Clint Eastwood
American actor and film director (born 1930)
A director's score is the sum of their films' composite canon scores — methodology.
- Born
- May 31, 1930 · San Francisco
- Nationality
- United States
- Work
- film producer, film actor, film director, restaurateur
The star who outlasted the star
Eastwood is the rare case of a movie icon who quietly became a better director than he ever was a symbol — and who kept the symbol on the payroll to fund the director. The world knew the face first: the squinting "Man with No Name" in Sergio Leone's Dollars Trilogy of the mid-1960s, then the antihero cop Harry Callahan across five Dirty Harry pictures through the 1970s and 1980s, a masculine brand so durable it threatened to be the whole story. What makes him matter is that he refused to let it be. Behind the icon was a filmmaker of unusual economy and patience, and the icon paid for the patience.
Malpaso and the long apprenticeship
Born in San Francisco on May 31, 1930, Eastwood set up his own production company, Malpaso, in 1967 — an act of control years before it looked like ambition. He directed his first feature, Play Misty for Me (1971), while still primarily a star for hire, and then simply never stopped, running two careers in parallel for decades. His method became a legend of restraint: small budgets and short schedules that shamed his peers. It took a long time for critics to file that economy under art rather than efficiency. The turn finally came with Unforgiven (1992), the revisionist Western that won him the Academy Award for Best Director and Best Picture; he repeated both prizes with Million Dollar Baby (2004). In between the star found time to serve as mayor of Carmel-by-the-Sea, California, from 1986 to 1988. He was still directing in his nineties — Juror #2 (2024) is the latest film in our library.
What the numbers say
Our library ranks Eastwood #8 among all directors, composite 29.13 across 33 films — one of the largest filmographies we hold. But the shape of that score is a single mountain beside a long plain. Unforgiven sits at #23 overall (4.96) and draws 16 of our source lists, more than double any other Eastwood film; it is doing an enormous share of the lifting. Million Dollar Baby, his second Best Picture, lands far back at #155 (3.00), and Mystic River (2003) at #407 (1.95). After that the curve collapses: Gran Torino (2008) at #620, Letters from Iwo Jima (2006) at #646, American Sniper (2014) at #1007, and the westerns that built the icon — High Plains Drifter (1973) down at #6302 — barely register. A director this decorated with this steep a drop-off is telling you something honest: reputation rests on a handful of films, and the aggregate refuses to round the rest up.
Where to start
Unforgiven, without argument — the film where the persona is interrogated instead of sold. Then Million Dollar Baby for the late plainspoken gravity, and Mystic River for what he could do with an ensemble when he stayed behind the camera entirely.
Films in our library, ranked
Ranked by composite canon score across 20+ authoritative lists, awards and polls — our ordering, with every placement citing its evidence on the film's page.
- 1
1992 · United States · western, drama, crime
Oscar Best Picture winner 1992 · Cahiers du Cinéma annual top 10 1992 #1 · Kinema Junpo Best Ten (International) 1993 #1
4.9616 citations - 2
2004 · United States · drama
Oscar Best Picture winner 2004 · Kinema Junpo Best Ten (International) 2005 #1 · Ebert's annual top 10 2004 #1
3.005 citations - 3
2003 · United States / Australia · mystery, thriller, crime
Kinema Junpo Best Ten (International) 2004 #1 · Film Comment year-end poll 2003 #2 · Kehr's annual top 10 2003 #1
1.956 citations - 4
1993 · United States · adventure, crime, drama
Cahiers du Cinéma annual top 10 1993 #1 · Kehr's annual top 10 1993 #1 · Sarris's annual top 10 1993 #12
1.503 citations - 5
