.

-Family shows were in favor, especially Western series, which brought families together around the television set and the commercial breaks.

And these shows needed tall, slim, vigorous young men to play wholesome cowboys.

Young men like Clint Eastwood.

-On a trail drive, each and every man has his chore.

The man who holds the whole caboodle together is the trail boss.

There's one man in the outfit who's got no chores of his own.

I've got to be ready and willing to take over anyone else's.

Yeah, that's me, ramrod of this outfit, Rowdy Yates.

♪♪ -Just as he was about to abandon his career, Eastwood was offered a regular part on "Rawhide," which enabled him to hone his acting skills week after week for 200 episodes.

♪♪ ♪♪ Thanks to the part, female viewers voted him the most handsome cowboy in the world, but Eastwood himself referred to his character as the idiot of the plains.

-Say "I do."

-Hmm?

Oh, I do.

I do.

-The series lasted some seven years.

Ample time for boredom.

But the young actor made the most of the long days shooting to watch the crews at work and soak up the craft knowledge of the Hollywood old-timers, who often turn to television at the end of their careers.

-You have a lot of different directors every week coming and doing a show.

You start finding out what you like and what you don't like about various characteristics that directors have.

Finally, one day, I started thinking, "I ought to try this myself."

-"Rawhide" was Eastwood's film school, and it piqued his interest in directing.

But it was far too soon for that.

First, he had to make a name for himself with a character who had no name.

♪♪ -The Man with No Name.

Danger fits him like a tight black cloud.

He is perhaps the most dangerous man who ever lived.

[ Gunshots ] -I was doing "Rawhide," and I was coming to a hiatus.

My agent in Los Angeles called me up, the William Morris office, and asked me if I would like to go to Europe and make an Italian, German, Spanish coproduction of a remake of a Japanese film in the plains of Spain.

And I said not particularly.

[ Men laughing ] -I don't think it's nice you laughing.

-I liked it though, and I felt that maybe a European approach would give the Western new flavor, something 'cause I thought it had been in a very stagnant period at that point.

-You see, my mule don't like people laughing.

Gets the crazy idea you're laughing at him.

Now, if you apologize, like I know you're going to, I might convince him that you really didn't mean it.

♪♪ [ Gunshots ] -This man with no name is played by Clint Eastwood.

He's going to trigger a whole new style and adventure.

-[ Speaking Italian ] -I really wanted James Coburn, but he was too expensive.

The Italian cinema is very poor.

We got Clint for $15,000.

Coburn wanted $25,000.

I didn't see any character in "Rawhide," only a physical figure.

What struck most about Clint was his indolent way of moving.

-[ Speaking Italian ] -It seemed to me Clint closely resembled a cat.

♪♪ -Get three coffins ready.

-When he took off to Spain to shoot a Western with Sergio Leone, the actor had no idea it would give rise to a trilogy, a milestone in the history of cinema.

♪♪ From the outset, he was actively involved in constructing this cynical man from nowhere, starting with his appearance.

Clint even brought along his "Rawhide" boots, belt, and revolvers.

-Where did you get your wardrobe?

-Well, I brought it.

I bought it from this country.

-Where did you get the little cigars?

-I got them in Beverly Hills.

-Beverly Hills?

-Yeah.

Yeah.

[ Laughter ] They were Beverly Hills cigars.

They had a cigar called the Virginia cigars, long and had a big stem through it.

And I just bought them and cut them up in three pieces and used them like that.

So I made a whole box of them last the length of the picture.

[ "The Good, the Bad and the Ugly" theme plays ] ♪♪ -The Italian director and the TV actor smashed the conventions of this prestigious American genre.

And Eastwood laid his bland "Rawhide" character to rest for good.

-The part wasn't as fair is that in the script.

But to me, the more the character would get into expository scenes and start explaining things, the more it would dissipate the mystery of the character or the strength of the character.

So we cut it down very lean and Sergio Leone agreed that we'd try to make this guy a little bit unique.

You're not quite sure who is.

You're not even quite sure he's the hero until three quarters or halfway through the film.

-This Italian detour finally brought him major Hollywood roles.

