Walt Kowalski has just lost his wife. He is a decorated Korean war veteran, who has never been close with his two sons and their families, and now he is left all alone with his dog Daisy. He has a cynical outlook on life \u2013 he does not want to accept the assistance of the parish priest, and he is very racist. His neighbourhood is filled with Asian people, whom he dislikes, including his next door neighbours.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Walt is very \u201cold school\u201d. He\u2019s a man\u2019s man in many ways \u2013 he has collected tons of tools over the years, he\u2019s a superb handy-man, and his ideal of manliness is clearly one of toughness, common decency, and honesty. At heart, under his gruff exterior, he is a good man, as is shown by the way he slowly allows himself to be won over to friendship with his next door neighbours, whom he initially despised.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
But Walt is also haunted by his past, by the things he did in the Korean war. He is a bitter man, but he slowly opens up and learns to accept his neighbours as friends.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
He mainly connects with Sue and Thao, sister and brother. Thao is being pressured by his cousin\u2019s gang to be a part of the gang lifestyle, and because he is easily pressured into things, he agrees to try and steal Walt\u2019s Gran Torino as initiation. However, his attempt fails, and his mother makes him work for Walt in recompense.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Thao and Walt slowly grow closer. Walt begins trying to teach Thao how to be a man \u2013 he insists that Thao ask out on a date a girl he is obviously interested in, he gets Thao a job, and he tries to teach him how to be a handyman. Meanwhile, Walt realizes that he is dying after getting some tests back from the hospital. He calls his son, but his son is busy and Walt has never really learned how to talk to him. The distance between them is shown to be complete, as Walt is unable even near the end to reach out and bridge the gap that he formed between himself and his son.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
However, the gang is still after Thao. They stop him on the way home from work one day and break his tools. In retribution, Walt beats up one of the gang and threatens him if anything further happens to Thao. However, this turns out to be the wrong move on Walt\u2019s part \u2013 the gang retaliates brutally by machine-gunning Thao\u2019s house, and kidnapping and raping Sue.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Walt is devastated. He had acted on his instincts, as he had acted in the Korean War, but this time his instincts had only brought worse things upon his new friends. Thao wants revenge, but Walt manages to calm him down, with a promise that something will be done. Walt has clearly made a decision, and we think that he\u2019s going to go in and gun down the gang.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Walt prepares throughout that day for the evening, when he will confront the gang. He cuts his lawn, he gets a hair-cut and a shave, he buys a fitted suit for the first time in his life. Most important of all, he fulfills his wife\u2019s dying wish that he go to confession. The priest, who suspects that Walt is going to kill the gang, is startled that the main thing Walt confesses is that he has never been close to his children. \u201cIs that it?\u201d the priest asks incredulously. \u201cIt? It\u2019s been bothering me my whole life!\u201d Walt replies.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Thao comes over to Walt\u2019s house, thinking that he will be going with Walt to retaliate against the gang. However, Walt tricks Thao, locking him in the basement. Thao demands to be released, but Walt insists that he\u2019s going to do it alone \u2013 killing a man is horrible, Walt tells him, and because his hands are already stained, he will be the only one to go.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Walt arrives at the gang\u2019s house that evening and confronts them. They are all on edge, expecting him to do something. Walt takes out a cigarette, and makes as if to go for a gun. As he does so, he prays a Hail Mary. When he pulls out his hand, the gang, thinking he\u2019s drawing his gun, fire and kill him. As he falls, we see that he had only been pulling out his lighter.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Thao and Sue arrive in time to see Walt being taken away and the gang arrested. One of the police officers tells Thao that the gang will be going to jail for a long time \u2013 they killed an unarmed man in front of witnesses. Thao and Sue now realize what Walt has done \u2013 he has given them a chance in life by removing the gang from the picture. And he did it not by killing them, but by letting himself be killed.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Thao and Sue and their mother attend Walt\u2019s funeral. During the reading of the will, it turns out that Walt has left his Gran Torino to Thao in light of their friendship.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Analysis<\/p>\n\n\n\n
In this movie, Thao is offered two paths to manliness. Early on, we see him being encouraged by the gang to join them. They offer what looks like a very manly, macho lifestyle, where nobody pushes them around. One of the gang tells Thao that he knows what Thao feels like: \u201cEverybody used to beat me up. Now nobody wants to f\u2014k with me.\u201d This is depicted as the epitome of manliness.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
