Gran Torino

Have you ever been to the Electric Cinema? OH MY LORD. Massive comfortable chairs, lots of space, little footstalls to put your feet up, a bar, a sidetable for your drink, a beautiful renovated 30s picture house...

Oh, the film. It was good, and gripping, and old Clint does his grizzled old flinty-eyed thing superbly, but my, what a bleak view of race relations in America today.

The Korean immigrants have all become assimilated beautifully into the local culture - they wear the clothes, they talk the talk, they're all driving around in gangs beating people up and shooting them.

'You should go out with your own kind' Clint says to his Korean next-door-neighbour, when he sees her with a white boy. She has just been harrassed by black boys angry when they see her and a white boy walking together through their neighbourhood.

But it's okay, Clint arrives in his truck (which replaces his horse) and his gun saves the day. Firepower is just as important in this movie as it ever was in Spaghetti Westerns. Is this the way they're going to solve their problems, shoot their way out of it? Whoever has the biggest gun wins? Is that the best we can hope for? I won't write a spoiler, but if you see it, do note Clint's final pose and what it tells you. Individualism alive and well in the American cinema - too bad people somehow have to get along together.