Great Actors Smackdown: Eastwood vs Bronson-- The Results

Last week I asked for opinions on the pressing question, Who's the better actor?-- This guy?

Or this guy?

Quick answer: the first guy won with 75% of the vote. So it's official: Clint Eastwood is a greater thespian than Charles Bronson. Now for the details.

For what it's worth, Bronson prompted more griping than Clint. "The Death Wish movies were for shit." "Great in Once Upon A Time In The West, but the harmonica playing made ME want to kill him." "Name me a movie where Bronson emoted some believable positive emotions. I loved the guy in lots of movies, but his emotional range was Duchovneyesque." (That last comment was from a Bronson voter!)

But the "apples and oranges" differences in their careers were also mentioned. "Bronson's earlier roles in The Magnificent Seven, The Dirty Dozen and especially The Great Escape are better than Eastwood's early roles in Kelly's Heroes and Where Eagles Dare." "Bronson never seemed to want to be more than Bronson. Eastwood wanted to be more than a tough guy." "[Eastwood] obviously managed to take far more control of his projects than Bronson, who was at the mercy of the people who hired him to rehash what everyone expected. But do we count that as acting ability, however, or being a superior Hollywood player?"

The author of that last comment also had my favorite argument in favor of Bronson's superior acting talent: "If you look at Bronson's '50s work in shows like Have Gun, Will Travel, you can see him playing against his looks to project credible vulnerability, managing dialects, and with a range that covers stoic tough guys (where he landed and stuck) to wheeling-dealing con men. It's hard to imagine Eastwood pulling off the same variety. [And] Bronson is able to achieve humanity on screen when given the right material. Think of his claustrophobia as he works underground in The Great Escape and ask if Eastwood's screen persona could break open long enough for you to accept Clint in such panic."

On the Eastwood side, to me, this email summed up Clint-ness best: "From Rowdy Yates to Dirty Harry to his character and direction in Unforgiven, he has made my day more than any other actor ever. Given my druthers, if Unforgiven was on one channel and The White Buffalo was on another, I'd watch Unforgiven-- over and over and over. In fact, I do. I think one of the greatest scenes I have ever seen in any movie is when Eastwood confronts Hackman. The lighting on Eastwood's eyes still scares me. And how would anybody come up with a line like, "This can't be happening to me. I'm building a house!" just before he's shot to death? It's pure Eastwood, and Eastwood is the best."

As for my own opinion, as always, I'm in the minority-- don't make me defend the latter entries in the Death Wish franchise, but I'm a Bronson man. Chuck may be a limited actor, but to me he is an actor, while Clint was a star almost from the beginning, but took his own sweet time learning to act. And while there isn't a single role of Eastwood's that I can't envision Bronson as an emergency substitute, try to imagine Clint as Vincent Price's mute, ape-faced henchman in House of Wax-- it's impossible.

So many thanks to everyone who wrote in with a vote and a quote. Check in next week for another really important edition of Great Actors Smackdown!

P.S. One wiseguy suggested that I should have included this western star.