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Last week as I was googling for images for last week’s “Pet Peeves” Medium Cool post, Gene Hackman kept showing up. He is 94 95 years old now, and they say he retired from making films in 2004, but I see he snuck a bit of work in after that. Such an exceptional talent., and he was apparently on Nixon’s enemies list, so he’s got that going for him, too.
I thought that tonight maybe we could talk about Gene Hackman and some of the outstanding films he starred in. What are your favorite films? What makes them your favorites? What are the things that contributed to Gene Hackman being such a great actor?
Steeplejack could have told us about all the TV shows Gene Hackman guest starred in.
He surely belongs in the Top 10 Best Actors of all time list. But let’s save that discussion – I think that could be a good topic for next week, what do you think about that as a topic?
A list of films from Fandango is below the fold.
For those new to Medium Cool, these are not open threads.
Filmography
| YEAR | TITLE | ROLE |
| 2017 | We, the Marines | Narrator |
| 2009 | I Knew It Was You: Rediscovering John Cazale | Actor |
| 2006 | Superman II: The Richard Donner Cut | Lex Luthor |
| 2004 | Welcome to Mooseport | Monroe Cole |
| 2004 | Imaginary Witness: Hollywood and the Holocaust | Actor |
| 2003 | Runaway Jury | Rankin Fitch |
| 2001 | The Mexican | Arnold Margolese |
| 2001 | Heartbreakers | William B. Tensy |
| 2001 | The Royal Tenenbaums | Royal Tenenbaum |
| 2001 | Behind Enemy Lines | Reigart |
| 2000 | The Replacements | McGinty |
| 2000 | Under Suspicion | Henry Hearst |
| 1998 | Antz | General Mandible |
| 1998 | Enemy of the State | Edward ‘Brill’ Lyle |
| 1998 | Twilight (1998) | Jack Ames |
| 1997 | Absolute Power | President Allen Richmond |
| 1996 | The Birdcage | Sen. Kevin Keeley |
| 1995 | Get Shorty | Harry Zimm |
| 1995 | The Quick And The Dead | John Herod |
| 1995 | Crimson Tide | Capt. Frank Ramsey |
| 1993 | Geronimo: An American Legend | Brig. Gen. George Crook |
| 1992 | Unforgiven | Little Bill Daggett |
| 1990 | Narrow Margin | Robert Caulfield |
| 1990 | Postcards From the Edge | Lowell Kolchek |
| 1988 | Bat 21 | Lt. Col. Iceal Hambleton |
| 1988 | Mississippi Burning | Agent Rupert Anderson |
| 1988 | Another Woman (1988) | Larry Lewis |
| 1987 | Superman IV: The Quest for Peace | Lex Luthor/Voice of Nuclear Man |
| 1986 | Hoosiers | Coach Norman Dale |
| 1985 | Twice in a Lifetime | Harry MacKenzie |
| 1983 | Under Fire | Alex Grazier |
| 1981 | All Night Long (1981) | George Dupler |
| 1980 | Superman II | Lex Luthor |
| 1978 | Superman – The Movie (1978) | Lex Luthor |
| 1977 | A Bridge Too Far | Major General Sosabowski |
| 1975 | Night Moves (1975) | Harry Moseby |
| 1975 | Bite the Bullet | Sam Clayton |
| 1975 | French Connection II | Doyle |
| 1975 | Lucky Lady | Kibby Womack |
| 1974 | Young Frankenstein | The Blindman (Harold) |
| 1974 | The Conversation | Harry Caul |
| 1973 | Scarecrow (1920) | Max Millan |
| 1972 | Prime Cut | Mary Ann |
| 1972 | The Poseidon Adventure | Rev. Frank Scott |
| 1971 | The French Connection | Det. Jimmy “Popeye” Doyle |
| 1971 | Cisco Pike | Officer Leo Holland |
| 1970 | I Never Sang for My Father | Gene Garrison |
| 1969 | The Gypsy Moths | Joe Browdy |
| 1969 | Downhill Racer | Eugene Claire |
| 1969 | Marooned | Buzz Lloyd |
| 1968 | The Split | Detective Lt. Walter Brill |
| 1967 | Bonnie and Clyde | Buck Barrow |
| 1966 | Hawaii | Dr. John Whipple |
| 1964 | Lilith | Norman |
Gin & Tonic
The Conversation is by far my favorite. I actually own a DVD of it. Despite advances in recording/audio technology, it holds up very well, IMO.