And when he was offered the part of foul-mouthed cop Harry Callahan, Eastwood imposed his choice of director, Don Siegel.

The pair had already worked together, and Eastwood particularly admired Siegel's expertise.

By watching Siegel, he learned the efficiency and economy of the no-frills world of "B" movies not only in storytelling, but in budgeting.

After the mentor Sergio Leone, Don Siegel became a father to him.

They went on to make five movies together.

But with "Dirty" Harry, they created an iconic character who gave Eastwood a new dimension.

-Stop!

-Defined by his Magnum, often filmed with a long focused lens to deliberately distort it, Harry wielded his oversized gun in four sequels following the massive success of the 1971 original.

A virile extension of his silhouette, which helped shape Eastwood's movie persona and etched on audience's minds his unique brand of masculinity.

-You are cold, bold Callahan with his great big .44.

Every other cop in this city is satisfied with a .38 or .357.

What do you have to carry that cannon for?

-Because I hit what I aim at.

That's why.

.357 is a good weapon, but I've seen .38s careen off windshields.

No good in a city like this.

-I see.

So it's -- it's for the penetration.

-Does everything end in a sexual connotation with you?

-This hero rewrote the rules for police action films and came to life before the eyes of the next generation who paid close attention to this remodeling.

Among them, the future actor and Republican governor of California Arnold Schwarzenegger.

-Obviously, when you then see your idol, coming up with a movie like "Dirty Harry" and creating a whole new standard in action movies, and also to do it with a certain style and the way he played it with certain, you know, characteristics and lines that were memorable lines, I said to myself, "That's what I have to do."

-Well, a naked man is chasing a woman through an alley with a butcher knife and a *******, I figure he isn't out collecting for the Red Cross.

-Who's "we," sucka?

-Smith and Wesson.

And me.

Opinions are like... Everybody has one.

Go ahead.

Make my day.

-Eastwood updated the movie cop, just as he had reinvented the cowboy, giving him an unforgettable, inimitable coolness.

-He's very soft-spoken.

He never screamed like you normally see when people play cops.

He was eating his sandwich or his hamburger.

-Oh... -He was pulling out the gun and he was doing his job.

[ Alarm ringing ] -Halt!

[ Gunshot ] -He was eating a hamburger.

He was eating a hamburger and blasting the criminal away.

[ Gunshots ] -With Harry, Eastwood became the link between past and future heroes, between old Hollywood and the 1980s action cinema explosion.

♪♪ But it is no coincidence that this character came into being in early '70s America.

Harry appeared on the scene two years after the election of Richard Nixon, who had run his campaign on a law-and-order platform... ...in a country on the verge of imploding after long years of war in Vietnam.

With his lone-wolf methods and contempt for authority, the character held out a mirror to the Americans, which they eagerly seized.

And not always for the right reasons.

-I've got nothing personal against you, Callahan.

But we can't have the public crying police brutality every time you go out on the street.

-This little wild West show of yours yesterday is exactly the kind of thing this department's no longer prepared to tolerate!

-It's the law.

-Well, then the law is crazy.

-While Harry was an instant hit with audiences, it was a different story with critics and intellectuals.

Harry's individualistic methods were not always well-received.

And the highly respected New Yorker film critic Pauline Kael accused the character, the film, and by extension the actor of "fascist medievalism."

-You must realize that political attitudes are carried and very intentionally carried in some of these films.

I mean, the John Wayne films and the Clint Eastwood films made during the Nixon era and particularly the heyday of the Nixon era, were carrying the line for a political position in this country.

Their scripts are shaped in terms of what those stars believe.

That relish that Eastwood showed about killing, I found offensive.

-A staunch Republican and more specifically a Libertarian, it is true that Eastwood was capable of questionable remarks at the time.

For instance, in 1973, when Marlon Brando asked a young Native American woman to refuse an Oscar on his behalf and deliver a speech about the treatment of Native Americans in Hollywood movies.

-And the reasons for this being are the treatment of American Indians today by the film industry.

[ Applause ] -A few minutes later, Eastwood cracked a rather questionable joke.

-I don't know if I should present this award on behalf of all the cowboys shot in all the John Ford Westerns over the years.

