AFI Life Achievement Award: A Tribute to Sean Connery (2006) DVD-R

Starring Michael Caine, Harrison Ford, Tippi Hedren, George Lucas
Directed by Louis J. Horvitz
Print: Color
Runtime: 60 min
Genre: Documentary

In a world of instant celebrity and disposable heroes, there are precious few enduring stars. Sean Connery is one of them. From the moment he captured secret agent 007 on film, Connery has come to stand for virility, tinged with just enough wit and intelligence to make us believe that such men really do exist.

In the forty years since bringing Bond to life, Connery has reinterpreted what it means to be a leading man in roles as varied as a turn-of-the-century British adventurer, an aging Robin Hood, a chivalrous Arab sheik, an insubordinate British army trooper and a 14th century monk. His performance as street-smart Chicago cop Malone in THE UNTOUCHABLES won the Best Supporting Actor Academy Award in 1987.

What all those characters share is that indefinable quality that is pure Connery. His larger than life presence is the anchor that tethers a fantasy world and makes us believe. Never one to overanalyze in print, he came close to explaining the magic in an interview with The New York Times’s Benedict Nightingale. “My strength as an actor is that I’ve stayed close to the core of myself, which has something to do with a voice, a music, a tune that is very much tied up with my background.” He credits another independent Celt who refused to curb his accent, Richard Burton, as inspiration.