feeling listless

People My Mum is a particularly picky film watcher. Apart from our ongoing argument about whether any film should have flashbacks ('I just don't see why they can't have a beginning, middle and an end' she'll say -- can't wait to show her 'Momento'), there are some genre she won't watch. But in the same way there are certain actors which I know will make something a must see film. Gene Hackman is one of these. Now I've never been too much of a Hackman fan. Frankly he mugs his way through Superman and I just wanted to be looking elsewhere during 'Get Shorty'. Oh and during 'Crimson Tide', there is something distinctly irritating about his neck. But I know why my Mum likes him. It's his choice of films. As Fame Tracker points out he's made nearly eighty films and only very few of them have been awful. Which is odd because he's a stallwart -- never actually famous but never out of work: "In fact, rather than shunning subsidiary roles, he's embraced the providence of the stalwart -- the soldier, the senator, the coach, the cop. Of course, it helps that he can play these parts better than anyone else out there; there are few thrills in modern cinema more satisfying than the sight of Gene Hackman losing his temper."