Newman is easily one of the greats, a movie of his I really like that often gets overlooked is The Life and Times of Judge Roy Bean.
Another Newman film that gets overlooked, and which I liked a lot, was "Sometimes A Great Notion". I think the UK title for that movie was "Never Give An Inch".
Another facet of Newman that always puzzled the heck out of me is the chasm that invariably existed between his film roles and his known political views. He was an intense left-wing political activist, which would seem to suggest a liking for government authority and its' role in our lives. Yet in every one of his best roles, he portrayed a rebel against any type of authority, government or otherwise.
He won numerous awards, including an Academy Award for best actor for his performance in the 1986 Martin Scorsese film The Color of Money and eight other nominations, six Golden Globe Awards (including three honorary ones), a BAFTA Award, a Screen Actors Guild Award, a Cannes Film Festival Award, an Emmy award, and many honorary awards.
This aspect of Paul Newman's career was a source of huge frustration and disappointment for me. I personally thought Newman was the finest actor in Hollywood and that he should have won the Best Actor award for several movies, including "The Hustler", "Hud", "Cool Hand Luke", "The Sting", "Absence of Malice", "The Verdict" and "Nobody's Fool". Yet the only Best Actor Oscar he won was for the silly "Color of Money", a follow-up to "The Hustler" and a film in which Tom Cruise probably had the starring role.
