The Mule (2018) Review

Earl Stone is 90 years old and has let his family down constantly over the years, he is a Korean War veteran and had been a horticulturist. When he ends up on even tougher times he ends up working for the Mexican drug cartel as a driver through Illinois.

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The film starts showing Earl at an awards event for the flowers he grows and missing his daughter’s wedding in the process, which is a good way to tell us that he is not a good family man at all. We then flash forward 12 years as he did not get on board with the internet and he had slowly seen his business just disappear over that time. Now his granddaughter is getting married and this could well be the opportunity for him to make up for past mistakes.

When he gets involved with the cartel he actually is very oblivious and naive to begin with he just sees himself as driving from one place to the next. Although eventually during one of the trips he does look in the bag, after being told not too. That is when he eventually realises what he has been transporting. It didn’t make him stop though he was making a lot of money from doing this.

It is quite strange though as you just feel sorry for him throughout and the different things he uses the money for are actually good deeds. Which I guess is very confusing as we all know that it is drug money and massively against the law. But he is a 90-year-old man how can we not feel sorry for him? I think that is how the film is made interesting at times. It is not amazing or the best but I still love watching Clint Eastwood. When I saw this film at the cinema it was actually pretty busy in the screen which was fantastic to see, so it just shows that he still has a rather large fan base considering the cinema I go to is hardly ever busy now.

Overall it does have a nice family message in terms that no matter what happens it is never too late to try to make things right. That may take a lot of time for the trust but you should never give up and keep trying to make amends before it is too late. With his advancing years he also passes wisdom onto the younger men around him, one the detective who was actually trying to find the mule! The other the man who had become his handler and he wants better for him. This meant some good scenes between Eastwood and Bradley Cooper, I enjoyed his role in this film as well.

This was Clint Eastwood’s first role since 2012 when we pretty much thought he had retired. But considering this film is inspired by a New York Times article about a 90-year-old drug mule I guess only one man could do that and that is what Eastwood did and why he came out of his acting retirement?