The Mule, BBC 1, BBC iPlayer, Writer Nick Schenk, Director Clint Eastwood.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/m0019n5y/the-mule

Based on a true story (kinda, but not really). An article in The New York Times reported that Earl Stone, aged 90, had been convicted for transporting drugs for a Mexican cartel. If Earl Stone had been aged 30 or 40, or even 50, there’d be no story. The story is in his age. He was just doing what a man gotta do.

You have, for example, Brian Cox leaving the Scottish islands and chasing Patricia Arquette in Rory’s Way. This is meant to be a wry look at getting older and the aging process.

Anne Reid getting up to the naughty with a bearded (James Bond) Daniel Craig in The Mother.

Glenn Close, The Wife, standing behind her man, who is not much of a man and more of a meme dictionary with nice hair.

King of Thieves, The Hatton Garden job pulled off by old codgers Michael Caine, Tom Courtney, Michael Gambon, Charlie Cox, Jim Broadbent, Paul Whitehouse and Ray Winston.

Going in Style, a remake of a heist movie also starring Michael Caine. Morgan Freeman is the lead, as he’s always going to be. The premise of the movie is familiar. Like Clint Eastwood’s The Mule, old age brings with it baggage and no pension pot. Make my day, becomes make my pension please, or we’ll take it anyway. But, of course, they’d never hurt anyone in the taking. They’d be kind and courteous. Christopher Lloyd brings an aged geeky angle and the glamour comes from a youthful looking Ann-Margret (remember her?)

It’s not difficult to get Clint Eastwood to look ninety. He just looks like he always did. But older, when younger. Then, of course, there are the ladies. Just because Earl is ninety…girls a third of his age go for him…two at a time. Wow. Hmmmm. But he’s still loyal to his wife. Still a straight talker. He did the jobs for the best of reasons. He lost his business and home. His pal’s place burned down, but Earl provides. Earl always provides. That’s the moral of these stories. Everything goes to shit, but the old codgers see it out in Clint Eastwood style barking at the judge he’s guilty. Of course, he’s guilty, he’s Clint Eastwood protector of the faith.