Editing Steve McQueen (section)

===1970s===
In 1971, McQueen starred in the auto-racing drama ''[[Le Mans (film)|Le Mans]]'', which received mixed reviews, followed by ''[[Junior Bonner]]'' in 1972, a story about an aging rodeo rider. He collaborated once again with director [[Sam Peckinpah]] in ''[[The Getaway (1972 film)|The Getaway]]'', where he met his future wife [[Ali MacGraw]]. McQueen then took on a physically demanding role as a prisoner on [[Devil's Island]] in the 1973 film ''[[Papillon (1973 film)|Papillon]]'', alongside [[Dustin Hoffman]] as his character's tragic companion.

By the time of ''The Getaway'', McQueen was the world's highest-paid actor.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Barger |first1=Ralph |author-link=Ralph "Sonny" Barger |last2=Zimmerman |first2=Keith |last3=Zimmerman |first3=Kent |title=Ridin' High, Livin' Free: Hell-Raising Motorcycle Stories |date=2003 |publisher=Harper Paperbacks |isbn=978-0-06-000603-7 |page=37 }}</ref>

In 1974, with [[Paul Newman]], McQueen co-led [[John Guillermin]]'s disaster film, ''[[The Towering Inferno]]''. McQueen played a fire chief assigned to stop a fire in a skyscraper. He was originally asked to play the architect who is the other hero of the story, but he requested to play the fire chief, thinking the part was "showier". The role of the architect went to Newman, a part that had more lines, hence McQueen requested more dialogue to even it out. McQueen was paid $1,000,000 plus a percentage of the gross, and he insisted on doing his own stunts. The film was a success, and its North American gross was $55,000,000.<ref>{{Cite web |title=The Towering Inferno (1974) |url=https://catalog.afi.com/Film/54398-THE-TOWERING-INFERNO?cxt=filmography |website=[[AFI Catalog of Feature Films]] |publisher=[[American Film Institute]] |access-date=March 14, 2025 }}</ref>

After this, McQueen disappeared from the public eye to focus on motorcycle racing, traveling around the country in a [[motor home]] and on his vintage [[Indian Motocycle Manufacturing Company|Indian motorcycles]]. He did not return to acting until 1978 with ''[[An Enemy of the People (1978 film)|An Enemy of the People]]'', playing against type as a bearded, bespectacled 19th-century doctor in this adaptation of the [[Henrik Ibsen]] play. The film was never properly released theatrically, but it has appeared occasionally on [[PBS]].

McQueen's final two films, both released in 1980, were loosely based on true stories: ''[[Tom Horn (film)|Tom Horn]]'', a Western adventure about a former Army scout turned professional gunman who works for big cattle ranchers hunting down rustlers, and later hanged for murder in the shooting death of a sheepherder; and ''[[The Hunter (1980 film)|The Hunter]]'', an urban action movie about a modern-day [[bounty hunter]].