Real Movie Men: Steve McQueen

Male actors today are largely glorified for their ability to be a chameleon. They tap into their sensitive sides and pull a female audience because of their ability to simulate emotion.

This was not always the case.

Badass

In the past, the male movie stars didn’t play a role as much as they were just being themselves. Guys whose idea of breakfast was a shot of Jack as a strange woman searched for her underwear. Men who would smoke a cigarette in between throwing punches. Their presence on screen would provide enough testosterone to guarantee that all viewers would walk out of the theater with a few extra chest hairs and their voice an octave deeper. These were real men in movies. People for guys to emulate.

A prime example of this is Steve McQueen.

For those of you who are unaware, McQueen was one of the biggest drawing movie stars in the world in the 1970’s. He got his first big break opposite a giant pink ball of sexual lubricant in 1958’s The Blob. His next huge break was in 1963 as “The Cooler King” Hilts in The Great Escape. In the movie he earned the nickname “Cooler King” by constantly showing up at parties with a cooler full of beer and a dog with sunglasses.

Now that I think of it, that might not be correct. I’ll have to re-watch it.

McQueen was nominated for an Academy Award for his role in the 1966 film The Sand Pebbles. In all seriousness, if you have not seen this, go find it. It’s long, but VERY good. After that he did such iconic films as The Thomas Crown Affair, Bullitt, Papillion and The Towering Inferno.

It has been reported that on August 8th 1969, the night of the Manson murders,? McQueen was invited to Sharon Tate’s home. But, while on his way, he stopped to pick-up a random girl he spotted walking down the street. Maybe one of the few people in history that can say infidelity saved his life.

When McQueen wasn’t bedding down women half his age, he was racing.

Proficient in both cars and motorcycles, one could say that he had motor oil (and perhaps a few STD’s) in his blood. As often as the studios would allow it, he would preform his own stunts. In the case of Bullitt, the studio told him no on any stunt. But in typical bad-ass McQueen fashion, he just went ahead anyway. Preforming much of the now classic car race through the streets of San Fransisco.

McQueen died in 1980 of cancer, believed to have been from asbestos exposure from the equipment he was around in the Navy and in the fire-resistant suits he wore when racing. He was a hard drinking, chain smoking kind of guy. He was rude, paranoid and cheap (reportedly the man never pick-up a check in his life). Despite these flaws, woman flocked to him in droves and he rarely said no.

Today we have Jude Law, James McAvoy and Leonardo Dicaprio, guys that look like they struggle opening an envelope. At least we still have the movies of Steve McQueen, a real movie man.