I consider myself a movie fan, but its only been over the last few years that I’ve really become passionate about movies. Something I have always known though is that Alan Rickman was a fantastic actor, and today it was announced that he’s passed away.

The first thing I saw him in was Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves as the Sheriff of Nottingham. Rickman really stole the show with his performance. It’s been a long time since I saw it and the first time I saw it I was only young, but I remember not being able to take my eyes off of him when he was on screen.

Then I saw Die Hard. Now at the time I didn’t realise that it was the same actor but I really remember the cool way he played the role of Hans Gruber and especially how he slipped from being this nasty piece of work to faking being an american when John McClane stumbles across him while Gruber is unarmed.

The next role I’ll remember him for is as Serverus Snape in the Harry Potter films. Throughout these eight movies I think we saw Rickman pull off what has become an iconic performance. From the really heart wrenching parts of his performance to his grumpy school master performance I think its such an amazing performance especially when you get to that final film.

The movie I will remember him mainly, and most fondly, for though will be Kevin Smith’s Dogma. Rickman played the Metatron. If I remember rightly he was basically an angle who was the voice of God (because if God spoke to anyone mortal their heads would explode). Rickman in Dogma is at his snarky best. He throws off ones liners like there’s not tomorrow. He does tender and caring as good as he did the snark. I think Dogma is a film where he could see how much fun it was going to be and just threw himself into it and you can see that in his performance.

Alan Rickman was a great actor, and from f what I’ve heard, he was a great person as well. My thoughts go out to his family and loved ones. I, like countless others, only knew him from what we saw when he was doing what he clearly loved; and for that I just want to say thank you Mr. Rickman, you gave us some iconic characters and you will live on through them.

Rest In Peace Alan Rickman