DVD collection salutes Eastwood

February 15, 2010 at 12:00a.m.

Clint Eastwood has been a towering part of the American movie landscape for more than 50 years. We have watched him evolve from the wide-eyed young cowboy Rowdy Yates on TV’s “Rawhide” to one of Hollywood’s most accomplished directors.

No one has enjoyed watching Eastwood’s rise more than Richard Schickel, Time magazine movie critic since 1972 and producer, director and writer for dozens of documentaries on film history.

“Those of us who knew him from those spaghetti Westerns to where he is today,” Schickel said during a recent phone interview, “that’s one of the most interesting things about his career.”

Not surprisingly, Schickel makes some contributions to “Clint Eastwood: 35 Films 35 Years at Warner Brothers” (Warner, $179.98), a spectacular DVD set to be released Tuesday. It is the largest DVD collection ever devoted to one actor.

The films are housed in a thick 111‚Ñ2-by-8-inch book with photos and pictures of movie posters showcasing Eastwood’s work. There are also studio letters and photos as well as a 24-page booklet lifted from Schickel’s new book, “Clint: A Retrospective” (Sterling, $35), scheduled to be released later this month or in early March.

Although Eastwood has made films for other companies, his long association with Warner Brothers began in 1975 when he signed a contract with the studio. The actor/ director even moved his Malpaso Productions to the historic studio lot where the likes of Bogart and Cagney once roamed.

That doesn’t surprise Schickel. “Clint has great grasp of movie history. I think there are some who underestimate him intellectually.”

Eastwood takes Schickel on a tour of the lot in the collection’s 35th film “The Eastwood Factor,” a 22-minute documentary that includes clips from his movies selected by Schickel. A feature-length version of the documentary is scheduled for release during the summer.

The collection covers a 40-year span of the star’s career from “Where Eagles Dare” (1968), which has Eastwood teaming up with Richard Burton to take on the Nazis, to “Grand Torino” (2008), starring Eastwood as a bigoted Korean War veteran whose Asian neighbors gradually cause him to have a change of heart.

During those four decades, Eastwood has won dozens of awards, including a pair of best director Oscars for “Unforgiven” (1992) and “Million Dollar Baby” (2006).