Famous Hollywood actor dies

Хотел написать, что Джин Хэкмен, которого нашли мертвым в их доме с женой, был последним ветераном независимого Голливуда 70-х. Но потом понимаешь, что это неправда. Живы, по крайней мере, Аль Пачино, Роберт Де Ниро и Дастин Хоффман (кстати, он, наряду с Хэкменом, считался самым безнадежным учеником на курсах актерского мастерства). Другое дело, что Хэкмен старше их — он дожил до 95 лет, хотя ушел из кино двадцать лет назад именно по состоянию здоровья. (Это «состояние», кстати, не помешало ему стать автором нескольких книг «на пенсии»). Дело в том, что Хэкмен прославился, пожалуй, позже всех — в 40 лет. Нет, Хэкмен снимался и раньше, и порой успешно, как, например, в «Бонни и Клайде», за который он был номинирован на «Оскар» как лучший актер второго плана, но его «звездный час» настал с главной ролью в одном из лучших полицейских боевиков в истории кино — «Французский связной».

This happened due to a circumstance that is easier to explain with an example. For example, Jean-Paul Belmondo, who played representatives of the law in many films, always looked on the screen not as a real policeman, but as "Belmondo in the role of a policeman". But Gene Hackman in the role of a police detective in "The French Connection" looks exactly like a New York cop, recklessly passionate in his hunt for criminals. Then this trait was borrowed from him by the "hard nut" Bruce Willis, and he was not the only one.

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Moreover, as often happens in the history of cinema, the discovery of this image happened by accident. 35-year-old director William Friedkin was planning to shoot a police action film in the style of the French New Wave, that is, "like a reportage", with outdoor street shooting, a moving camera, etc.

But Hackman was the last actor Friedkin wanted to see in this role. Surprisingly, for some reason he believed that the main character should be played by Paul Newman, not realizing that it would be, as in the case of Belmondo, "Newman as a cop." In addition, Newman has completely different psychophysical data than Hackman, and now, remembering the film, it is simply impossible to imagine a slightly ironic Hollywood handsome man (remember, for example, "The Sting", where he played together with another Hollywood handsome man Robert Redford) in this role.

Another candidate for the role of "Popeye" (the main character of the film was nicknamed so for his hat) was Steve McQueen, and he was much more suitable for it than Redford. But McQueen, again, was recognizable, and besides, he played a similar role a year earlier in the film "Bullitt" - so he refused himself, not wanting to repeat himself. That is, which rarely happens, the actor turned out to be smarter than the director (as an excuse for Friedkin, we will add - a young director).

But the whole point here is that if this role had been played by a model not of beauty, like Newman, but of stern masculinity, like McQueen, it would have been a repetition of the past. But the fact that the almost insanely passionate (it is not for nothing that at the end of the film, in the pursuit scene, he accidentally shoots at random and hits a colleague) cop was played by Hackman, who looks like an accountant, was a revelation. And the actor, whom Friedkin really did not want to take on the role, received an Oscar for it. As for the excitement, here we must remember that in the car chase scene, which, although more than 50 years have passed since the New York premiere of the film, which took place on October 7, 1971, no one has managed to surpass, Hackman himself was behind the wheel. 

Well, then everything went like clockwork - Hackman starred in many films, in each of which he showed himself to be a true professional, let's be honest - as one of the best actors of the second half of the 20th century in general, and not just in detectives. So if any of the young viewers want to re-watch Hackman's filmography in real life, you can take almost any film, and not just detective ones - he was good in everything, although, of course, cool cops, sheriffs (like in "Unforgiven", for which he received his second "Oscar") and criminals were his best successes.

There is only one caveat to this - Hackman received another portion of fame for his leading role in Francis Ford Coppola's film "The Conversation". But this film, although showered with awards (for example, the Golden Palm at the Cannes Film Festival) and filmed in the detective genre, is actually quite boring, not to say tedious, and Hackman cannot be compared with his "Popeye".

But the whole point is that the release of "The Conversation", where the detective plot is based on electronic eavesdropping, coincided with the Watergate that shook the world. However, Hackman cannot be accused of anything there - he was fulfilling the task that the director gave him.

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