2006 · United States · war, drama, action
Kinema Junpo Best Ten (International) 2006 #1 · Cahiers du Cinéma annual top 10 2006 #10 · Sarris's annual top 10 2006 #4
1.504 citations - 6
2008 · United States / Australia / Germany · drama, crime
Kinema Junpo Best Ten (International) 2009 #1 · Cahiers du Cinéma annual top 10 2009 #4 · Film Comment year-end poll 2008 #32
1.503 citations - 7
2006 · United States · war, drama
Kinema Junpo Best Ten (International) 2006 #2 · Oscar Best Picture nominee 2006 · Film Comment year-end poll 2006 #16
1.474 citations - 8
1995 · United States · romance, drama
Kinema Junpo Best Ten (International) 1995 #3 · Cahiers du Cinéma annual top 10 1995 #4 · Kehr's annual top 10 1995 #4
1.304 citations - 9
2000 · United States · sci-fi, adventure, comedy
Kinema Junpo Best Ten (International) 2000 #1 · Cahiers du Cinéma annual top 10 2000 #9
1.302 citations - 10
2014 · United States · action, war, biography
Kinema Junpo Best Ten (International) 2015 #2 · Oscar Best Picture nominee 2014
1.082 citations - 11
2014 · United States · musical, biography, drama
Kinema Junpo Best Ten (International) 2014 #1
1.001 citation - 12
2016 · United States / United Kingdom / Australia · drama, biography
Kinema Junpo Best Ten (International) 2016 #1
1.001 citation - 13
2018 · United States · crime, drama, biography
Kinema Junpo Best Ten (International) 2019 #4 · Cahiers du Cinéma annual top 10 2019 #8
0.752 citations - 14
1988 · United States · biography, musical, drama
Cahiers du Cinéma annual top 10 1988 #5 · Kehr's annual top 10 1988 #10 · Rosenbaum's Essential Cinema
0.643 citations - 15
2009 · South Africa / United States · biography, drama
Kinema Junpo Best Ten (International) 2010 #2
0.631 citation - 16
1976 · United States · western
National Film Registry (inducted 1996) · Empire 500 (2008) #219 · NYT Best 1,000 Movies
0.593 citations - 17
1997 · United States · film-noir, drama, crime
Cahiers du Cinéma annual top 10 1998 #3
0.501 citation - 180.501 citation
- 19
2011 · United States / United Kingdom · biography, drama
Kinema Junpo Best Ten (International) 2012 #9 · Film Comment year-end poll 2011 #48
0.482 citations - 20
1990 · United States · action, drama
Kehr's annual top 10 1990 #6 · Hoberman's annual top 10 1990 #10 · Rosenbaum's Essential Cinema
0.433 citations - 210.431 citation
- 220.361 citation
- 23
2018 · United States · biography, thriller, drama
Kinema Junpo Best Ten (International) 2018 #6
0.361 citation - 240.321 citation
- 25
1971 · United States · thriller, crime, mystery
NYT Best 1,000 Movies · Edgar Wright's 1,000 favorite movies
0.282 citations - 260.241 citation
- 270.171 citation
- 280.171 citation
- 290.161 citation
- 300.161 citation
- 310.161 citation
- 320.151 citation
- 33
1973 · United States · western, drama, horror
Edgar Wright's 1,000 favorite movies
0.111 citation
Complete filmography
All 42 directorial credits recorded on Wikidata, in chronological order; films in our library link to their canon-score page.
- 1971Play Misty for Me
- 1971The Beguiled: The Storyteller
- 1973Breezy
- 1973High Plains Drifter
- 1975The Eiger Sanction
- 1976The Outlaw Josey Wales
- 1977The Gauntlet
- 1980Bronco Billy
- 1982Firefox
- 1982Honkytonk Man
- 1983Sudden Impact
- 1985Pale Rider
- 1986Heartbreak Ridge
- 1988Bird
- 1990The Rookie
- 1990White Hunter Black Heart
- 1992Unforgiven
- 1993A Perfect World
- 1995The Bridges of Madison County
- 1997Absolute Power
- 1997Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil
- 1999True Crime
- 2000Space Cowboys
- 2002Blood Work
- 2003Mystic River
- 2003Piano Blues
- 2004Million Dollar Baby
- 2006Flags of Our Fathers
- 2006Letters from Iwo Jima
- 2008Changeling
- 2008Gran Torino
- 2009Invictus
- 2010Hereafter
- 2011J. Edgar
- 2014American Sniper
- 2014Jersey Boys
- 2016Sully
- 2018The 15:17 to Paris
- 2018The Mule
- 2019Richard Jewell
- 2021Cry Macho
- 2024Juror #2