[ Gunshot ] -With that in mind, it is little wonder that Inspector Harry, co-creation of Don Siegel the Democrat and Clint Eastwood the Republican unsettled people and fed the misunderstanding.

-Can't you see I'm hurt?

You shot me!

Please!

Don't, don't!

Put the gun down!

Put the gun down!

-But we must not forget that widower Harry Callahan is, above all, a damned soul wandering among the living, a man struggling with his own demons, and that the psychopaths he pursues are simply reflections of his own tormented soul.

-I have the right for a lawyer.

-Where's the girl?

-I have the right... -And in this unbelievably violent scene, it is hard to tell who, between the killer and the cop, looks crazier.

-[ Groaning ] ♪♪ The movie poster was very clear about this from the start.

♪♪ Despite the misunderstandings and controversy, even the prestigious Life magazine had to face the facts.

Clint Eastwood had become a superstar.

At 40-something, he had reached heights far beyond his dreams.

But there was no question of being pigeonholed in a role like many of his actor friends.

Eastwood felt he was at a turning point and needed to think of the next step.

What makes him happy?

What excites him?

What is Clint Eastwood running after?

♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ -Downtown Burbank.

We're just across the road from the Warner Bros. Studios, where the Eastwood operation has its own mission control.

Although his office is on the studio lot, Eastwood, as in his films, remains a loner.

Malpaso consists merely of a secretary and a friend who went to school with him.

His personal style is low-key, no chauffeur, and he wears his sneakers to work.

♪♪ -Bruised by frustrating experiences on several big-budget movies, Clint Eastwood decided to set up his own company to produce films that matter to him.

He named it The Malpaso Company, and his business partner was a childhood friend.

Having his own company meant he could not only back different projects, but take risks.

Such as giving a first break to a young unknown director who had not made a single movie, but who would go on to become one of America's leading filmmakers, Michael Cimino.

-I sat down and wrote an original screenplay and gave it to him on a Friday.

[ Gunshots, churchgoers screaming ] And on Monday, Clint said he would do it.

And so I said it was not for sale unless I could direct it.

Which was rather, you know, rather audacious of me at the time, considering that I had no background in film whatever.

And I think it kind of sparked something in Clint.

Clint admires risk taking.

I said to Jeff in the beginning, "Jeff, you have only one job to do in this film."

He said, "What's that?"

I said, "You have to make Clint Eastwood laugh.

We have never seen him laugh on all of the movies he's done, all the Westerns he's done, all the TV he's done.

Nobody has ever seen Clint laugh."

-Smells like... Ah!

Raccoon... -Raccoon...

Hang your hand out the window, let the rain get at it.

-Would you like a little on your...?

-No, get out of here.

Just remember not to pick your teeth.

-In an atmosphere of joyful improvisation, Eastwood the superstar happily let his crazy young partner steal the show and was not afraid to explore a strong male friendship quite close to love.

Very far from his super-macho image.

-I don't want your watch, man.

I want your friendship.

God damn it.

I like you.

That's all.

I thought we were getting to be friends.

-But producing was not enough.

Eastwood had been around Hollywood long enough to know that complete control was the key.

In 1971, the actor decided to try his hand at directing, an idea he had long nurtured.

It was time to take the plunge.

He chose a genre film, but one with a singular universe that would allow him to express himself and continue to work on his image.

"Play Misty for Me."

-KRML.

Dave Garver speaking.

-Hello.

-Hi.

What'll it be?

-Play "Misty" for me.

-"Misty," huh?

-In this directorial debut, Eastwood cast himself as a super-cool jazz deejay who has a string of one-night stands until a romantic encounter with an obsessed female fan makes him regret his casual attitude.

The story allowed him as a filmmaker to play around with his masculine image to the point of destroying it... ...revealing a more insecure, more anxious side.

Influenced by his second mentor, Don Siegel, Eastwood insisted on economy and efficiency in this picture, a working method he has always applied.

But he also allowed himself to wander, meandering moments such as this long documentary-style sequence shot at the Monterey Jazz Festival, which deliberately disrupts the narrative.

