Although Gene Hackman, who died at age 95, was one of Hollywood’s most enduring and recognisable stars, it was nearly impossible to put him in a box. Over a five-decade career, he portrayed cops, villains and men of the cloth, in thrillers, comedies and superhero blockbusters.
His accolades included two Academy Awards and four Golden Globes, including, in 2003, the Cecil B. DeMille Award for outstanding contributions to entertainment.
Here are some of his most notable performances.
‘The French Connection’
Hackman’s breakout role was as Jimmy “Popeye” Doyle, a cop investigating a heroin deal in William Friedkin’s “The French Connection.” Hackman won the best actor Academy Award for this performance, and critics immediately recognised his star quality. Stephen Farber, reviewing the movie for The New York Times, said Hackman had brought “a new kind of police hero” to the screen. (Stream, rent or buy it on Prime, YouTube, Apple TV or Fandango.)
‘The Conversation’
Hackman didn’t always see eye to eye with directors, including when working with Francis Ford Coppola on 1974’s “The Conversation", about a skilled surveillance expert whose natural paranoia shades into mania during the course of a difficult assignment. Hackman reportedly bristled at Coppola’s loose instructions and demands for more improvisation. Perhaps because of the actor’s confusion and frustration, Hackman gave what many critics have called his career-best performance as a man perpetually on edge, fumbling his way through everyday human interactions. The movie won the Palme d’Or, the top prize, at the 1974 Cannes Film Festival. (Stream, rent or buy it on YouTube, Fandango, Apple TV or Prime.)
‘Bonnie and Clyde’
Although Hackman’s breakthrough was with “The French Connection", he had actually scored his first Oscar nomination years earlier with 1967’s “Bonnie and Clyde", a movie that kicked off American cinema’s “New Hollywood” era and introduced audiences to a wave of fresh faces and film-makers with lofty aesthetic ambitions. Director Arthur Penn helped turn the true story of Depression-era fugitive bank robbers Clyde Barrow (Warren Beatty) and Bonnie Parker (Faye Dunaway) into a lyrical, blood-spattered study of the American dream. Hackman played Clyde’s squarer older brother, Buck, and represented all the sturdy Midwesterners who couldn’t help but fall for the romance of outlaws. (Stream, rent or buy it on Apple TV, Fandango or Prime.)
‘I Never Sang For My Father’
This 1970 version of the drama class staple garnered Hackman his second Oscar nomination. It was for best supporting actor, but the story is really all about Hackman’s character, Gene, a middle-aged man still afraid to stand up to his father and live his own life. (Stream, rent or buy it on Apple TV, YouTube, Fubo, Fandango or Prime.)
‘Night Moves’ Re-teaming with “Bonnie and Clyde” director Arthur Penn, Hackman starred in this 1975 movie: one of the last great “New Hollywood” films, which arrived just before “Jaws” and “Star Wars” saw movie studios turn towards blockbusters. “Night Moves", about a moody private eye working a missing-persons case, is stubbornly not a crowd-pleasing action flick. Hackman’s hero, Harry Moseby, is a loser and the case offers few satisfying payoffs. This is a movie about people going nowhere, slowly; and Hackman delivers a memorably lived-in performance as a detective mainly searching for his own elusive dignity. (Stream, rent or buy it on Apple TV, YouTube, Hulu, Fandango or Prime.)
‘Mississippi Burning’
Hackman’s major movie of the 1980s was “Mississippi Burning", in which he portrayed an FBI agent in 1960s Mississippi who uses violent tactics to help an investigation into the murder of three civil rights activists. Around its release, some civil rights experts criticised the movie for fictionalising the real murder of three men, but many movie critics and fans praised Hackman’s “achingly plausible” performance, which led to his second best actor nomination. (Stream, rent or buy it on YouTube, Fandango, Apple TV, Tubi, Roku, Pluto TV or Prime.)
‘Unforgiven’
Hackman won his second Oscar — a best supporting actor award in 1993 — for “Unforgiven", in which he played a sadistic small-town sheriff who comes up against a string of bounty hunters, including one played by Clint Eastwood. In the Times review of the film, Vincent Canby said Hackman “delights” in the role, and he noted a shift for the performer: “No more Mr. Good Guy.” (Stream, rent or buy it on Prime, Fandango, Apple TV or YouTube.)
‘The Royal Tenenbaums’ Hackman also won acclaim playing in comedies. In 2001, he starred in Wes Anderson’s “The Royal Tenenbaums” as a disbarred lawyer who tries to reconcile with his eccentric children. A.O. Scott, reviewing the movie for the Times, said that Hackman had “the amazing ability to register belligerence, tenderness, confusion and guile within the space of a few lines of dialogue. You never know where he’s going, but it always turns out to be exactly the right place.” (Stream, rent or buy it on Apple TV, Prime, Fandango or YouTube.)
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