I Want My Liberace Record Back! The Gene Hackman Poll

I didn't hugely like Unforgiven in '92 -- never rewatched -- but typically GH was the best thing in it.

That's the problem when you haven't seen something (i.e., Another Woman)--one difference, though, is that his bit in Young Frankenstein is somewhat famous.

My top three are the obvious: The Conversation, Tenenbaums, and Night Moves. After that--and I'm going to guess I've seen close to half--I'd go with Cisco Pike, Scarecrow, Class Action, The Firm, The French Connection, Young Frankenstein, and the two Supermans. Wasn't that big on Unforgiven, more to do with Eastwood than him. Most want to see Downhill Racer.

anyhow really know i should vote night moves or the conversation or one of the french connections here or maybe hoosiers or crimson tide for sentimental reasons or maybe heist cuz god was he built for mamet but feel like to really honor what makes hackman special i should choose one where the material and the film in general are mediocre at heart but salvaged by a great hackman performance. the firm it is!

I think he's like Boyle in The Candidate in Downhill Racer: the vinegar/ cold reality in Redford's life.

I know--the film is junk, but he (and Holly Hunter, and Gary Busey) are so good. (xpost)

don't forget brimley!
http://blog.301films.com/images/wilford.gif

The Firm was one of the few potboilers I read before watching the movie (it was a huge seller, remember), so I was kinda stunned Hackman took this nothing part and made an almost tragic hero out of it.

He also gets away with a mullet.

lol what is that Brimley painting all about?

It's about him being a walrus.

It's the right thing to do.

this guy went on a noble crusade starting in the 80s and going thru retirement to make any old pile of shit he was in watchable. a movie like The Firm almost doesnt deserve the A-game he brings to it. tough poll, might go with Unforgiven

Feel like people might be in danger of sleeping on Get Shorty here, and how funny he was in it.

Look at me.

when he's funny, he's great, but it's v hard to rank the comic stuff alongside the dramatic. (which is why the AAs gen ignore comedy)

i'm trying to think of what clem cut that was a starring role, and so far i got Zandy's Bride?

what about Hackman's addled monologue in The Birdcage about driving through America ("Purple mountains. Grain.")?

It's about him being a walrus.

― a regina spektor is haunting europe (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Monday, July 23, 2012 2:43 PM (7 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

It's the right thing to do.

― a regina spektor is haunting europe (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Monday, July 23, 2012 2:43 PM (7 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

lol, indeed.

I was sitting here wondering if there was something I was missing about Brimley being a seal. Duh. It's been a long day.

Some others that ended up on the cutting-room floor: Lilith, Hawaii, Riot, The Gypsy Moths, Doctor's Wives, Lucky Lady, The Domino Principle, A Bridge Too Far, Reds, Postcards from the Edge, and a few what looked to be starring roles from the '80s and '90s that I didn't know at all (e.g., Split Decisions).

he's good in Reds and Postcards too; he probably deserves his own supporting actor poll too.

If ILE did single artist ballot polls for actors the way we're doing for musical artists, Hackman would be the one I'd want to see first. But we don't need more polling.

I think I have to go with Unforgiven here.

"But we don't need more polling."

Or do we?

My long-ago memory is that he was very good in Reds, but he gets 26th billing on the IMDB page--one scene, I'm guessing?

one or two, a drop in the bucket

Excuse to rescue this from the void: a local station was playing Class Action last night, and I hung around for about the last half. I don't think many people have seen it. Michael Apted directed (somewhere between 28 and 35 Up, I think), and there's a good turn from Fred Thompson, before he graduated to reverse-mortgage spokesperson. Hackman's excellent, in what might be the only drippy film I associate with him...parts of it, anyway--mostly it's just good solid courtroom stuff.

I saw Class Action on a plane when I was 11 and it diverted me long enough that I didn't throw up.

Hey--I remember that exact quote on the movie poster!

damn, it's gotta come down to TFC vs. The Conversation

have always found The Conversation somewhat obvious and overrated

gene. what a hack, maaaaaaaan

he's not very good in cisco pike

Thanks to this poll I sawThe Conversation again on Wednesday. Excellent Copp commentary track. Same impressions I got eighteen years ago: about fifteen minutes too long.

Cisco Pike, he was a friend of mine...I like Hackman's contrast with Kristofferson--he was born middle-aged in a gray raincoat. As I've probably said on numerous threads, I wouldn't change a second of The Conversation.

Automatic thread bump. This poll is closing tomorrow.

The late eighties I-need-cash sequence, as I said last week, is better than you remember, and responsible for good Saturday afternoon viewing.

The Package
Narrow Margin
Class Act

his two-minute perf in Woody's Another Woman as a lovelorn novelist jolts the film to life.

― a regina spektor is haunting europe (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Monday, July 23, 2012 2:12 PM (5 days ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

yes, he is wonderful in it.

Yup. the REAL movie is about his and Rowlands' relationship

whoa... has he really not done a movie since 2003?

he retired after his last one. he seems to love retirement too, just fishin all day in the keys

Keeping a very close eye out for overhead planes.

http://www.jonathanrosenbaum.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/08/night-moves.jpg

Saw Cisco Pike not long ago and liked it a lot, but for me this comes down to Tenenbaums vs. The Conversation. The Conversation because it's one of my favorite movies ever, and he's absolutely brilliant in it playing one of the most shut-down guys ever; Tenenbaums because he reminds me of my own dad in it, which is kind of terrifying. Interestingly, I saw him on Inside the Actor's Studio once and it turns out he's from the same part of California as my dad (though Hackman's 15-20 years older).