-[ Singing indistinctly ] ♪♪ ♪♪ -As well as his love of music, what was also apparent was an unconventional narrative approach, as laid back as the man himself.

A style was born.

[ Applause ] -Thank you.

Thank you, everybody.

-And it was no coincidence either if Eastwood chose as the location for this directorial debut his own wild corner of California, Carmel and its surroundings, even filming outside his home.

-This is where I think best.

It's where I work best.

I may go up in the mountains somewhere, hike.

I play a little tennis or golf, something like that, with some friends.

-You shy away from the more traditional Hollywood-style life.

Why is that?

-I'm not a social-type person.

As a rule, I enjoy it occasionally, but not on a regular thing.

I live up here where the air is cleaner and I see movies at the local cinema in town, and I watch them with people who are not involved with the cinema business.

And so I see how they react, and I feel I get a better look at what reality is around me.

♪♪ -For Clint and Maggie, this northern Californian town was the perfect refuge.

Two children were born, Kyle in 1968, Alison in 1972, and grew up in this huge wooden house overlooking the Pacific.

Clint is not known as the most faithful of husbands, but at the time, the children, a love of nature, and the outdoor life were enough to keep their marriage going.

♪♪ -He's invested his money in large slabs of California, and in the nearby town of Carmel, he's often to be found at the restaurant he owns.

It's called the Hog's Breath Inn.

-That was all by a former partner.

He thought up all these things, a Dirty Harry Dinner.

I was a little bit reticent about it, but nobody seems to object to it.

-He became actively involved in town life, even serving as Carmel's mayor in the 1980s for two years and a monthly salary of $200, much to the delight of his local female fans.

♪♪ Now that he was a director, Eastwood had an oeuvre to create, and he called the shots.

A far cry from the macho-fascist image of Eastwood the actor, the path he chose to take as a filmmaker was disconcerting to many... ...with films such as the sensitive and magnificent romance "Breezy" about a young hippie girl, the humanist Western "The Outlaw Josey Wales," and the tender ode to country music, "Honkytonk Man," subtle and gentle films that tug at the heartstrings, such as this story of a self-destructive singer in which he willingly shows his weak side.

And that included his voice.

-♪ When I sing about you ♪ ♪ Every note seems to be right on key ♪ ♪ Oh, it all sounds so right to me ♪ -A coming-of-age movie with lots of loving glances between him and his son, Kyle, who played his nephew.

-♪ When I sing about you ♪ ♪♪ -To continue to explore Eastwood the director's sensitive films, Eastwood the producer had to adopt a classic Hollywood strategy, the "one for them, one for me" approach, which his independent status allowed... ...often alternating in a single year between crowd-pleasing blockbusters... ...and films that mattered to him personally.

Action films and auteur films.

♪♪ There was no need to stop playing beefy heroes in roadside bars or sharing the limelight with his truck and an orangutan... -You're getting pretty tricky, Clyde.

-Alright, turn around.

-...to make riskier films or explore his personal obsessions, as he began to play with his own legend.

-Wow, look at his gun.

-He really is Bronco Billy.

-Put your hands down.

-Are you really the fastest gun in the West?

-Wow!

-Wow!

-Ain't nobody faster than Bronco Billy.

-"Bronco Billy" is a good example of the Eastwoodian tension between classical Hollywood cinema and the modern age.

Eastwood plays the leader of a wild West show, struggling in contemporary America, uncool for some, but essential for those prepared to really look.

[ Camera shutters clicking ] After years of making films that were largely ignored and derided, Eastwood's first glimmer of recognition came from Europe and France in particular.

French film critics and movie fans viewed his work in a different light.

This changed everything.

For the first time, at the age of 55, the director had a film in the official selection at Cannes.

The atmosphere in the room was electric.

Could he be both a star and an auteur?

Cannes' journalists do not always know how to handle such beasts.

-Mr. Eastwood, Jean-Luc Godard has dedicated "Détective" to you.

-Beg pardon?

[ Laughter ] Well, if he didn't like it, then that's his opinion.

I don't know what else to tell him.

I'm sorry, but the price was right, so what the heck?

[ Laughter ] -Thank you.