hells littlest angel
The Conversation is a movie I can watch over and over.
NeenerNeener
He was a great Lex Luthor in the Superman films, maybe because he was great at playing @$$holes. I hated The Royal Tenenbaum’s, just could not watch that film all the way through.
Nukular Biskits
Damn.
His first movie was the year I was born!
CliosFanBoy
@NeenerNeener:
You stole my post! Hackman is THE Lex Luthor. And I got about 15 minutes into Royal Tennabaums before I switched channels.
Tehanu
The Conversation is of course a great film, but I’ve always loved Hackman playing comedy — Young Frankenstein, Superman II, Heartbreakers, Get Shorty. I saw him in person once, at the Sherman Oaks Galleria, of all places, just walking down a corridor, and was totally astounded to see that he was at least 6’3″ tall — I’d always thought he was a little stocky guy.
funlady75
I loved him in The Runaway Jury & Absolute Power…..a great bad guy…..but my favorite character he played was in The Birdcage…love the ending dressed in drag….
The Thin Black Duke
What I appreciated about Gene Hackman was his authenticity. His magic was being able to navigate and explore the nuances of the characters he played without it clumsily stumbling in caricature. Hackman could be quiet and still fill up the frame with his presence. There was never the loud, in-your-face, dialed-up-to-eleven hamminess seen in actors like Pacino and Nicholson. But I wish he retired after The Royal Tenebaums; it would have been an elegant and appropriate grace note to a remarkable career.
Scout211
It’s not on your list, but Gene Hackman played a creepy scary SecDef in No Way Out. (1987)
I loved that movie and all its plot twists and turns.. Hackman really made that character and really made that movie.
Precursor to our current SecDef? Hmmmm. Just a thought.
Suzanne
Enemy of the State was a trifle, but I enjoyed it tremendously. He was fantastic in it. He had great rapport with Will Smith.
I watched the first half of The French Connection about a month ago. Had never seen it before and still haven’t finished it. I don’t watch movies often, but every once in a while, when I catch something that that 60s-70s era, I am reminded how common the N-word was and it’s incredibly jarring.
Another actor who I feel like is equally great and similar in vibe….. Woody Harrelson.
thalarctosMaritimus
Whoa. I saw the title, and assumed it was an RIP post. Very glad to be wrong.
I loved him in The Birdcage. I always thought of him as a dramatic actor; it was good to see him do comedy.
Rachel Bakes
Twilight was a good film for its time. All older actors (Hackman, Sarandon, James Garner, Newman) playing older characters. It was honest. No making them appear younger than they were.
CliosFanBoy
@Scout211:
Good catch! It’s a fav in DC to 1. catch the spots where they really did film here and 2. catch the errors. Taking the GW Parkway to go to the Eastern Shore? (wrong direction!) and a Metro stop in Georgetown? We wish!
oldster
“The Taking of Pelham 123” is my favorite Gene Hackman movie in which Gene Hackman did not appear.
What can I tell you? That Walter Matthau role — he did pretty well in it, but it had Hackman written all over it.
Chief Oshkosh
I, too, like his comedic roles the best, of which I include his Lex Luthor.