Automatic thread bump. This poll's results are now in.

Seems pretty reasonable. I thought Tenenbaums might sneak in, but Harry Caul's charisma overwhelms all.

kinda amazed french connection only managed one vote!

thought 'you pick your feet in poll-keepsie?' was a shoo-in for thread title!

christ i love this guy.

"Whatever you do, don't sell that POLL!"

Imagine Crimson Tide without Hackman...

i thought CT was gonna get some votes for sure. im not a big Conversation guy.

Unforgiven was almost my vote. "But...I was building a house..." always slays me.

(shit, wish I could change my vote now)

― to welcome jer.fairall, pie is served. (jer.fairall), Monday, July 23, 2012 6:17 PM (1 week ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

I missed the poll, but that would've been my vote, largely for that exchange with Eastwood. Runner-up would've been the first Superman -- he and Ned Beatty were a great comic team.

Oh, and Heist -- I think the movie overall is 2nd-tier Mamet, but Hackman's great. "I don't want you to be as quiet as an ant pissing on cotton. I want you to be as quiet as an ant not even thinking about pissing on cotton."

kinda amazed french connection only managed one vote!

we would never vote for a guy's star-making performance in a million years.

yeah hackman, devito and lindo are all killer in Heist.

he's out there driving and doing his thing

Someone caught him on film just this morning--looking very spry for his age.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ciHMuk0VLmY

Thinking about this on the drive home, how I'd categorize them:

Nicholson, De Niro, Pacino -- first tier, the three guys who most define the decade.

Hoffman and Hackman -- a shade below; actor's actors, maybe minus some of the glamour of the three above

Redford and Beatty -- sex symbols striving for more; more serious roles, directing, etc.

The genre/action stars -- Eastwood at the top, and then Reynolds, McQueen, Roundtree, Jim Brown, Charles Bronson, etc.

After that, character actors, second-tier stars (e.g., Richard Dreyfuss), etc.

I would absolutely include Hoffman in the top tier. Including box office.

Nicholson, De Niro, Pacino -- first tier, the three guys who most define the decade.

Hoffman and Hackman -- a shade below; actor's actors, maybe minus some of the glamour of the three above

Redford and Beatty -- sex symbols striving for more; more serious roles, directing, etc.

The genre/action stars -- Eastwood at the top, and then Reynolds, McQueen, Roundtree, Jim Brown, Charles Bronson, etc.

After that, character actors, second-tier stars (e.g., Richard Dreyfuss), etc.

Where do you put Paul Newman? He slips between categories 1 and 3 for me.

He had a pretty good decade, but I still think of him as a '50s/60s guy, with a big comeback in the '80s. So I don't know where I'd put him.

Needs a separate thread, but I'd like to try actresses. The decade was grossly unfair to them. Jane Fonda would seem to stand alone at the top, but even she had to do stuff like Fun with Dick and Jane and Califonia Suite. Maybe Julie Christie, too, I don't know.

Califonia, right next door to Caledonia--say it with flair.

I still think of him as a '50s/60s guy, with a big comeback in the '80s

The Sting (1973)
The Towering Inferno (1974)
Slap Shot (1977)

That's a pretty good decade, all right.

* points at elliot gould like gen turgidson *

I thought of him, for sure. Gould and George Segal (and others, I'm sure) are almost a category unto themselves: so '70s they barely exist outside the decade. (Not meaning they didn't continue to work, just that the association is so strong.)

James Caan might be in that category too.

Again, this is not a science. You can shuffle and reconfigure them dozens of ways.

Yeah, any movie James Caan was in after Thief (1981) was received as a comeback.

The Sting is one of the highest grossing American films of all time.

Fun with Dick and Jane, after five years of activism and Godard films, was her comeback even though it's terrible.

Faye Dunaway has to be in the running if we're talking about female actors in The 1970s. But that was a decade when the new era of Hollywood really pushed male actors to the extreme forefront, maybe it was the auteurism from male directors that did this but you wound up with a lotta one-sided male gaze going on. When you look at it from that point of view, it feels like a step back from what was going on in the 1930s and 1940s and 1950s.

Knowing full well of course that Hollywood was definitely not an ideal place for women in those decades either.

Yeah, she was pretty key. Maybe Fonda, Christie, Dunaway, and Ellen Burstyn are at the top (although Burstyn's second half of the decade didn't match her first).

Dunaway, Keaton, MacLaine, Burstyn

Hell, even throw Streisand in the mix.

I love Desperate Characters, but I don't know about MacLaine in the '70s. (Didn't know--or had forgotten--she turned down The Exorcist.)

Sally Fields later in the decade...I'll start a new thread; Gene's losing his.

I'd add Liv Ullmann (two Oscar nods) and a fairly major cultural force for most of the decade.

MacLaine sat out the middle of the decade doing famous person stuff (travelled the world, did a Vegas revue) before coming back with The Turning Point.

Actress talk: You Like Me! (Actresses of the 1970s)

A cable station here aired The Conversation and Downhill Racer tonight.