Would there be no justice for Clint Eastwood director? Juror #2the latest film by the 94-year-old American filmmaker was released in France on Wednesday. Operated on 448 screens, it recorded, in five days, just over 385,000 admissions, or $3.1 million in revenue. If we add the five other territories (Spain, United Kingdom, etc.) excluding the United States, where the feature film is showing, the revenues collected reach 5 million dollars.
The highly scrutinized first session on Wednesday morning at the UGC des Halles in Paris, considered a reliable indicator of the commercial success of a work, indicated that 122 tickets had been sold for the screening of Juror #2against 101 – which remains a very good score – for the Palme d’or Anoramuch more publicized.
In the United States, it’s a completely different dynamic. Released Friday on only (!) 35 screens, it only collected $90,000 at the box office, the Ecran Large site indicated on Tuesday. “At first, Warner didn’t want to release the film in theaters there at all. She still decided to do it after Juror #2 closed the American Film Institute (AFI) Festival at the end of October, which is very prestigious, underlines 20 Minutes the critic Philippe Rouyer, co-director of the review Positive. The idea was above all to put it online on the platforms. »
“The system has failed Clint Eastwood”
“The information is not confirmed but, indeed, the specialized North American media suggest that it is a technical release to allow the film to compete for the Oscars, but that the studio is mainly banking on an exploitation in streaming on Max where it would arrive by the end of year holidays,” explains Damien Choppin, deputy editor-in-chief ofEcran Total.
“The system has failed Clint Eastwood,” writes magazine critic Bilge Ebiri New York and for the Vulture site. And continues: “Despite its emblematic stature, [ce réalisateur] is one of the few major filmmakers making studio-financed adult dramas. To today’s studio executive, he must appear like a bug in the matrix – not an artist to be protected, but a mistake to be corrected. »
“In Hollywood, you are worth the scores of your latest films”
“Americans think that, at 94, Clint Eastwood is burned out, that he makes dusty cinema, not in keeping with the times,” summarizes Caroline Vié, film journalist at 20 Minutes. Juror #2a trial film, a reflection on guilt, justice and truth, does not help to counter this prejudice. “In Hollywood, you are worth the scores of your latest films,” explains, for his part, Philippe Rouyer. If your last success was ten years ago, we consider that the wheel has turned. »
Indeed, the last big international success for Eastwood dates back to American Sniper in 2015, with 547 million in box office revenue – including 350 million in the United States and 21.2 million in France. Cry Machoin 2021, was a flop, even in France where it had barely 200,000 admissions. At the US box office, it collected $10.3 million in revenue for a budget of $33 million. In other words, he did not do good business with Warner – and the studio’s oils would not have digested this loss.
Clint is no longer a prophet in his country. “In the United States, with the platforms and media chronology very different from ours, the rather elderly, very cinema-loving public, oriented toward arthouse films no longer necessarily exists,” says Damien Choppin. At least, the studios do not focus on this market and favor younger targets, teenagers in particular.
“France is the first country to have considered him as an author”
However, Eastwood remains loyal to France, the only territory (along with Japan), where he benefits from a particularly solid aura, even if not all of his films meet with public and/or critical success. “He is historically very beloved here, while other countries find his cinema reactionary or devalue it. France was the first to consider him as an author. He agreed as well The Cinema Notebooks what Positive [les deux revues cinéphiles de référence avec leurs chapelles généralement distinctes] and he is very popular with the general public as evidenced by the audience figures when his films are broadcast on television,” underlines Philippe Rouyer.
Making Clint Eastwood a plague of American cinema would, however, be an exaggeration. Critics of Juror #2 in the United States are overwhelmingly positive. THE New Yorker calls it a “vivid and engaging thriller.” “Eastwood can’t be blamed for resting on his laurels. Some artists half his age would not have the ability to make a “station novel” cinema so intriguing,” says Rolling Stones. On the Chicago side, the Third Coast Review site is perhaps going a little too quickly in thinking that it is the director’s final film but notes that it is a “solid end point for a worthy career behind the camera.
In the race for the Oscars, but with little breath
This enthusiastic reception would, according to Fandom Wire, have convinced Warner to embark on “a small campaign” to obtain Oscar nominations. “That doesn’t mean much. The Oscars only work if voters watch the films,” recalls Caroline Vié.
Winner of the trophy for best director in 1993 for Ruthless and 2005 for Million Dollar BabyClint Eastwood’s last nomination in this category dates back to 2007 with Letters from Iwo Jima. “It’s no longer a question of talent, but perhaps they say to themselves that he’s had his time and won’t go looking for him with 94 brushes,” believes the cinema journalist from 20 Minutes. In the race for the statuette, good old Clint already seems doomed without having been able to plead his case.
