Steve McQueen
 

A few nights ago I watched a classic on tv - The Getaway - with McQueen and his future wife Ali McGraw. What a great movie.

What McQueen movie, or TV show, is your favorite and why? I have 3 in the top 10: Bullitt, Papillion, and The Magnificent Seven. I'll pick The Magnificent Seven because of story line and gun fights.

Nevada Smith, because I remember seeing it in a theater with my parents when it first came out and I was 7 years old.

Nevada Smith is a great movie - can't argue that. The persona he has in that movie reminds me of his character in Tom Horn, which is another great movie.

Bullitt is my fav made me a fan of chase scenes. The Thomas Crown Affair is up there as well.

Steve McQueen was the king of cool.

Thomas Crown Affair & The Getaway both great movies.

Along with those mentioned I'd add The Great Escape and Tom Horn.

Papillon
The Great Escape
The Sand Pebbles

The fire Chief in The Towering Inferno

loved all his movies but especially the Great Escape

Love the Classics

The Blob, of course

The Cincinnati Kid hands down

If you have some time to kill, search youtube and find the pretty cool video where a guy 're-enacts' the famous Bullitt chase scene sequence by contemporarily driving the same route taken in the film. Fascinating. Love stuff like that!!


ETA: not sure if this is the one I was thinking of, but it does the job...
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nhSDAxgLgho&t=85s


ETAA (edited to also add): look how many times that same frickin' green Volkswagen Bug (Beetle) appears as an 'extra' during the car chase. That sucker gets around!!! :D

Attachment 580070

Attachment 580071

Honorable mention for LeMans.

We didn't know it but growing up with idols like McQueen, Eastwood, Bronson, Knievel, etc was pretty cool. I think the difference from today is these guys were working class just like us, and accessible. I took a piss with Knievel at a bar and had dinner at a local restaurant with Eastwood in the next booth over, nbd, just folks living their lives. It's not like that anymore, too bad.

Only because I've not seen it mentioned above - Excellent supporting role in the 1959 Frank Sinatra vehicle - "Never So Few" as Ringa, Sinatra's right hand guy.

Great line: "Execute the hostages Ringa"

And you get Gina Lollobrigida too, who Bogart once mentioned after working with her on a noir spoof - "She makes Marilyn Monroe look like Shirley Temple."

Long movie that drags a little in spots, but an old fav.

personal lineup of favs to my top one -

5. The Cincinnati Kid
4. LeMans
3. The Magnificent Seven
2. Bullitt
1. The Great Escape

"The Getaway" and "Tom Horn" are the two I have the fondest memories of.

I remember "Tom Horn" being somewhat of a strange Western and was very young when I first saw it. I always knew he was sick while making it, and there was just something very haunting about it.

It was very much an Anti-Spaghetti Western. It didn't have much fanfare when it came out, but I think it was a precursor to a lot of the more naturalistic Westerns that came later...including Clint Eastwoods move to a more realism based approach to the art form.

By the way, here's my favorite "card" of him. It's from a German or Austrian Race Car Driver set of the era. Likely a reference to the LeMans movie he made, and his being a huge fan and participant of the racing circuit.

Pretty cool they thought highly enough of him to put him in the same set as Andretti, Fittipaldi, Jackie Stewart, Dan Gurney, Jack Brabham and others.

Issued sometime in the early 70's. He's the only "celebrity" in the set.

As mentioned by some fellow 54`ers, no doubt, " The Cinncy Kid".

Since there seems to be a lot of McQueen vans, how about some of his TV appearances - I want to be the first to claim Josh Randall - Wanted, Dead or Alive!