Clint Eastwood’s Earl Stone is broke, alone and facing foreclosure when a job offer lands in his lap. All he has to do is drive. He does not know he has just signed on as a drug courier for a Mexican cartel.
That is the setup of The Mule, a 2018 crime, drama and thriller running 116 minutes, directed by and starring Eastwood, written by Nick Schenk, produced by Eastwood, Dan Friedkin, Jessica Meier, Tim Moore, Kristina Rivera and Bradley Thomas, and based on Sam Dolnick’s 2014 New York Times article about Leo Sharp, a World War II veteran in his 80s who ran drugs for the Sinaloa Cartel.
Trailer, via Warner Bros..
Earl Stone’s Daylilies and the Wedding He Missed
The Mule opens in 2005, when Earl skips his daughter Iris’s wedding to collect a lifetime award for his daylily work. Iris stops speaking to him. His wife Mary files for divorce.
Twelve years later he turns up at his granddaughter Ginny’s wedding rehearsal, hiding the fact that his flower farming business is bankrupt and his home has been foreclosed. A cartel member, tipped off by one of Earl’s former employees about his financial problems, spots him. Earl takes the job.
His age, his ethnicity, a spotless criminal history and strict obedience to driving laws mean he faces little suspicion. The cargo increases exponentially. So does the money.
What the Cash Buys
Earl buys a new truck and buys back his home. He pays for badly needed renovations at the local VFW post after fire damage, covers Ginny’s wedding and her college tuition.
| Figure | Actor | Role in The Mule |
|---|---|---|
| Earl Stone | Clint Eastwood | Courier for the cartel |
| Colin Bates | Bradley Cooper | DEA agent chasing him |
| Latón | Andy García | Cartel head |
| Julio | Ignacio Serricchio | Cartel handler |
| Ginny | Taissa Farmiga | Granddaughter he pays for |
| Iris | Alison Eastwood | Daughter he neglected |
Bradley Cooper plays DEA agent Colin Bates, who moves to the Chicago DEA office and gets Agent Treviño as a partner. Laurence Fishburne, Michael Peña, Dianne Wiest and Andy García co-star, with Richard Herd as Tim Kennedy, Lobo Sebastian as Bug and Manny Montana as Axl.
A Veteran Actor Playing a Veteran
The Mule was Eastwood’s first acting project since 2012 and his first leading role in a film he directed since 2008. Filming started in June 2018 in Atlanta and Augusta, Georgia, with locations in Las Cruces, New Mexico and Colorado. Warner Bros. released it on December 14, 2018. It grossed over $174 million.
The Problem With Earl
The Mule has charm and a genuine performance at its center, but it is soft where it should be sharp. The cartel is a backdrop, not a threat. Earl’s crimes cost him almost nothing until the plot decides otherwise, and the moral reckoning arrives late and thin.
The film asks us to like a man moving cocaine to Chicago because he loves his granddaughter. That is a pitch, not a story.
Metacritic’s 58/100, or 5.8 of 10, is about right.
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