Superstar, rebel, and movie icon Steve McQueen, was the biggest star in the world. He riveted audiences around the globe with his tough guy persona. A new film captures the life of this multi layered man.
(PRWEB) July 18, 2007 -- Superstar, rebel and movie icon Steve McQueen is back in a new documentary, which introduces the legend to a younger, hipper audience who has forgotten where cool comes from.
In the sixties and early seventies, McQueen was the biggest movie star in the world -- the James Dean of his generation. He riveted audiences around the globe with his tough-guy persona, which consisted of an unlikely combination of willfulness, unpredictability, strength and vulnerability. All of those elements have been brilliantly captured in a new 90-minute documentary called An American Rebel: Steve McQueen.
The film, based on Marshall Terrill's best-selling biography Steve McQueen: Portrait of an American Rebel, was produced and directed by film veteran Richard Martin. Martin was a fellow actor and drinking buddy of McQueen's, whose friendship with the superstar dates back to the 1950s.
"I've either seen or participated in almost every film documentary on Steve McQueen," Terrill said. "This by far is the most definitive and sensitive portrait of 'The King of Cool.' I guarantee if you're a McQueen fan or novice, you'll be mesmerized by the iconic images and riveting footage of McQueen racing his cars and motorcycles."
Narrated by Martin and actress Jacqueline Bisset, who co-starred with McQueen in Bullitt, the documentary traces McQueen's epic life, even though he died at the age of 50. The film traces McQueen's roots to Slater, Missouri, where he was born in 1930 to a teenage runaway alcoholic who abandoned him repeatedly throughout his life, and he never got to know his father. After a stint in reform school and then the United States Marines, McQueen drifted to New York where he fell into acting for "the chicks" and to escape working menial jobs. McQueen did not choose his profession for the love of the craft or to fulfill some high aesthetic deal. And yet he came to master his craft and know the camera like nobody else.
Off camera, McQueen was complex, temperamental and less sympathetic than the characters he portrayed on celluloid. He was a boy from the wrong side of the tracks. He was a loving father and husband. He was a male chauvinist. He was notoriously cheap and tightfisted. He gave generously and anonymously to charity. He was mistrustful to the point of paranoia. He was a loyal friend. He had a weak spot for old people and children. He distrusted men in suits. He was ashamed of his ninth grade education but he outfoxed and outsmarted everyone who crossed his path, including the studio moguls who ran Hollywood.
The documentary captures the 'vibe' of the different cultural trends of which McQueen took part: the beatnik years in New York, his brush with Sinatra's Rat Pack, the go-go years of the Sunset Strip, the flower children generation and the funky seventies. The film's soundtrack features music from the '50s, '60s and '70s.
By the end of the film, a multi-layered image of a man who was far from perfect will emerge. He lived his life looking in the rear view mirror, always on the run.
Jump on it. This will be one helluva ride.
Press kit available on the website: www.AnAmericanRebel.com
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"An American Rebel" Steve McQueen
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