Wednesday, May 20, 2009

Man on the Edge

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Yesterday's Loner, the Film Society of Lincoln Center's 12-film Steve McQueen festival, opens today at the Walter Reade Theater. Even when we lived in New York, Lincoln Center seemed as far away from Brooklyn as it does now from Seattle, but many of the films in the festival are on DVD, and the list provides a good study guide for packing the queue with McQueen classics:
-Bullitt
-The Cincinnati Kid

-An Enemy of the People

-The Getaway

-The Great Escape

-Love with the Proper Stranger

-The Magnificent Seven

-Nevada Smith
-Papillon
-The Sand Pebbles

-The Thomas Crown Affair

-The Towering Inferno
Of course the big screen is always better though, and if you're at the actual festival (as opposed to the homemade one in your living room), an added bonus is that a number of guests will be on hand to introduce the films: Candice Bergen for The Sand Pebbles, David Forster for The Getaway, Norman Jewison for both The Cincinnati Kid and The Thomas Crown Affair, Robert Vaughn for The Magnificent Seven, and more. Click here for more info.

While we're at it, some stills and other photos to round it out:

McQueen at the California Junior Boys Republic reformatory in Chino Hills, 1963. He credited the school with turning his life around when he was a juvenile petty thief, and would often return to visit and hang out with the kids.
McQueen's first wife, Neile Adams, was born in Manila and spent 18 months during the war imprisoned in a Japanese POW camp in the Philippines.
McQueen with his cat, "Kitty Kat"
McQueen with Natalie Wood
With Peggy Moffatt in front of McQueen's 1963 Ferrari GT Berlinetta Lusso. Photo by William Claxton
Steve McQueen and Tuesday Weld
McQueen with Ann Margret and Tuesday Weld
McQueen with Faye Dunaway and Norman Jewison on the set of The Thomas Crown Affair
Steve McQueen and Jacqueline Bisset in Bullitt
McQueen on set with Ali McGraw (who would become his second wife) and Sam Peckinpah

McQueen on the covers of Harper's Bazaar (photo by Richard Avedon) and Sports Illustrated



Click here for more info on the festival .
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2 comments:

SKL said...

The coolest, and the hottest.

Unknown said...

Another incredibly cool Steve McQueen movie is the documentary "On Any Sunday," which is about dirt bike racing in the 60s, starring McQueen and Malcolm Smith, who was a champion racer and McQueen's good friend. It's an awesome movie.

Also, for a very short time, when I was a child, my father owned a Berlinetta Lusso. Very beautiful.