Gene Hackman RIP

I was sad to hear of the passing of actor Gene Hackman this week and even more so when I learned he was 95 years old. I really didn't know he was still around. He apparently retired in 2004 and moved from Hollywood to Santa Fe, New Mexico where he spent the last twenty years with his wife and writing novels. There were lots of stories about him on the news programs over the past few days.

Just recently we watched one of my favorite movies, The Bird Cage, where he played the right wing conservative senator father of the bride-to-be of the son of the gay couple. I loved when the senator leaves the gay club dressed in drag at the end of the movie.

He certainly was in a lot of good movies. I was recently updated my film lists on the online app Letterboxd and of course I checked on the movies of Gene Hackman. He was in 118 films. These are some of my favorites in no particular order.

• The Conversation, 1974
• The French Connection, 1971
• Bonnie & Clyde, 1967
• Unforgiven, 1992
• Superman, 1978
• The Bird Cage, 1996
• Young Frankenstein, 1974
• The Royal Tenenbaums, 2001
• Reds, 1981
• Get Shorty, 1995
• Hoosiers, 1986
• Enemy of the State, 1998

And so many more