This lifestyle has a very real and dangerous possibility of attraction for Thao. He is not a very strong person \u2013 his mother and his sister more or less control his life, and he never had a very good role model in his father. As a result, there is a real danger that he could fall into the hands of the gang if he has no one to look up to or point him in the right direction. At one point, Walt shows that he knows this very well \u2013 he tells the priest that \u201cThao and Sue don\u2019t have a chance unless the gang goes away.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The other model of manliness offered to Thao is what keeps him out of the gang. This is the one provided by Walt. Walt is of an older generation, a generation of do-it-yourselfers, men who had to earn everything they owned by the sweat of their hands. He\u2019s a proud American, and he\u2019s tough. Unlike the gang, however, his toughness is used on behalf of other people \u2013 at one point he saves Sue from three ruffians. Walt\u2019s style of manliness has its negatives too \u2013 he is very xenophobic, he is bitter and aloof, he\u2019s foul-mouthed, and he has a self-reliance and pridefulness that won\u2019t allow him to admit God into his life.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
However, he becomes for Thao the necessary role model that can help him become a man. He helps Thao get the courage to ask a girl out on a date. He gets Thao a job to help him realize his dream of going to school. He starts to teach Thao how to be a handyman around the house.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
However, Walt\u2019s ideal of manliness is also flawed by violence. He is still used to the way of acting that was necessary in Korea, where you acted first and thought later. He tries to solve the problem of the gang through violence, by retaliating in kind when the gang assaults Thao.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
There is danger in this approach for Thao as well. Thao wants to kill the gang when they have raped his sister, and he thinks Walt is going to help him do it. This could only spark a further cycle of violence, and Walt knows that something else is needed. So instead of killing, he allows himself to be killed. In doing this, he ends the violence, and gives Thao the best role model of manliness that he possibly could. Thao is now not only free from the gang, he has been freed by a completely selfless and generous act of self-sacrifice, the kind of action that defines true manliness.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Thus, Thao is offered two models of manliness at the beginning, both of which involve, in some way or another, violence and pride. At the end, however, the third, and best, way is shown to him, involving self-sacrifice. Walt becomes a Christ-like figure, helping bring Thao redemption from the violence that loomed over him as a dangerous possibility.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
As for Walt, we see in him a progression from self-centredness to openness to others which culminates in his ultimate sacrifice. Sue and Thao help bring out the inner goodness that was always there \u2013 the goodness that made Walt willing to do little things to help people out, such as boosting a person\u2019s car or being appalled that some boys won\u2019t help an old lady whose bags had fallen.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Walt finally not only becomes more open to others, but he also becomes more open to God. At the very end, faced with the choice between retaliation with violence and self-sacrifice, he chooses the latter, and in doing so he is able to find God again after having been away for so many years. And in his returning to God, we find out that the main thing bothering Walt is not so much the horrible things he did in Korea, as it is his failure as a father. Walt is a man possessed of a great sadness, the sadness of having failed in his role as father to his sons. Thus, in being able to be a father-figure for Thao, and ultimately giving his very life for Thao, Walt finds his own redemption too.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Questions<\/p>\n\n\n\n
1. Walt falls to the ground in the form of a cross, which clearly means we are supposed to think of him as a Christ-figure. What do you think of this? Is it accurate? How does what Walt did make him like or unlike Christ?<\/p>\n\n\n\n
2. What are the characteristics of manliness that Thao learns from Walt? How are they different from what manliness means to the gang? Are there any similarities?<\/p>\n\n\n\n
3. At Walt\u2019s funeral, the priest says that he learned a lot about life and death from Walt. What do you think he means by this?<\/p>\n\n\n\n
For the teacher: Bring up how Walt \u201cknows a lot more about dying than about living.\u201d He has lived with death his whole life \u2013 with the killing of people on the battlefield. At the very end, when he himself is dying, he himself learns about life \u2013 about what\u2019s important in life, about what is stronger than death. He is able to give life to Thao, in a sense, by dying himself.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" “Walt becomes a Christ-like figure, helping bring Thao redemption from the violence that loomed over him as a dangerous possibility.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":593,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[200],"tags":[201],"class_list":["post-591","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-movie","tag-movie"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.viavirtutis.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/591","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.viavirtutis.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.viavirtutis.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.viavirtutis.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.viavirtutis.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=591"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.viavirtutis.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/591\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":595,"href":"https:\/\/www.viavirtutis.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/591\/revisions\/595"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.viavirtutis.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/593"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.viavirtutis.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=591"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.viavirtutis.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=591"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.viavirtutis.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=591"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}