Cool isn't a leather jacket and shades...it's wrinkles,creases and a generous sized pair of ears

If you asked me who defines the word cool, I wouldn't have to think very long and hard on my answer. The answer is a man who is now 85 and still has yet to reach his prime. Cool is not an image or a way of walking or keeping up with the current fads and fleeting trends. Cool is someone who walks to their own inner rhythm and beat, cool is someone who can make a film memorable by just being in it for 5 minutes.
Cool is a man who at 60 years of age decided to add singer / songwriter and musician to his already impressive CV by co writing and singing on the classic Ry Cooder song 'Across the borderline'.... his warm weather beaten vocals adding a gentle yet powerful backbone to an amazing song.
The man in question is Harry Dean Stanton, an actor who first grabbed my attention without me even realising how in films of such caliber as 'Alien', 'Repo Man' and 'Paris Texas'.He is blessed with a face that looks like it's bore witness to a thousand lifetimes, at times world weary,quietly amused or deeply sad. He is the owner of the original hangdog expression, jaded yet resigned to the hand that fate has dealt. His eyes betray glimpses of a sad smile.
Nowhere is this more evident than in the swirling emotional dustbowl of  modern cinema that is 'Paris Texas'. As the haunted amnesiac he carries the story of a man who forgot his life,slowly leading up to a powerful endgame of total recall, love, redemption and forgiveness. In somebody else's hands this character could have been ruined by trying to convey feelings through ticks and mannerisms, but not Harry Dean Stanton. He is a virtual emotional blank slate until the time of his recollection of his life which is told in a matter of fact way as a man recounting a fable to a child. I haven't seen the film fully in almost 15 years but i can still remember it vivdly, such was the power of his performance.
Later on in his career he became a staple of many a David Lynch film. Kindred spirits maybe? Both bear the outside appearence of good old down homey Americana from a bygone age, but viewed through a glass darkly.
Nowhere is Harry Deans bubbling undercurrent of menace more prevelant than as the Mormon Sect leader in the fantastic HBO series 'Big Love'. You wouldn't want to cross him.
To see if you agree about my opinion of this quiet giant of an actor I recommend the following films/tv shows to show the diversity of character he can display:

PRETTY IN PINK
PARIS,TEXAS
REPO MAN
WILD AT HEART
THE GREEN MILE
BIG LOVE -TV SERIES

He's no vest on....it's Charlton Heston !!!!!

Mr Willis, stay at home and polish your head.

Arnholt ...don't come back.

Eastwood try wearing spectacles it might cure your squint.

For me there was only one real manly man action hero....drum roll please.....brrrrrrrrrrr  klunk......laydeeeees 'n' gennlemen I give you the hero of times past and apocalyptic futures....... Charlton Heston!!
Who else led Gods chosen people out of Egypt? Raced chariots in Rome? Still found time to show off his impressive chest rug whilst battling viral vampires as the last man on Earth? Or fought against a society that was turning humans into tasty blocks of green? He was truly the action icon of the 20th century.
He made safari jackets and cigars look cool, even his affected slightly crazy cackle of a laugh in 'The Omega Man' was something an impressionable youth knew would sound silly and slightly sad coming from anyone else but Mr Heston.
Yes he didnt emote much past a guttaral growl or sardonic smile ....but he had great big hairy gravitas.
For me the film that made me become a follower and believer in all things Heston was when I first encountered the simian wonder of 'Planet Of The Apes'. I couldn't believe my eyes and ears when even as he was bound and semi naked ( I think there was a bare torso clause in his contract ) by his gorilla captors he was able to defiantly look them in the eyes and utter the immortal line '....damn dirty ape!' .....he just had no fear.....he knew he was THE MAN and knew they would eventually know he was THE MAN.This was a man who was not afraid of a bit of interspecies flirtation....hey any port in a storm.
Mr Heston you complete me....you made the Bible exciting to me and taught me that if you do start to lose your hair ...it doesn't matter just show them the chest rug....they'll soon forget about failing head hair follicles.
You de man.

Welcome ,wave and Waits.

Ooooooookay so this is my first post. Welcome, velkum, hola, gunten tag and flibble. 
I think for my first blog I will praise the deity of musical perfection that is Tom (whisky soaked tonsils coated with a lining of cancerous razor blades) Waits.

Admittedly He is an acquired taste, but like Pringles once you pop and bop to Mr Waits you just can't stop. From his downtrodden beat poet/bum image to the savage yet tender love stories of an America that exists on the back of a packet of cheap cigarettes  and abandoned whisky bottles. His music encompasses all the vaudville splendour of carny style honkytonk blues laced with an under shot of fast and loose be bop jazz whilst treading on the toes of Mr Avant and Mizz Garde.Why use traditional instruments when a much better racket can scream out of discarded rubbish and a dischordant megaphone.Please take time to sample at leat 4 of his albums, from his early days as a bar propping troubadour on 'Closing Time' to the Captain beefheart infused skeleton bones rattle of' 'Rain Dogs', the Nine Inch Nails meets gospel cocktail that is' Bone Machine' and finally resting at the feet of his latest and greatest work 'Bad As Me'.