Actor Gene Hackman, his wife, and his dog were found dead in their home last week under mysterious circumstances. As of now, no cause of death has been found.
Gene Hackman was an Academy Award-winning actor who appeared in some of my favorite movies and movie scenes. Looking back at his filmography brought back a lot of memories, so I thought I’d write a blog post in memorium of Mr. Hackman by highlighting some of my favorite Gene Hackman moments.
Hackman won the Best Actor Oscar for his role in The French Connection, where he played Jimmy “Popeye” Doyle, a rough police detective who routinely breaks the rules in an effort to catch criminals, in this case a group of French drug smugglers. Roy Scheider appeared as a detective alongside Hackman in this movie. I couldn’t find a lot of clips from The French Connection, but I found the original movie trailer on YouTube. I’ve never seen it, but I am going to try to check it out soon.
My first memories of watching Gene Hackman in movies was when he played Lex Luthor in the Superman movies. He was a great villain, with a sarcastic and humorous side to him. Here is a scene from the first Superman movie with Christopher Reeve.
JM: Here is Hackman in one of my favorite scenes from Superman II.
JM: Hackman won an Oscar for Best Supporting Actor for playing Sheriff “Little” Bill Daggett, Here are a couple of scenes from the movie, which starred Clint Eastwood.
JM: One of my favorite Hackman roles was him playing FBI agent Rupert Anderson in the movie “Mississippi Burning.” The scene where Anderson confronts Deputy/KKK member/wife beater Clinton Pell is a favorite movie scene of mine….
JM: One of my favorite movies, and definitely my favorite sports movie, is “Hoosiers.” Hackman played coach Norman Dale, who led Hickory High to the state championship in Indiana. The entire movie is fantastic, but I picked out a few scenes that I like…
JM: One of Hackman’s more recent movies was “The Birdcage” with Robin Williams and Nathan Lane. The movie is pretty slow until Hackman shows up and from that moment on it is comedy gold. Here’s a scene from the movie.
JM: I also forgot that Hackman starred with Denzel Washington in “Crimson Tide” as a submarine captain. Another great role….
JM: Hackman played football coach Jimmy McGinty in “The Replacements.” This is my friend Scott’s favorite sports movie. I’ll have to go back and watch it again. I found a few scenes on YouTube. This one shows Hackman trying to recruit a quarterback (played by Keanu Reeves) to come play for him.
You can view Gene Hackman’s complete filmography on his IMDB page. I probably missed some good scenes and some other great roles that he played, but these are the ones I remember most. Rest in peace, Gene Hackman.