Fun fact: he and his son owned and flew an aerobatic airplane, a Pitts S2A, I believe. That’s kind of a big deal in sport aviation circles (not that he was a pilot, necessarily, but that he apparently mastered that airplane).
piratedan
strangely enough one of his best turns isn’t on the list…. the film Heist, when I think of his range and consider how awesome he was in Young Frankenstein and then absolutely believable in A Bridge Too Far.
Nowadays, he would be considered the generational equivalent of Tom Hanks, could do anything, could wear any mask and breathe life into his character.
pretty awesome legacy if you ask me.
Scamp Dog
It looks like you have a link to the wrong Scarecrow movie, the 1920 Buster Keaton short, instead of the 1973 movie featuring Hackman.
Citizen Dave
Hoosiers.
Pretty sure he retired to Sante Fe a couple decades ago. He’s 95./p>
Jeffro
@Scout211:
@CliosFanBoy:
‘No Way Out’ is literally the only Hackman movie I could think of off of the top of my head (and it, and he, were excellent)
This says volumes about how few movies I watch, especially quality ones, but still – great flick!
Almost Retired
@Tehanu: Agree on both your points. When some dramatic actors do comedy they do it sort of as self-parody of their usual screen persona. Not Gene Hackman. He was also a genuine comedic actor. And Get Shorty is a great example.
Which gets to my second point of agreement with your post. There was a restaurant scene in Get Shorty that was filmed at an actual restaurant downstairs in the building where I worked at the time (at 5th and Santa Monica boulevard in Santa Monica). I think he was cut from the scene but I saw him from a distance outside. Totally surprised at how tall he was, since we’re all so used to the Hollywood stereotype of leading men in high heels (ahem…cough ….Tom Cruise).
funlady75
What was the movie he played with Maria Schell as a Mail order bride?
Another Scott
Hackman and Boyle together in Young Frankenstein was just so perfect.
I enjoyed The Royal Tenenbaums very much, but admit I can have a twisted sense of humor at times.
Best wishes,
Scott.
WaterGirl
@thalarctosMaritimus: I changed the title slightly so as not to alarm anyone else.
WaterGirl
@Scout211: I can’t believe that’s not on the list. Great film!
WaterGirl
@Scamp Dog: That was a copy & paste from Fandango. I take no responsibility for the bad link! :-)
Nukular Biskits
I had completely forgotten Gene Hackman was in Young Frankenstein.
zhena gogolia
Seconding Young Frankenstein and Heartbreakers. I liked Night Moves too
MattF
The Conversation is great. That brief bloody scene in the bathroom is a nightmare worthy of any horror flick.
And Unforgiven…. also great, but more Eastwood than Hackman.
laura
He looks like my dad- and that, in addition to his amazing character acting, is why I’ll always be a fan. Mr. Blanche Barrow, the Conversation, the French Connection- 3 movies of his that spouse and I will always stop what we’re doing to watch. He’s an everyman.
Craig
He’s excellent in the underappreciated Twilight. The cast is insane. Paul Newman stars as a beat down ex-cop, now PI that acts as the bagman for his old movie buddy Gene Hackman. Susan Sarandon plays Hackman’s skeezy moviestar wife. This before her idiot turn to politics. Then it’s everybody; Margo Martindale, Giancarlo Esposito, Reese Witherspoon, young Jason Clarke, M. Emmett Walsh, Liev Schreiber, knockout performance from Stockard Channing, and a brilliant late career flourish from James Garner. Beautiful film from Robert Benton. Hackman is understated, but clearly a dangerous man.
Lapassionara
Loved him in Bonnie and Clyde, the French Connection, Hoosiers, Birdcage, etc. what a talent.
Splitting Image
Hackman was probably very lucky in his timing when he started out. Antiheroes and schlubs fighting the system were starting to become a big thing and he was perfect for those kinds of part. He had charisma to spare without being especially handsome, so he got a lot of roles that someone like Gregory Peck might not have. (Popeye Doyle, for one.)
Terrific comic timing, too, which served him well over the years, especially in Superman. “Otisburg…?”
