The Mule (2018)

"Clint Eastwood reunites with the writer of 2009's Gran Torino to direct and star in this crime drama about an elderly war veteran who smuggles cocaine through Michigan for a Mexican drug cartel."

"This isn't the role that will earn Eastwood a legion of new fans, but it's almost sure to delight those who appreciate him already."

"I am a fan of Eastwood's films, which means I've learned to value the fact that they are more nuanced than Eastwood's public statements about his political beliefs."

"Tonally, this thing is a disaster, and you can only conclude that its maker, capable of sharp ironies as recently as 2014's American Sniper, didn't fully digest the material."

"Because the movie never builds to something greater than its parts, Eastwood ends up blowing raspberries and floundering for meaning in a void."

"As a drama, it's frustratingly insubstantial, failing to provide enough of an emotional centre or a convincing payoff."

"The Mule is a cloth-eared vanity project with little of Eastwood's trademark wit or grudging humanity to commend it."

"It's the detours on Eastwood's road movie - the stops along the way that show an old man dealing with the dim possibilities of change near the end of his life - that reveal this drug-mule-in-winter drama as a deeply personal reckoning."

"Although there's a spare, basic quality to The Mule, it remains undeniably watchable throughout and generates some degree of tension. Clint has cinema in his veins, and it shows here."

"For one thing, though the feeling sneaks up on you, "The Mule" has an unexpected emotional kick."

"Less cranky and inciting than Gran Torino but persuasively expressive in conveying an old man's regrets along with his desire to improve himself even in late age, The Mule shows that Eastwood's still got it, both as a director and actor."