Gran Torino actually opens in a church. Walt Kowalski presides with grimaces and growls over his wife’s memorial service as the priest homilizes, “Is death the end, or the beginning?” Meanwhile, Walt’s Son Steve grouses to his brother that “there’s nothing that anyone can do that won’t disappoint the old man.”
Walt’s neighborhood is changing as various dark-skinned ethnic groups replace the white-skinned ethnic-heritage auto workers Walt once knew. He chafes at the presence of the Hmong family who lives next door, yet hates the gangs that cruise the streets and harass the neighbors even more. When he breaks out his Korean War rifle to confront them and starts in with his “gooks” and “slants” rhetoric, we’re pretty sure we’re dealing with a tortured and self-centered cantankerous bigot. His observation to the priest even tilts that direction: “The thing that haunts a man the most,” he intones, is the horrible thing that he does voluntarily.
This all heads toward the inevitable confrontation. “I knew this was gonna happen,” Walt moans. But as the story progresses and we learn a little more about Walt, his friends, and the ways in which he invests in his neighbors, we conclude that we really didn’t know Walt. In fact, if we find the film’s conclusion credible, we have to accept that Walt is not a man to be feared and reviled but a hero to be admired.
Everything in this parable, of course, in the service of Walt. Sure, we’re told why the Hmong celebrate, for instance: “Today is a blessed day, for a child is born.” But it’s also blessed because the Old Man is there, too. Sure, the Old Man’s Children pay him lip service; but they’re more scared of him than anything else, and the Old Man rejects His Children in favor of a People Who Were Not His Own.
Getting to know Walt is, in a way, like getting to know God.
It’s valid to ask questions like, “If God is so good, why does he allow evil to exist? Why is there so much suffering in the world?” It’s also valid to look at the Old Testament and think, “Wow, that God ain’t kidding when he calls himself jealous. What a violent, sadistic bastard!”
It’s just as valid to think about what we know about God and what we don’t know about God (presuming he exists) and conclude that we’re a pretty presumptive creation. Even something as simple as fairy tale is hard to judge on just a wee bit of the story, and yet we don’t presume as much about its creator as we do about God.
But I’ve gotta say: if you want a pretty good picture of finding out a thing or two about issues (or people) you don’t understand, pay close attention to Gran Torino. Eastwood, at least, doesn’t deserve to be second-guessed, and neither does Walt Kowalski. And compare Walt’s solution with Christ’s!
