The Legend of Clint Eastwood
Piano Blues, 2003
Eastwood's lifelong passion for jazz has informed many of his films, from the Errol Garner theme in Play Misty for Me to the documentary he produced on jazz pianist Thelonious Monk (Straight, No Chaser) to the piano scores he's written for such films as Mystic River and Million Dollar Baby. In his contribution to the seven-feature doc series The Blues, supervised by Martin Scorsese, Eastwood sat on a bench next to Ray Charles, Marcia Bell, Dr. John and other magnificent piano pumpers, talking about the craft and feel of making rough poetry by slamming or caressing the keys. Antique film clips buttress the conversations. Maybe the film should have been called Piano Jazz — this is not really about the blues — but it's still a smartly composed love letter from a icon of one indigenous American art form to the masters of another.