Others can and probably will comment about his other roles in much greater detail than I am capable of, but for me Falk's signature role is obviously Columbo.
He was the premiere personification of the unassuming detective who always managed to get the culprit in the end. Presenting exactly the image he wanted you to see while subtly amassing the evidence to put the villain away.
The way Hollywood operates, someday someone is going to have the bright idea of trying to revive the Columbo concept. When they do, they will have to search far and wide in hopes of finding just the right actor for the lead role because Peter Falk, metaphorically, left a might big rumpled raincoat to fill.
To get away from Columbo a bit, I remember Peter Falk's scene-stealing role in It's a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World, as a cabbie who gets caught up in the mayhem near the finish, when all the folks chasing after the hidden money are in the park. It takes some doing to hold your own on the screen around the likes of Spencer Tracy, Milton Berle, Ethel Merman, Sid Caesar, Mickey Rooney, Buddy Hackett, Jonathan Winters and Phil Silvers!
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Seriously?
What a crappy, frickin' day.
Damn.
Good one.
And Max in The Great Race.
First Gene Colan and now Peter Falk?
Geez...
Others can and probably will comment about his other roles in much greater detail than I am capable of, but for me Falk's signature role is obviously Columbo.
He was the premiere personification of the unassuming detective who always managed to get the culprit in the end. Presenting exactly the image he wanted you to see while subtly amassing the evidence to put the villain away.
The way Hollywood operates, someday someone is going to have the bright idea of trying to revive the Columbo concept. When they do, they will have to search far and wide in hopes of finding just the right actor for the lead role because Peter Falk, metaphorically, left a might big rumpled raincoat to fill.
I remember him best, movie-wise, as Nick Diamond in Murder By Death. "I was in disguise-in disguised-in disguised!"
If anyone tricked their way into heaven and think they got away with it, watch out!