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Canadian actor who had a decade of Hollywood success playing anti-heroes

The Canadian-born actor Michael Sarrazin, who has died of cancer aged 70, was so visible in Hollywood movies from 1967 to 1977 that one may wonder what happened to his subsequent career. A facetious answer might be that he moved back to Canada and made Canadian movies. Another answer might be that his sensitive, gently rebellious, flower-child persona and his lanky, boyish looks, with his long hair and soulful eyes, were no longer appropriate to the roles he took as he got older.

However, during the decade of his stardom, Sarrazin seemed to fit the anti-hero ethos of the era, often playing rootless characters, typically in his most celebrated role as the ex-farmboy drifter in Sydney Pollack's They Shoot Horses, Don't They? (1969). Sarrazin, idealistically willing to let fate take a hand, is paired with an embittered Jane Fonda in a dance...

Actor Michael Sarrazin, whose roles in the genre have ranged from The Creature in the 1973 TV movie "Frankenstein: The True Story" to a small supporting part in FeardotCom, has passed away in Montreal after a brief battle with cancer. He was 70.

Aside from the aforementioned appearances, along with a few more on TV's "The Outer Limits" and "Poltergeist: The Legacy", Sarrazin was best known (and beloved) by horror fans for his portrayal of the titular character in director J. Lee Thompson's 1975 classic The Reincarnation of Peter Proud. In the non-genre realm, Sarrazin's greatest acclaim came for his performance opposite Jane Fonda in Sydney Pollack's Depression era-set They Shoot Horses, Don't They?.

Sarrazin was born Jacques Michel André Sarrazin in Quebec City in 1940. "Michael was one of the most talented, generous and committed actors I have ever worked with," George Mihalka, who directed Sarrazin in 1993's La Florida, told the Montreal Gazette.