Wednesday, January 14, 2009

Ricardo Montalban (1920-2009)


This is a sad day for pop culture historians, with Montalban following McGoohan so closely into the grave. MSN's homepage, as might have been guessed, identifies Montalban with "Mr. Roarke," and many people will remember him that way, while others may recall him primarily as "Khan!!!" Others still, hopefully not just older folks, may recall a decent run of roles he had at MGM in the late 1940s, from the bullfighter's son who'd rather be a concert pianist in the eccentric Fiesta to the grunt fighting alongside the late Van Johnson in William Wellman's Battleground to the Mexican cop going undercover as an illegal immigrant in Anthony Mann's tough gem Border Incident. And others yet will be able to cite more than I can, while another cohort altogether may know him mostly as the guy in the flying wheelchair in that one Spy Kids movie. Combine all these accounts and you have a persistent and diverse career that transcended the "Latin Lover" stereotype that prevailed when he was breaking in. The more of his older films I see, the better I like the man's work. I hope Turner Classic Movies gives us an opportunity soon to see more.

4 comments:

hobbyfan said...

I wonder if his grave will have a lining of rich, Corinthian leather. Just kidding. Although those car commercials could turn up in news reports.....

Anonymous said...

Rumour has it that he wishes to be buried in his Cordoba.

Samuel Wilson said...

It just goes to show the diversity of the man's work, but I honestly didn't think that people would remember the car bit above everything else!

hobbyfan said...

"Everything else" has been played up in all the news accounts, like Fantasy Island, Star Trek II, The Naked Gun, etc., although I think he might want to leave the 1973 Wonder Woman TV-movie off his resume.