Million Dollar Baby

This movie had some superb acting in it and is, IMO, Eastwood's best piece of work. He and Morgan Freeman are old and washed up but they still have spirit, and I think that this is a very important part of the movie.

I think seeing Swank struggling for her dream of boxing, and becoming a fantastic contender, is a wonderful touch.

spoilers:

The foreshadowing was more prevalent in the attitude of her family than the actual story of her father that she told.

Euthanasia is a very controversial subject, and Eastwood went through a lot to bring us that lesson, but I (for once) believe it was worth it.

The kid in the gym who Morgan Freeman fights for is one of the best comic relief that I have seen in a drama in a long time. And when Freeman says "One Hundred and Ten", I actually applauded. So did half the theater.

Everything that Eastwood does in this movie is symbolic of the masochistic nature of his character. He keeps Freeman on the payroll- a constant reminder that he is the cause for his handicap. He attends church every day and playfully harasses the priest, but even though it is portrayed that he is trying to get over his past, it serves as little more than a reminder of that past. He writes his daughter every week- to no avail. The letters are always returned. In the final scene, when he pulls the plug, he is not only depriving himself of a daughter-figure and the chance to be the father he never was (Why? We never find out.) but he is once again blaming himself for taking on a project that he knew better than to start in the first place. I believe his character is the personification of the masochistic nature of man.

On Eastwood Himself:

Clint Eastwood has never been one of my favorites. His entire career has been pretentious and boring, although I have never seen Unforgiven, which I may be now willing to give a try. Frankly, most of the films he does bore the piss out of me. Mystic River was a pretty good movie, but it didn't rock my world or anything. Sean Penn was really good in it. Midnight in the Garden, with the love of my life Spacey- I nearly fell asleep. It was long and drawn out... I think the thing about Eastwood is that he takes a story and wants to tell every single aspect and nook and cranny and most of it is irrelevant- we don't need to know. Yet, he continues to leave out the most important pieces in his movies (that is, in the case of MDB, his past- what he did to lose the love of a daughter, but I suppose when you find out that Freeman is telling the story, perhaps we are left to guess that he doesn't even know the reason.)

Million Dollar Baby was IMO his best movie ever and if it loses Best Picture it will be a damned shame. But there were times when we were in the theater and they were doing a close-up of Eastwood on the screen- I turned and said "Is it just me, or does he look like a fish?"

Not a big Eastwood fan. But MDB was a very good movie.