Harry Brown - Gran Torino in England

MJ23

Saw Harry Brown at the weekend. Its just gran Torino with english accents, except Gran Torino was much better.

bonerm

Vauxhall Cavalier would have been a better title in that case.

To be completely honest it's more Death Wish in a council estate than Gran Torino anythign. I watched it a few times and really enjoy it but then again I think the Death Wish series is entertaining nonsense so perhaps I was predisposed to enjoying it. Michael Caine is superb and there are enough moments of true greatness to impress even the casual viewer.

starviewadams

Yeah just a poorer/British version of Gran Torino(Michael Caine & the lad who played Noel(I think) were brilliant I thought,but the rest of the cast,especially the detectives,were rubbish)

indough

the entire cast of gran torino bar eastwood himself were laughably bad

heffomike54

MJ23 wrote: »

Saw Harry Brown at the weekend. Its just gran Torino with english accents, except Gran Torino was much better.

Agree to a certain extent, however, I think a key difference is the fact Michael Caine's character was liked in the film by most people, whereas, Clint Eaastwood's character was still abusing people in the film from start to finish. But yeah two very similar films.

irishh_bob

it must be crap so , i thought gran torino was very average , storyline was highly implausible and clints charechter was baschically a three way cross of the man with no name , dirty harry and victor meldrew

irishh_bob

indough wrote: »

the entire cast of gran torino bar eastwood himself were laughably bad

the young korean girl was ok

bonerm

indough wrote: »

the entire cast of gran torino bar eastwood himself were laughably bad

They were a bit "Diagnosis Murder" in terms of believability alright. I thought the Korean family were good enough (esp the daughter), but the gang, the black assholes and white doofus who was tryna talk all gangsta' were laughably done.

ziedth

I thought the chav lads were pretty good in HB but I'm sure it wasn't a stretch.

The two detectives where cringeworthyly bad though

faceman

I finally watched Harry Brown and IMO its far superior to Gran Torina. Maybe its because Ive never lived in one of those estates in the US, but I certainly felt the characters in HB were more believeable than GT.

Also, I felt more emotionally connected to Brown, his loneliness, anguish and sense of purposelessness (is that a word?) was far more "real" and better portrayed than in GT.

HB was excellently paced too.

krudler

I liked Harry Brown, its only similarity to Gran Torino is it has a pensioner who takes things into his own hands at the centre, aside from that they're different movies entirely. Caine was brilliant in it and I've never been a big fan of him, he has gotten much better as an actor as he's gotten older though, cant stand him in stuff like The Italian Job and Alfie, but he was brilliant in The Prestige and this.

Degag

Thought it was a fantastic film. On a par with Gran Torino. Clint and Caine gave majestic performances IMO.

thirtythirty

MJ23 wrote: »

Saw Harry Brown at the weekend. Its just gran Torino with english accents, except Gran Torino was much better.

Gran Torino is one of the cheesiest films i've ever seen! Was laughing my way through it!

Harry Brown's awesome though. No cheese, and more gritt.

faceman

krudler wrote: »

I liked Harry Brown, its only similarity to Gran Torino is it has a pensioner who takes things into his own hands at the centre, aside from that they're different movies entirely. Caine was brilliant in it and I've never been a big fan of him, he has gotten much better as an actor as he's gotten older though, cant stand him in stuff like The Italian Job and Alfie, but he was brilliant in The Prestige and this.

Completely agree, he used to be such an awful actor all those years ago. I find him a very believeable actor nowadays.

mikhail

I slightly prefer Harry Browne to Gran Torino. Caine is comfortably the better actor at this stage (Clint's an icon, but he never showed much range that I saw), the cinematography's a bit uninspired in GT and the plot's a little twee. Harry Browne goes a little off the rails in the third act though. GT has better jokes though.

jimi_t2

Too right. I keep thinking I saw the wrong bloody film when I saw the reviews. I mean Harry Brown is pretty damn flawed, but the first ten minutes of it say more, have more emotional impact and are just a beter overall piece of cinema than Gran Torino could ever aspire to.

Now you can argue that its a matter of flashiness given the setpieces that dominate the action

that piece of brilliance in the tunnel with the guy from Skins with the chain around his neck, the gun buying scene, collapsing at the canal, the all out riot at the end

but the acting and character development stands up by itself - show me one low-key scene to match this in Gran Torino (early on in film, doesn't give away much)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MkGbhxqY27Y

Fair enough the other cop is crap, the Irish barman ain't great and there's a fair bit of suspension of disbelief going on toward the end - but I couldn't take any of the bit players in Torino seriously, especially cliches like the priest.

It ain't perfect but its got a great soundtrack, is quite arthouse in the way its shot in places, and avoids the overly sanitised trap that Gran Torino falls into. The disparity between what I ascertained from trailers ''Clint Eastwood as Widowed, Racist veteran takes on Korean Gang invading his whitepicket community'' and what actually transpired was boggling. It's the kind of movie you'd happily watch with your granny, but both of you would feel a bit cheated.

Oh, and the little fact that Michael Caine is a far cooler and harder mo-fo in his old age than Eastwood

Penn

I know these films get compared a lot, but I honestly don't see why.

Harry Brown takes the law into his own hands because he's fed up of the local thugs and what happened to his friend. Gran Torino, Walt befriends his neighbours, and ultimately sacrifices himself so they can live safely. I mean, did Walt even fired a gun at any point in the movie. Maybe just a warning shot or something. Whereas Harry Brown brutally kills the thugs.

And thats the difference. Harry Brown is about revenge. Gran Torino isn't.