Clint Eastwood Warns Political Correctness ‘Killing’ Country: ‘We’ve Lost Our Sense of Humor’

Hollywood screen legend Clint Eastwood sounded off on what he described as the scourge of political correctness in an impassioned speech this weekend at the Cannes Film Festival.

While addressing a packed audience Sunday, the Oscar-winner said his seminal crime drama Dirty Harry could not have been made in today’s politically correct climate.

“A lot of people thought it was politically incorrect,’ Eastwood said of the 1971 film he starred in. “‘That was at the beginning of the era that we’re in now, where everybody thinks everyone’s politically correct.”

“We’re killing ourselves by doing that,” the 86-year-old star warned, declaring that “we’ve lost our sense of humour.”

Of course, this wasn’t the first time that Eastwood has warned of the dangers of political correctness.

In an interview last August with Esquire, Eastwood said then-candidate Donald Trump’s political success was due in part to his disregard for political correctness.

“He’s onto something, because secretly everybody’s getting tired of political correctness, kissing up,” the actor said, “That’s the kiss-ass generation we’re in right now. We’re really in a pussy generation. Everybody’s walking on eggshells.”

“He’s said a lot of dumb things. So have all of them. Both sides,” he added. “But everybody —the press and everybody’s going, ‘Oh, well, that’s racist,’ and they’re making a big hoodoo out of it. Just f*cking get over it. It’s a sad time in history.”

While the filmmaker told festival-goers that he would return to acting “someday,” he did impart some filming wisdom on a crowd that featured A-listers and entertainment industry executives.

“If you have good luck with your instincts, you might as well trust them,” he said. “It’s an emotional art form. It’s not an intellectual art form at all.”

Eastwood was honored with several screenings of his films over the weekend.

The filmmaker recently signed on to direct The 15:17 to Paris, a film based on the thwarted ISIS-inspired terror attack in 2015 in which a gunman opened fire on a high-speed train traveling to Paris.

 

Follow Jerome Hudson on Twitter @jeromeehudson