Not necessarily 24 hours of movies

TCM's Summer Under the Stars honors a different actor every day in August, with roughly 24 hours of their work, minus the time between movies, of course. Sometimes, though, when TCM honor an actor, part of the salute is to include a documentary about the star's life. Such is the case today, with Steve McQueen, as TCM is reairing the documentary Steve McQueen: The Essence of Cool, at 1:15 PM ET.

I'm not a huge fan of McQueen, but I recall watching this when it first came out in 2005 and finding it more than competent for those of us who aren't too familiar with McQueen's life. It discusses not only his movie career, but also his life and TV career before becoming a big actor; and some of his personal life -- the marriages, and notably, his interesting in racing cars and motorcycles -- that he maintained even after becoming a star. I don't know how much new there will be for people who are already big fans of Steve McQueen, but I certainly think it's worthwhile.

To be honest, I generally find most of TCM's documentaries worth watching, especially when it's a topic I'm not so familiar with. There's another one coming up on Saturday afternoon about the life of Errol Flynn, which contains a fair bit of footage from his sailing hobby and discusses his early days in Australia; that one is highly recommendable, too.