Clint Eastwood just can’t quit the movies. Technically, he’s been making them for seven full decades; 1955’s Revenge of the Creature, in which he made his (uncredited) screen debut, recently celebrated its 70th anniversary (or anyway, it could have). He might now be retired from acting, but on the other hand, who knows? He’s been credibly preparing farewell pictures for a solid 30-plus years; Unforgiven would be a capstone achievement of so many careers, but its Oscar win wound up inspiring more of the westerns it darkly eulogized, and launched Eastwood’s career into at least its third act, if not its fourth or fifth.

The best Clint Eastwood movies are not all of a somber mood, though. Those multiple potential goodbyes over the years have felt earned, not just because he’s made himself more scarce as an on-screen presence over the last couple of decades, but because he’s logged so much time in traditional star vehicles. Eastwood first came into prominence as a star of the TV Western series Rawhide, and made plenty more big-screen Westerns after that; he’s also done a lot of cop movies, war pictures, crime pictures…thrillers, mostly, that sometimes turn out to be more like dramas about the effects of violence, or explorations of American myths. (Sadly, Revenge of the Creature is, to date, his only monster movie.) There’s a lot to sort through, and many of his movies are thoroughly watchable by virtue of him holding the screen with that squinty, steely presence that still somehow holds a little surprise in the moments where it gives way to moments of warmth and humor. Still: Not all Clint Eastwood movies are created equal, and the goal here is to choose some of his best and, in some cases, less appreciated films for streaming.

Selecting a dozen movies from a filmography of over 60 films requires both some degree of arbitrary preferences and some enforcement of limitations. First: These are classical Clint Eastwood movies in the sense that they star Clint Eastwood. Since the 2000s, the majority of his films have been directing-only projects, and between those and the many self-directed vehicles he made before that period, the Eastwood directorial filmography is a whole other thing. Eastwood behind the camera doesn’t disqualify a movie from this list (if it did, there wouldn’t be much beyond the 1970s), but this group is intended as a sampling of his best work as a movie star, not as an accomplished filmmaker.

Second: A number of canonized titles have been eliminated automatically. Does anyone need to be told to check out The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly or the rest of the Man with No Name trilogy? Those movies, along with the five Dirty Harry pictures (more of a catch-’em-on-cable type of deal after the first one, anyway), are not represented here, nor are Eastwood’s two Best Picture winners, Unforgiven and Million Dollar Baby. Those films feature two of his best performances and deservedly won him a pair of Best Director Oscars, too. They also grossed $100 million apiece in North America so maybe you’ve already seen them. You definitely should if not. Same goes for the aforementioned Leone trilogy. But if those are the only Eastwood pictures you’ve seen and you’re interested in going beyond the obvious classics, you should check out these movies, too—a selection spanning half a century of cinema, presented here in chronological order.

The Beguiled (1971)

THE BEGUILED, from left, Elizabeth Hartman, Clint Eastwood, 1971Everett Collection