‘Gran Torino,’ the film co-written by Crookston native Dave Johannson that stars Clint Eastwood, who also directed it, will be released nationwide on Friday, Jan. 9, including the Grand Theatre in Crookston.
   
But Grand owner Bob Moore said landing the film this early wasn’t exactly a routine undertaking. The film distribution industry can involve a convoluted process, and when Moore initially asked his distributor to release Gran Torino to the Grand in time for Friday, his request was denied, he told the Times Tuesday. When he told the distributor that the film has a local angle in Johannson, he said the authenticity of his claim was questioned. It was only after he sent a copy of the Times’ story in December on Johannson and his role in writing the original Gran Torino story that the distributor relented.
   
Moore said his plan is to run the film at the Grand for three weeks. “It’s a pretty neat thing, that’s for sure,” he said of Johannson’s involvement.
   
Show times at the Grand are 4, 7 and 9:30 p.m. Friday, 1, 4, 7 and 9:30 p.m. Saturday, 1, 4 and 7 p.m. Sunday, and 4 and 7 p.m. Monday through Thursday. It’s Rated R.
   
Johannson, a 1988 Crookston Central High School graduate, said Tuesday night that had he known earlier that his hometown theatre would be showing the film, he would have made every effort to make the trip north from from the Twin Cities to see it here. But he’s made plans to watch the film with his wife, Dianna, and a few friends at a theater in Roseville and then partake in a low-key celebration afterward. Johannson lived in Roseville for years after graduating from the University of Minnesota before moving in December into a new home he and Dianna built a few miles away in Shoreview.
   
Johannson said he’s seen the film twice. He viewed it once with writing collaborator and screenplay author Nick Schenk, and saw it again at the December premiere in Los Angeles with Eastwood, a couple other “A list” stars like Angelina Jolie, other “Hollywood types” and people involved with the film.
   
“No one in a setting like that is ever going to say anything bad about it; they’re all going to say they love it,” Johannson said, adding that he’s looking forward to seeing the film in a “normal” setting with “regular people” who won’t shy away from saying what they really think of the film.
   
Johannson’s initial story was set in St. Paul, but the film is set in Detroit. Eastwood plays a bitter, bigoted Korean War veteran whose wife has recently died. He’s surrounded by a community becoming more multi-cultural by the day, mostly through an expanding Hmong population, and he can’t stand it. His pride and joy is a 1972 Ford Gran Torino that he helped to assemble in the Ford plant, and when a Hmong gang pressures a Hmong teen to try to steal it, Eastwood’s character, Walt Kowalski, catches him, and the film’s tone takes a turn from that point.
   
Four weeks since its release in New York and Los Angeles markets, Gran Torino sits in the 14th position on the latest box office charts, taking in just under $10 million. But, unlike “Marley & Me” and the other films on the list that are being shown in thousands of locations, Gran Torino is currently showing in only 84 locations. That fits the plan Johannson described before its limited release in December, to release it in limited markets for a few weeks and hope that it would generate a positive buzz through word of mouth and measured advertising in advance of its full release on Jan. 9.
   
Critics for the most part have heaped praise on the film, and Johannson was especially pleased when he read the glowing review written by the film critic he’s long respected the most, Roger Ebert. It’s generating Oscar buzz as well, but Johannson has refused to get too caught up in all that, saying it’s mostly due to the fact that just about anything the highly respected, legendary Eastwood is involved in generates all kinds of award talk.
   
Johannson’s full-time job is in sales and consulting for CenterPoint Energy. A big-time history buff, he’s currently deep in research on his next writing project, the details of which he prefers to keep under wraps for the time being.