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Clint Eastwood

Clint Eastwood is an award-winning director, producer and actor. Currently, he is directing and producing the drama Hereafter, written by Peter Morgan and starring Matt Damon and Cecile de France.

He most recently directed, produced and starred in the widely acclaimed 2008 drama Gran Torino. Eastwood won a Best Actor Award from the National Board of Review for his performance as Walt Kowalski, marking his first film role since Million Dollar Baby. Also last year, he directed and produced Changeling, starring Angelina Jolie in the true-life drama about an infamous 1928 kidnapping case that rocked the LAPD. The film was nominated for a Palme d'Or and won a Special Award when it premiered at the 2008 Cannes Film Festival. It also received three Oscar nominations, including Best Actress for Jolie, and Eastwood garnered BAFTA Award and London Film Critics Award nominations for Best Director.

In 2007, Eastwood earned dual Academy Award nominations, in the categories of Best Director and Best Picture, for his acclaimed World War II drama Letters from Iwo Jima, which tells the story of the historic battle from the Japanese perspective. In addition, the film won the Golden Globe and Critics' Choice Awards for Best Foreign Language Film, and also received Best Picture honors from a number of film critics groups, including the Los Angeles Film Critics and the National Board of Review. Letters from Iwo Jima is the companion film to Eastwood's widely praised drama Flags of Our Fathers, which tells the story of the American men who raised the flag on Iwo Jima in the famed photograph.

In 2005, Eastwood won Academy Awards for Best Picture and Best Director, his second in both categories, for Million Dollar Baby. He also earned a nomination for Best Actor for his performance in the film. In addition, Hilary Swank and Morgan Freeman won Oscars, for Best Actress and Best Supporting Actor, respectively, and the film was also nominated for Best Adapted Screenplay and Best Editing.

Eastwood's critically acclaimed drama Mystic River debuted at the 2003 Cannes Film Festival, earning him a Palme d'Or nomination and the Golden Coach Award. Mystic River went on to earn six Academy Award nominations, including two for Eastwood for Best Picture and Best Director. Sean Penn and Tim Robbins won Oscars in the categories of Best Actor and Best Supporting Actor, while the film was also nominated for Best Supporting Actress and Best Screenplay.

In 1993, Eastwood's foreboding, revisionist Western Unforgiven received nine Academy Award nominations, including three for Eastwood, who won for Best Picture and Best Director and was nominated for Best Actor. The film also won Oscars in the categories of Best Supporting Actor (Gene Hackman) and Best Editor, and was nominated for Best Original Screenplay, Best Cinematography, Best Art Direction, Best Editing and Best Sound. Eastwood was also honored with the Academy's Irving Thalberg Memorial Award in 1995.

Eastwood was first recognized by the Golden Globes in 1971 with the Henrietta Award for World Film Favorite. In 1988, he was awarded the Cecil B. DeMille Lifetime Achievement Award. The following year he won his first Best Director Golden Globe, for Bird, and in 1993, he again received the Best Director Award, for Unforgiven. Nominated in 2004 for his direction of Mystic River, Eastwood took home his third Best Director Golden Globe the following year for Million Dollar Baby. He was also nominated in 2005 as the composer of the score for that film.

Eastwood's films have also been honored internationally by critics and at film festivals, including Cannes, where he served as the president of the jury in 1994. In addition, he has garnered Palme d'Or nominations for White Hunter Black Heart in 1990; Bird, which also won the award for Best Actor and an award for its soundtrack at the 1988 festival; and Pale Rider in 1985.

In addition to the Thalberg Award and DeMille Award, Eastwood's many other lifetime career achievement awards include tributes from the Directors Guild of America, the Producers Guild of America, the Screen Actors Guild, the American Film Institute, the Film Society of Lincoln Center, the French Film Society, the National Board of Review, the Henry Mancini Institute (Hank Award for distinguished service to American music), the Hamburg Film Festival (Douglas Sirk Award), and the Venice Film Festival (Career Golden Lion).

He is also the recipient of a Kennedy Center Honor, awards from the American Cinema Editors and the Publicists Guild, and an honorary doctorate in Fine Arts from Wesleyan University, and is a five-time winner of Favorite Motion Picture Actor from the People's Choice Awards. In 1991, Eastwood was Harvard's Hasty Pudding Theatrical Society's Man of the Year and, in 1992, he received the California Governor's Award for the Arts. This fall, he received two more significant honors for his contributions to film: the Prix Lumiere at the inaugural Grand Lyon Film Festival; and the Commandeur de la Legion d'honneur, presented by French President Nicolas Sarkozy.


Note: This profile was written in or before 2009.
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Clint Eastwood Facts

Birth NameClinton Eastwood Jr.
OccupationActor, Director, Producer
BirthdayMay 31, 1930 (93)
SignGemini
BirthplaceSan Francisco, California, USA
Height6' 4" (1m93)  How tall is Clint Eastwood compared to you?
Awards2005 Academy Awards: Best Director (for Million Dollar Baby)
2005 Golden Globe Awards: Best Director (for Million Dollar Baby)
2003 Screen Actors Guild Awards: Life Achievement Award
1993 Academy Awards: Best Director (for Unforgiven)
1993 Golden Globe Awards: Best Director - Motion Picture (for Unforgiven)
1989 Golden Globe Awards: Best Director - Motion Picture (for Bird)
1988 Golden Globe Awards: Cecil B. DeMille Award

Selected Filmography

Clint Eastwood Breaking Steel
Escape From Alcatraz
A Fistful of Dollars
Unforgiven
Dirty Harry
Gran Torino
Pale Rider
Back to the Future Part II
The Outlaw Josey Wales
The Good, The Bad, and the Ugly
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