My favourite of his films might be The Poseidon Adventure, which is just damn good fun, but I have about a dozen of his films on DVD. His cameo in Young Frankenstein is great.
Sure Lurkalot
@Scout211: I looked over the list and saw No Way Out was missing as well and I agree…Hackman played a real creep quite well in that.
Princess
@Scout211: I was just coming in here to kvetch about No Way Out not being on the list. It’s a great film with a fabulous twist.
kalakal
He was excellent in The Conversation and Unforgiven. He’s also a really good comedy actor, The Birdcage, Young Frankenstein and Get Shorty spring to mind. I’m sure there’s a few films missing from that filmography.
zhena gogolia
@kalakal: His imdb page goes on and on and on.
ETA: It includes “Rowan and Martin’s Laugh-In”!
Sure Lurkalot
The list is also missing The Firm, Grisham novel adaptation.
pajaro
For me, #5 Enemy of the State, #4 Unforgiven, #3 Hoosiers, #2 The Conversation, #1 French Connection
He could do anything, and in a different mood, I’d probably answer it differently. I guess I’m dating myself with the French Connection. I thought, at the time, that it was a great movie, and that he was a great character, an action hero with a sense of the absurdity of what he was doing. (And then there was the car chase, maybe the best, along with Bullitt, ever filmed)
NotMax
Possible topic for future consideration.
What is the single most favorite joke you’ve ever heard/told/read about? Only the one, please.
Craig
@Princess: yeah, great twist. Hackman is awesome in it.
What Have the Romans Ever Done for Us?
Loved him in Young Frankenstein and Unforgiven and several other movies but I think my favorite is his hilarious turn as Lex Luthor in the first Superman movie.
comrade scotts agenda of rage
@What Have the Romans Ever Done for Us?:
You beat me to it. I’m not a Hackman film fan, I’m a Hackman role fan. And he’s hysterical as Lex Luthor in the first two Superman films.
In Unforgiven, it’s an incredibly nuanced performance because it’s hard to balance the inherent evilness of the character with his hysterical DIY cluelessness on his house building. He deservedly won an Oscar for that performance.
And as cameos go, Young Frankenstein is easily in the Top 5.
Splitting Image
@Tehanu:
Oddly enough, I’ve always had the same impression. Maybe because I remember him playing opposite Christopher Reeve, who was quite tall himself, and Peter Boyle, who was wearing extremely tall platforms for the monster role.
There is a group photo of the Bonnie and Clyde cast though where he absolutely towers over everyone else, including Warren Beatty.
WaterGirl
@Sure Lurkalot: I had originally copied in the list of films from wikipedia, but this format from Fandango was a little less clumsy. I bet the others were more complete.
A woman from anywhere (formerly Mohagan)
Haven’t read the comments yet, so someone has probably beat me to it, but the filmography leaves out The Firm from1993 (the Tom Cruise vehicle), and Hackman was (again) the best thing in it, and there were a lot of good people in it.
oldgold
Gene Hackman, Dustin Hoffman, and Robert Duvall were good friends in the late 1950s and early 60s, when they were working menial jobs and scrounging for any sort of roles. This interesting article in Vanity Fair, “Before They Were Kings,” reviews how these three close friends went from the bottom the acting barrel to Hollywood’s A-list. It is a good read.
https://www.vanityfair.com/news/2004/03/gene-hackman-dustin-hoffman-hollywood?srsltid=AfmBOorG-yGYP4Jv2kM7aP1ITSyiQ8qBfnnBkeQpGF2yFR2V1Ymmdsbv
frosty
Enemy of the State is one I would rewatch more than once. The final scene, when Hackman walks away in a police uniform, carrying a cat, is great.
Why is this a favorite? He and Will Smith have a good rapport … he’s not a mentor but more like a browbeater teaching Smith how the world really works.
