Hes on a case where he hunts a movie stars runaway teenage daughter in the Florida Keys.
But at one point Hackman watches a football game on TV, while his wife asks him whos winning.
Nobody, he says without taking his eyes off the screen.
“I pity directors who work with me,” Hackman (here in 1969) once said with a laugh.Santi Visalli/Getty Images
One side is just losing slower than the other.
A great line, so great thatThe Wireripped it off verbatim for Prez.
He brought a quintessential American fatalism to characters fromBonnie and ClydetoThe French Connection, fromThe ConversationtoHoosiers.
He brought so muchjoie de vivreto each role, even when he was playing jerks.
Hes a lonely man who has chosen to make loneliness his lifes work.
His drama teachers told him that with his everyman looks, he was a character actor.
The world character denotes something less than attractive,Hackman toldFilm Commentin 1988.
This was drummed into us.
But I still wanted to be an actor.
It earned Hackman his first Oscar nomination.
(You simply cant touch Harry with a bullet, no matter how close to him you fire.)
Popeye tells himself hes the kind of brutally efficient bastard who gets results at all costs.
Except he doesnt get the results.
Hes a Dr. Frankenstein playing God with patients, killing them off for his scientific experiments.
Yet his Midwestern warmth was always there.
Not only does he offer the creature a cigar, he sets his finger on fire.
As Anderson said, the role was written for him against his wishes.
Yet theres something apropos about that, fitting his blue-collar ethic.
Retiring with a masterpiece would have been too sentimental a finale for an actor as flinty as this guy.
Farewell to one of the all-time greats.
