Photo from McClatchy Tribune

Clint Eastwood just keeps on truckin’. Just when I think he’s gone and done his last great film, he goes and makes another.

His latest, “Gran Torino,” is the best he has directed since the 2005 Best Picture winner “Million Dollar Baby.”

The film, based on the collaborated story by Dave Johannson and Nick Schenk, is definitely not for the faint of ear. The movie tackles the issue of racism head-on, bulldozing through offensive speech like a kid through a sandbox.

Eastwood plays Walter Kowalski, a tough old coot and Korean War vet who has just lost his wife. Despite the well-meaning of a baby-faced priest (Christopher Carley) and his two grown sons (Brian Haley and Brian Howe) he just wants to be left alone.

It takes the persistent kindness of his next-door neighbor, Sue (Ahney Her) and her brother Thao (Bee Vang), to break through the barrier of his self-imposed solitude.

After a failed gang initiation and a subsequent run-in with the gang, Walter and Thao form a tentative friendship that blossoms into mutual respect and kinship.

Eastwood is a “grade-A badass” here, with the same gruff voice he had as Marshel Jed in “Hang ‘Em High” and the big guns he had in “Dirty Harry.” He chews up the scenery, as a character both tough and vulnerable, stealing every scene he is in.

This is a credit to him, of course, but has the disadvantage of making all other acting look mediocre by comparison.

“Gran Torino” meanders along at a rather leisurely pace as the story unfolds and we get to know the characters, but the last third quickens with a barrage of bullets, leading to a final showdown, reminiscent of one of Eastwood’s aforementioned westerns.

Nominated for only one Golden Globe and completely overlooked by The Oscars this year, “Gran Torino” may not be considered the best film of 2008, but it is definitely worth seeing for any Eastwood aficionado.