[ Applause ] -Clint Eastwood is the most underrated director in the world today.

I'm not talking about him as a star.

-Because his star image is so strong, they forget that he directs his own movies.

-And don't take him seriously the way they don't take beautiful girls seriously.

They can't believe they're intelligent if they're beautiful.

They can't believe they can act if they're bea-- They must be a little ugly to be forgiven by men.

And an actor like Eastwood is such a pure type of mythic hero star in the Wayne tradition that nobody's going to take him serious as a director, but somebody ought to say it.

And when I saw that picture for the fourth time, I realized that it belongs with the great Westerns, you know, the great Westerns of Ford and Hawks and people like that, and I take off my hat to him.

♪♪ -"There are no second acts in American lives."

Eastwood's film "Bird" begins with this F. Scott Fitzgerald quote, but the actor-director has spent his life proving the opposite.

-Three nights in October 1987, Hollywood, California.

A rare opportunity to look over the shoulder of Clint Eastwood directing a film on the life of Charlie "Yardbird" Parker, Eastwood's 13th film as a director.

-Okay.

Let's do something.

Let's do someone before it rains.

♪♪ -With "Bird," another act in his career began.

Opinions of him really began to change with this experimental impressionistic biopic where he was not afraid to let audiences fill in the gaps in the story in order to film what he liked best, the night and jazz.

-And I knew the press agent at the club, and I asked him, "Who could you possibly get to replace Don?"

And he said, "Oh, some cat in Kansas City.

You don't know him.

His name is Charlie Parker."

And I said, "Is he cute?"

And my friend said, "No, but you'll dig him."

♪♪ ♪♪ -Over time, Eastwood's shoots have acquired a reputation for being the most relaxed in the business.

No one shouts "action" or "cut," least of all him, totally in sync with the easygoing nature of his persona, his timeless cool.

-Okay.

That looks great.

Forest, will you come here for a second?

Come on, pony, go.

[ Laughs ] Okay.

Just pull right in a little more.

Now, when she starts swooning, start moving out and just go, "See, I got to worry about me, too," and you go right off in the sunset.

-Okay.

-Okay.

-Just give us one more minute, okay?

-Sure.

-Okay.

-Yeah.

Let's try one more.

And if we don't get it, let's get the...out of Dodge.

-He was very decisive, very clear.

He knew exactly what he wanted and wasted no time.

Two takes, finished.

-As for his crew, Eastwood uses a tight-knit team of trusted collaborators who follow him from film to film.

He has made a family for himself.

Many members have been with him for years, some for decades.

-And the Oscar for the Best Picture of 1992 goes to... Clint Eastwood, "Unforgiven."

[ Cheers and applause ] -At 62, Eastwood the director who had never won an Oscar as an actor earned nine nominations with his Western "Unforgiven" and received four statues, including the prestigious Best Film and Best Directing awards before his visibly moved 83-year-old mother, Ruth.

-This is pretty good.

This is alright.

[ Laughter ] I've been -- I've been around for 39 years, and I've really enjoyed it.

I've been very lucky.

When you're able to make a living in a profession that you really enjoy, that's an opportunity I think a lot of people don't have.

I got to thank the crew, David Valdes and Jack Green and all the camera crew.

The trouble is with living this long is you know so many people and you can't remember their names.

[ Applause ] -What did these Oscars reward?

-Thank you very much.

-The fact that Eastwood had the guts to cast himself as an aging killer who can't even get on his horse?

Or that, in this revisionist Western, he delivers a critique of the depiction of violence in film, including his own?

-It became very important to put this story on at this particular time, I felt.

And after the King beating in L.A. and all the instances that have gone on across the country, I just felt this one, even though it's a period piece, it's a story as old as time.

-In the movie, death is not a fun thing and so on.

-It's not beautiful.

Exactly.

It's not beautiful.

It's not romanticized.

-Have you romanticized it in the past a bit more in retrospect than you wish you had?

-Probably.

See, we all grew up watching action films.

We all grew up with Jimmy Cagney and Humphrey Bogart and a lot of gunplay and that sort of thing.

And everybody always figured that this was entertainment and people would recognize it's entertainment.