His role as the blind man in Young Frankenstein was one of the highlights of the movie for me. “Wait, come back! I’m making espresso!” I read that he lobbied for the part because he’d never done comedy and wanted to try it. Kudos to Mel Brooks for going for it!
Chris
Not gonna mean anything to most people, but he was always my mental image for Joruus C’baoth, the mad Jedi from the old Thrawn books. He’s good at playing authority figures that can be terrifying while still being charismatic enough to be compelling.
Just look at that parking lot
The Conversation is at the top for me. It’s beautiful watching how he plays the character’s downward spiral into guilt and paranoia. Davis Shire’s soundtrack is one of the best matches I heard for any movie. The piano pieces are as warped as Harry Caul himself.
I’ll throw in Bonnie & Clyde just for getting to hear him repeat that insipid cow and sick mother joke to everyone he meets.
The 1969 movie The Gypsy Moths with Hackman, Bert Lancaster & Scott Wilson was one I always remember him in. They play a skydiving performance/ daredevil act touring the Midwest. As with some of his other roles, his character was the loudest, most boisterous one in the room. Watching this movie for the first time fifty years ago, it flipped me how Lancaster’s character chose to die.
tam1MI
Gene Hackman was one of those actors who made it look so easy you tended to forget how good he was. Just quietly excellent in every movie he was ever in. My favorite was THE CONVERSATION, but believe me, it is a very crowded field!
raven
@Scamp Dog: It’s a movie with him an Pacino as two drifters. The scene where Pacino goes psycho and picks up a kid in a huge fountain in Detroit. chillin
https://youtu.be/mWpyll8GVGg?si=JmZaaddW8omRZuXe
Chris
As far as actual roles of his? I know it’s a load of pro-FBI copaganda that’s egregious even by those standards, but his cop in Mississippi Burning was great. He kind of comes off like LBJ – a Southerner who at least at first is less committed to the cause than his Yankee partner, but also understands the culture down there much better so that when he finally decides to take the gloves off, they’re off for real.
raven
The “Duck of Death” is one of the great lines in movie history.
raven
dupe
thalarctosMaritimus
@WaterGirl: That’s kind of you–thanks! I think seeing so many memorial blog posts like that has turned me hypervigilant.
TheOtherHank
When I was but a lad my dad (a surgeon in the Navy) was stationed in Taiwan for two years (this was just before Nixon Went To China). The movie theater on the base had matinee movies every Saturday and Sunday for $0.25. I went to at least one matinee a week. There was a very short list of movies in heavy rotation for the matinees. One was The Poseidon Adventure and another was Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory. I must have seen each of them at least a dozen times during the time I lived there.
It occurs to me that seeing those two movies so often might be the source of my vague impression that Gene Hackman and Gene Wilder were the same guy.
All that being said, I think my favorite Gene Hackman is in Get Shorty when his character is trying to be a tough guy and gets his ass kicked.
Ruckus
@Suzanne:
It depends on who you knew and who you were at the time how often you’d hear it. I was in my second year in the USN that year and heard it occasionally but the ship I was stationed on, a not insignificant percentage of the crew were black and so I very rarely heard that word. Otherwise I might have. Summers before that I had a job just east of south central Los Angeles and very rarely heard that word. And until I was six, when she passed, my grandmother lived on the north side of Watts. And I never heard that word. And I went to integrated schools 7th grade and on. I rarely heard that word. And in high school saying that out loud often got one somewhat bruised up. So I almost never heard that word. And that is still far more than I ever should have had to hear it. At home? Never. Use it? Never. It’s massively disrespectful to human beings.
Soprano2
Mine is Hoosiers. I think it’s more because that movie reminds me of my dad so much. He was a basketball coach whose teams played in a lot of gyms like that. Hackman’s character was a lot like my dad except I can’t imagine him ever hitting a player. The movie was true to what those spaces were like, and to how my dad coached and how he saw sports.
