A Spooky Family Movie With A Hilarious Clint Eastwood Cameo Has Hit Prime Video's Top Charts

Warner Bros

Clint Eastwood was one of the biggest movie stars in the world in 1995, but, up until that point, he was not known for appearing in family-friendly films. CBS' "Rawhide," the television series that launched him in the 1960s, and 1982's "Firefox," with its video game tie-in, are probably his two most kid-appropriate works. "Bronco Billy" and "Honkytonk Man" are also family films in a way, though, really, Eastwood only hit the bullseye with kids when he plopped Clyde the orangutan into the bare-knuckle-brawling adventures of Philo Beddoe in "Every Which Way But Loose" and "Any Which Way You Can" (both of which have no shortage of gleefully raunchy moments).

Eastwood also wasn't known for his romantic dramas, so the summer of 1995 promised to be an outlier for him with his adaptation of Robert James Waller's runaway bestseller "The Bridges of Madison County." It was a directing-acting twofer for Eastwood, who cast himself as an aging, yet still hunky photographer opposite Meryl Streep's unhappily married Iowan. All of this seemed terribly unlikely for the filmmaker, but the biggest Clint surprise of that summer wound up arriving a week before the release of "The Bridges of Madison County" in a tentpole family flick that shared one element in common with his rural romance.

The film in question? Brad Silberling's "Casper," a supernatural romp that has found its way into Prime Video's top 10 in the U.S. in the days leading up to Halloween (via FlixPatrol). Needless to say, you can chalk that up to people wanting to stream some family-friendly entertainment befitting of spooky season. But let's talk more about that surprise Eastwood cameo, shall we?

Universal

No one handed over their admission (and their kids' admissions) for "Casper" expecting to see a Clint Eastwood cameo. While the star had always allowed the likes of Johnny Carson to make good-natured hay out of his stern, laconic persona, he wasn't in the habit of doing pop-ins in other people's films.

So, when Bill Pullman, who plays the overwhelmed father of Christina Ricci in the surprisingly melancholy "Casper," runs into the bathroom to splash cold water in his face and look in the mirror, no one thought he'd suddenly see Clint Eastwood staring back at him. But that's what happened! His visage quickly morphs into Clint, who glowering threatens him by saying, "I'm gonna kill you, your mama and all her bridge playing friends." To top off the strangeness of this moment, Clint then morphs into Rodney Dangerfield (we also get to see Mel Gibson and the Cryptkeeper).

So that happened! And if you're wondering why Clint would do something so uncharacteristic for a Universal movie when he was fiercely loyal to Warner Bros., the cameo might've been a favor for Steven Spielberg, whose Amblin Entertainment produced both "Casper" and "The Bridges of Madison County." I doubt adults needed a reminder that one of the most hyped movies of that summer was en route, but an extra nudge couldn't have hurt.