Jim Jarmusch

The Leopard has been having a home movie festival lately of films of Jim Jarmusch! His first theatrical film “Stranger Than Paradise” is the one that catapulted him as a major new indie talent was way back in 1984, but still holds up well today. Since then, he’s been fairly consistent with each successive film and incredibly original, each beautifully made and undeniably the work of a singular artist. Favorites: Paradise, Down By Law (1984), Night On Earth (1991), Dead Man (1995), Ghost Dog : The Way Of the Samurai (1991), Limits of Control (2009) and Only Lovers Left Alive (2013). Go check out his work. Great stuff.

Bogie

Before there was Harrison Ford, before Mel Gibson and Arnold Schwarzenegger, even before Sean Connery, there was Bogie, the greatest of them all. the prototype, the true star. No one was better than Humphrey Bogart at balancing sheer masculinity with stirring sensitivity. The Leopard's favorite Bogie performances - Dixon Steele in A Lonely Place, Sam Spade in The Maltese Falcon,  Fred C. Hobbs in The Treasure of the Sierra Madre -- all featured tough, weathered men who always had a  certain vulnerability.

Bogart's best known role - Rick Blaine in Casablanca -- showed this unique talent most eloquently. He was a man's man and a woman's man at the same time. Something that very few actors have been able to achieve -- and he did this without conventional movie star good looks. He didn't look like Montgomery Clift, Gregory Peck or Cary Grant.  He didn't have to. His beautiful, sad, face was all he needed.