Salty Sam
Agree- Heist is my favorite… heist movie. It’s got the all time best “kill shot dialogue”:
Danny Devito as an evil underworld character who has fucked over Gene Hackman’s character repeatedly throughout the movie. Big gunfight on the wharf, Devito is down and mortally wounded. Hackman limps over, holds a shotgun to Devito’s face. Devito asks “Hey, don’t you wanna hear my last words?”
Hackman “I just did.” BOOM!
With the exception of “The Quick and the Dead”, I have loved Hackman’s work since I saw “The French Connection” in the theater. TQATD wasn’t Hackman’s fault, it was just a stupid movie.
raven
@Ruckus: Inglewood? My sister went to Morningside
Wyatt Salamanca
Many thanks to Peter Boyle for turning down the role of Popeye Doyle in The French Connection and to Marlon Brando for turning down the role of Harry Caul in The Conversation which allowed Gene Hackman to get these roles and deliver grand slam home run performances in both films.
In addition to Hackman, kudos to Fernando Rey who played Alain “Frog One” Charnier and to Don Ellis for his kick-ass musical score!
THE FRENCH CONNECTION Clip – “Subway”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sYySLaw3E-4&list=PLapba2UCKbm87J1S-ixpabIVBGH7WNUBN&index=23
Betty
@funlady75: He was so good in Absolute Power. Just a scary cold-blooded man.
Craig
Watched Night Moves awhile ago. Pretty great. Hackman as ex-football player for the Raiders. Now he’s a marginal Private Eye in LA. Gets a bone thrown to him to work a missing person from a buddy. Client is an old starlet. Her daughter ran off. Her skuzzy boyfriend James Woods(natch) points him to Florida. Teenage Melanie Griffith is hell on wheels Trouble. Hackman is great. Directed by his old pal Arthur Penn.
Annie
I don’t see Target on this list— Hackman played a businessman who is a retired CIA spy. His teenage son, played by Matt Dillon, does not know this and thinks his dad is kind of a schlub. Then the wife is kidnapped while on a trip to Europe and father and son go to try to find her. Very good movie, with some really funny moments when the son finds out Dad is really a bad-ass.
Gin & Tonic
@Wyatt Salamanca: Having watched The Conversation several times, I simply cannot imagine Brando in that role.
prostratedragon
@Tehanu:
Only saw part of The Birdcage once, on tv, and Hackman’s part was probably smaller, but I recall that he broke character just slightly and in a delightful way in one scene. I think his character was finding that he could connect with a world very strange to him.
prostratedragon
@funlady75: Aha! Think I only saw scenes that must have led up to the drag scene — so he was indeed telling us a little something.
prostratedragon
Thinking about it, The Conversation is my favorite combination of Hackman, character, and movie. It is possible to get only two of those three things (The French Connection), one of which will always be Hackman.
And of course the reason for his greatness is that he and I have the same birthday. A number of other actors that day as well.
West of the Rockies
I don’t see Class Action on the list. It also starred Mary Elizabeth Mastrantonio and Laurence Fishburne. I loved that movie.
tailfedders
Another missing from the list, 1996’s Extreme Measures. Great cast.
CaseyL
I’ve never seen Hackman in a role where he didn’t shine. Always a pleasure to watch; you can always sense a lot of depth behind the eyes.
I’m another one who loved him as Lex Luthor, particularly his scenes with Zod. So sure of himself he gives the General the same snark he gives everyone else.
Mai Naem mobil
I know it’s not one of his more well known movies but I really enjoyed Narrow Margin. I hadn’t realized how many movies he’s been in and how many I’ve watched.
The Unmitigated Gaul
@Scamp Dog: Scarecrow was a a great 70s movie.
Ishmael
@funlady75: I think it was Zandy’s Bride?
i remember him carrying the parts to her cookstove from the barn in the rain at the end. Great movie
i also liked The Package with Tommy Lee Jones and Joanna Cassidy.
funlady75
@Ishmael: thank you.