I think the average person does, I think, but the whole world gets so -- it gets so saturated with violence that you begin to wonder where maybe entertainment is just an addition to it that we don't need.

-It's a hell of a thing, killing a man.

You take away all he's got.

And all he's ever going to have.

♪♪ -In the closing shot of "Unforgiven," Eastwood vanishes into thin air, as if to signify that this twilight film would be his last Western.

Immediately after, he made "In the Line of Fire," his last film for another director.

♪♪ For the next 30 years, he would be his own director.

♪♪ It's as if the road already traveled had led him there.

He can carry serenely on his way.

Clint has become Eastwood.

♪♪ The years following his Oscar win, Eastwood was on a roll.

He cast Kevin Costner against type, giving the biggest star of the time his best role.

-What have you got there?

-A ghost suit.

-You kyped it?

Well, hell, Phil, put it on.

Let's understand each other.

Stealing's wrong, okay?

But if there's something you need bad, and you ain't got the money, it's okay to take a loaner on the item.

It's what you call an exception to the rule.

-And he cast himself in a great love story, his first tearjerker where the slightest gesture is enough to express the greatest love.

-Oh, yeah.

I heard about him.

I hear he's some kind of photographer or something.

[ Indistinct singing on radio ] Mm-hmm.

Hippie?

No.

Uh, I don't know.

Is that what a hippie looks like?

Um, no, I was just going to step into a bath when you called, so maybe... Yeah, they don't get back till Friday.

Yeah.

Maybe I'll call you then, okay?

Mm-hmm.

Bye.

♪♪ -Starring opposite him for the very first time, Meryl Streep saw something that nobody had likely ever seen before.

-I think he saw an opportunity for himself to reveal something.

That was another dimension to his fans that already bought a certain character from him.

He has a -- I don't know if anybody else would agree with me -- but he has a female sensibility in many ways.

♪♪ ♪♪ I really didn't realize how vulnerable he let himself be in that role.

And that's not something you just unpack from your kit bag.

That has to reside somewhere in you.

And yet he has this image of the sort of uber man.

♪♪ -Over the past 30 years, Eastwood has made film after film in total freedom at his own pace.

In 2005, 12 years after "Unforgiven," when "Million Dollar Baby" scooped a host of Oscars, it seemed like the perfect occasion to retire in glory and slowly begin a well-earned retirement.

But it was not to be.

Eastwood even picked up the pace, shooting a film a year.

To date, he has acted in more than 70 films, directed at least 40, and had eight children, including six daughters, a full life.

-What do you think it's going to be like to grow old, Clint?

-I don't know how I'm going to handle it, but I would hope that -- I hope that I enjoy it.

I think the advantage of growing old is enjoying yourself and knowing that you've had a good ride.

-How far have we gone, Frank?

-Shooting film after film at a frenetic pace, never quitting, as if to stave off time and filming himself aging, never shying away from it, documenting his aging, making it a part of his work... ♪♪ -That old hag hates my ass.

-...he continues to play with his own legend to tackle his myth head on, turning it on its head like the grumpy old xenophobe in "Gran Torino"... ...an anti-racist film that plays with the prejudice he has faced since "Dirty Harry."

Up to the imaginary gun that he points ironically at those who piss him off.

Confusing audiences has always been his auteuristic way of showing the complexity of the world.

Nothing is ever black or white with Eastwood, and nothing excites him more than examining the dark side of the American psyche and of his own image, turning up in unexpected places, constantly reinventing himself by playing with his spectral presence, eternal ghost of a cinema that survives only through him.

-How would you like to be remembered?

-Just as a person who, whatever he did, he did the best he could with it.

That's a hard one, isn't it?

You have to start predicting how you'd feel then.

Impossible to answer, really.

Was kind, considerate to people around him.

-What would you like written on a monument about you?

-"I told them so."

[ Chuckles ] That's the old hypochondriac, isn't it?

-"I told them I was sick."

[ Laughter ] -The old hypochondriac gag.

"I told you so.

I told them so."

Nothing.

Not necessary to write anything.

If somebody wants to remember something about it, fine.

♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