AFI Will Pay Tribute to Harrison Ford’s Life of Action

He has been a dominant presence on the big screen for a generation, a ruggedly handsome icon of Hollywood’s action genre whose film characterizations have become pop culture symbols, from the arrogant yet good-humored Han Solo in “Star Wars” to the swashbuckling archeologist hero in the “Indiana Jones” trilogy.

But on Monday, actor Harrison Ford was nearly tongue-tied.

One of Hollywood’s leading men, he had just learned that he had become the 28th recipient of the American Film Institute’s life achievement award--considered among the highest honors that the industry bestows for a career in film. Past winners have included Dustin Hoffman, Clint Eastwood, James Cagney, Bette Davis, Alfred Hitchcock, James Stewart, Jack Nicholson and John Ford.

“I’m surprised and honored and very flattered by it all,” Ford said in a telephone interview. “Unfortunately, [the award ceremony] is four months away, plenty of time to worry about it. . . . Public speaking is certainly not one of my strengths.”

Ford, who is in Los Angeles filming director Robert Zemeckis’ “What Lies Beneath,” co-starring Michelle Pfeiffer, will be feted Feb. 17 at the Beverly Hilton Hotel in Beverly Hills. CBS will broadcast the event later in the spring.

For the 57-year-old Chicago-born actor, who earned an Oscar nomination for the 1985 film “Witness” but never won an Academy Award, the AFI award is a crowning achievement in a career that, even he admits, took plenty of luck.

“I was working my way up without a lot of background in theater or film, trying desperately to do good work and get work--and not always successful at either,” the onetime carpenter recalled. “In my case, there was a lot of luck involved. . . . Really, the things that brought me success were other people’s successes, not mine. I’ve always given credit to them for that.”

Among those he singled out were producer Fred Roos, who cast him in George Lucas’ “American Graffiti” and Francis Ford Coppola’s “The Conversation.”

Any others, he was asked? “George Lucas, of course,” Ford noted, then added with a soft laugh, “I’d credit Steven [Spielberg], but what good would it do?”

Although his roles in “Star Wars” and “Raiders of the Lost Ark” made him a box-office superstar, Ford has become familiar as Jack Ryan in “Patriot Games” and “Clear and Present Danger,” a doctor wrongly accused of murdering his wife in “The Fugitive” and as a president whose plane has been hijacked in “Air Force One.”

“It is fitting that AFI begin the new millennium by honoring Harrison Ford--the most popularly acclaimed actor of our day,” AFI Chairman Tom Pollock said.

But Ford conceded his films have not always met with critical acclaim. His most recent film, “Random Hearts,” received mostly scathing reviews, although Ford was praised for his performance.

“There have been films they like and films they don’t like,” he said. “I can’t say I’ve ever been the darling of the critics.”